北山錄 2.2.4

2.2.4

he proclaimed himself an omniscient person and was just about to establish himself as a grand master when the dragon Anavatapta led him into his palace and showed him the secret treasuries [vast as] sands of dust. Ashamed of the offense he had incurred, he temporarily recited them in the dragon palace for ninety days, deeply regretting what he had claimed. (Nāgārjuna was originally a brahmin from Southern Tianzhu. He recited the four Vedas and thereupon entered the royal palace. Disgusted with desire, he went forth from the household. Having recited all the scriptures and treatises, he resented that the scriptures spoken by the Buddha were not numerous. Later, the dragon king invited him into his palace, where he spent ninety days; yet he could not finish marking the scripture titles. Deeply regretting his mistaken words, he attained comprehensive understanding and composed the *Treatise on the Great Perfection of Wisdom* in one hundred thousand gāthās. In Tianzhu, shrines were erected to revere him like a Buddha.) What he had memorized and practiced was partly obtained by the human realm; from this he broadly composed various treatises, greatly upholding the earlier teachings. (Greatly means vastly; it means he was greatly able to propagate and maintain the teachings of the ancient sages.) Down to one thousand years [after the nirvāṇa], Vasubandhu initially studied the Hīnayāna and frequently wished to disparage the Mahāyāna. His elder brother Asaṅga pitied him; feigning illness, he sent for him to come, and instructed him thoroughly with subtle words. Vasubandhu withdrew, examined his fault, and was startled. Taking up a knife himself, he was about to cut off his tongue. Asaṅga quickly came before him, stopped him, and said, "The offense comes from your mind, not from the fault of your tongue. Formerly you used it to defame [the Mahāyāna]; now why not use it to praise it? (Why not means why don't you.) What would cutting it off make up for?" Thereupon he composed a thousand treatises, either establishing doctrines or explaining texts, to assist and support the five vehicles. (Bodhisattva Vasubandhu was a native of the kingdom of Puruṣapura in Northern Tianzhu. The three brothers all went forth from the household under the Sarvāstivāda school. The elder brother Asaṅga first awoke to the Mahāyāna; he frequently went to Tuṣita to request Maitreya to explain the *Yogācārabhūmi*. When Vasubandhu was in the Sarvāstivāda school, he first composed five hundred Hīnayāna treatises broadly refuting the Mahāyāna. Later, due to Asaṅga converting him, having awakened to the Mahāyāna, he then conversely composed five hundred Mahāyāna treatises broadly praising the Mahāyāna; therefore he is called the master of a thousand treatises.) In the generation of Zheng of Qin, (The First Emperor of Qin. Surnamed Ying, named Zheng, courtesy name Zulong. Son of King Zhuangxiang of Qin. He absorbed the six states, built the Great Wall of Ten Thousand Li, and ordered fangshi practitioners to enter the sea and go to Penglai to seek the elixir of immortality.) eighteen śramaṇas arrived from the Western Regions. (Refers to eighteen people including Śrīmitra and others.) That violent Ying was just then occupied with all under heaven and had no leisure for the Great Way. (Had no leisure means having no time to practice the Great Way.) Resenting our virtuous ones, he imprisoned the śramaṇas within multi-layered walls, whereupon a vajrapāṇi spirit exerted his might and struck the walls. (The First Emperor merely submitted, bowed, and apologized, and the men of the Way returned back to the western countries.) Indeed, Qin's relation to our Way was like a stone not being soaked by water. That the gate of the incurable allows no medicine to take effect lies precisely here! (Qin was just then without the Way. Converting them with goodness thus did not accord. Duke Jing of Jin was ill and sought a physician from Qin. He dreamed that the disease transformed into two young boys, who said, "He is a good physician; I fear he will harm us." One said, "If we dwell above the huang and below the gao, what can he do to us?" When the physician arrived, he said, "The disease cannot be cured." Now the violent wickedness of Qin could not be converted with goodness, like an incurable disease.) Although the śramaṇas of that time were not appreciated in Qin and were even interrogated, they truly provided a basis for what followed. (Although Śrīmitra and the others did not meet with recognition in Qin and were moreover imprisoned, it was because Qin was violent and would not receive goodness; it also served as the cause for [She] Moteng and [Zhu] Falan.) The perilous and easy dispositions of the human mind are separated by mountains and rivers; that later arrivals were truly fortunate was because Śrīmitra and the others had tasted it first. Had they not sought them, they would not have arrived. (Tasted means tried out. Because Śrīmitra and the others first tried coming, although Qin did not accept them, later Tripiṭaka masters fortunately came to know of this matter; thus if Cai Yin had not sent men to seek and invite them, they would not have reached here.) In the seventh year of the Yongping reign of the Han, a xinmao year, (Calculating by the calendar, it should be jiazi; the present xinmao is an error.) Xianzong dreamed of a golden man (Xianzong refers to the second ruler of the Later Han, Emperor Ming. Named Zhuang, son of Guangwu, born of Empress Yin.) wearing sunlight at the nape of his neck, flying in the palace courtyard. Thereupon he put on his robes at night to wait for dawn. (To wait means to await. Dreaming at night of a golden man with light on his body, he thereupon sat to await dawn.) He summoned the assembly of ministers to inquire of it, and Fu Yi replied, "This is the Buddha spirit." (At that time Wang Zun, Fu Yi, and others memorialized: "In the twenty-fourth year of King Zhao of the Zhou, Grand Scribe Su You said: 'The Buddha will be born in the western countries; after one thousand years his voice and teachings will flow here.' Now over a thousand years have passed, and it must be that the Buddha spirit has arrived.") He ordered Cai Yin and Qin Jing to bear the command and seek the subject of his dream. (Thereupon he dispatched Cai Yin and others, eighteen men in all, to go to the western countries to seek it.) Reaching the Da Yuezhi, they met with She Moteng and Zhu Falan. (Reaching the kingdom of Yuezhi, they met two Tripiṭaka masters: one surnamed Kasyapa named Moteng, and one surnamed Zhu named Falan.) Those two gentlemen had long harbored the aspiration for distant travels to rescue the world; having obtained Qin and Cai, their purposes joined. (Qin Jing and the others met the two Tripiṭaka masters in Yuezhi, sought and invited them, and returned to the Han state.) In the tenth year, a jiawu year, (The original text had dingmao; jiawu is an error.) the Han envoys arrived from the Western Regions, and the two śramaṇas entered Luoyang. (At that time the Later Han had its capital in Luoyang.) They presented images of Śākyamuni and various scriptures; thereupon a monastery was first founded in the city of Luoyang (When the Tripiṭaka masters first arrived, they lodged at the Honglu Court. Because they came with scriptures packed on white horses, it was thereupon called the White Horse Monastery. In Sanskrit it is saṅghārāma, rendered here as 'community park', meaning a place where the Way is practiced.) and images were made at the Qingliang Terrace of the Southern Palace and above the Kaiguang Gate at the Xianjie Tomb. (They made painted images in all these places.) The translation of the scriptures was first commanded, with the *Scripture in Forty-Two Sections* placed at their head. (The two Tripiṭaka masters, Moteng and the other, first translated one fascicle of scripture, entitled the *Scripture in Forty-Two Sections*.) They were sealed in the Orchid Terrace and the Stone Chamber, awaiting those who could hear to hear them. How august! (The Orchid Terrace and Stone Chamber were the secret imperial archives for storing books in the Han. 'Yu' is an exclamation of sighing; 'mu' means reverent.) When the sacred teaching relates to the times, it may be accorded with, but not forced: when accorded with, it enriches things; (Enriches means soaks; refers to coming in the era of Emperor Ming of the Han.) when forced, it harms things. (Like coming in the Qin era, harming and sickening them.) Therefore, without supreme wisdom, one cannot perceive the way of drawing and leading. As people have also said: What era was Yongping, and what virtue had Emperor Ming of the Han? For the primordial simplicity was gradually deteriorating, and benevolence and righteousness were gradually falling into disuse; the Way, its virtue, and the Five Classics were about to fall to the ground. (From the time of Yongping, morality had already worn thin and written records were about to fall into ruin; this speaks of the extreme deterioration of the world.) Yet compassionate operations were devised from afar, and the teaching of the Śākya broadly spread, causing those of this land who had grown weary of what they had previously practiced to rejoice in what they newly heard. (The Buddha-dharma came in a declining and shallow age, causing those who were tired of benevolence, righteousness, rites, and music to rejoice in its new teaching.)