集沙門不應拜俗等事 4.48

4.48

Next: The imperial edict states, 'The Song dynasty temporarily reformed this practice, but shortly returned to the old custom.' Since the Buddhadharma flowed eastward for more than six hundred years, imperial dynasties have succeeded one another, approaching a hundred kings. None did not venerate and honor the Buddhadharma and plant merit in the monastic field. Therefore, dyeing their robes and shaving their hair, they match the demeanor of the Buddhas; severing ties with parents and relinquishing glory, they differ from the attachments of the multitude. Gods and dragons venerate them, calling them fields of merit. Therefore the Buddha said to Gautamī: 'Do not make offerings to me; you should make offerings to the Saṃgha.' These are the truthful words of the Great Sage, and in principle cannot be discarded. If the Buddha's words could be discarded, we request that [the Saṃgha] be entirely abolished. How could it be permissible to retain them to seek their merit, while humiliating them and demanding that they perform bowing rites? We humbly consider that Emperor Wen, Taizong, reached everywhere in holy wisdom, and subdued all through divine awe. At that time, was it not easy to order the monastic assembly to kneel and bow? It was because the Buddhadharma is worthy of veneration, fostering their capacity for goodness, and because he was ashamed of delighting in strangeness, which would leave traces of disturbing the regular norms, that he did not do so. We only wish that nearby we follow the way of holy transformation of the previous court, and from afar discard the frontier methods of the Jin and Song dynasties. Then ten thousand ages will find nothing strange, and both monastics and laity will be at peace in their minds.