經律異相 20.17

20.17

佛在舍衛國。有異比丘。日至城外曠野塜間路。由他田乃得達彼。其主見已便興瞋恚。此何道士。日往來不修道德。即問道人。汝何乞士。在吾田中縱橫往來。乃成人蹤。道人報曰。吾有鬪訟來求證人。時彼田主。宿緣鉤連應蒙得度。便逐道人。私匿從行。見在塜間。尸骸狼藉。膖脹臭穢。鳥狩食噉。散落其處。或有食噉盡不盡者。有似灰鴿。蛆蟲囋𠲿。臭穢難近。烏鵲狐狗。老鷲鵄鵂。噉死人屍。比丘舉手。語彼人曰。此諸鳥狩。是我證人。問曰。此諸鳥狩。何為證人。汝今比丘與誰共諍。比丘報曰。心之為病。多諸漏患。我觀此骸。分別惡露。便還房室。自觀我身。從頭至足。與彼無異。然此心意。流馳萬端。追逐幻偽。色聲香味細滑之法。我今欲識心之原本。汝心今當興起是念。無令將吾入於地獄餓鬼之中。我今凡夫未脫諸縛。然此心賊不見從命。以是之故日往曠野。為說惡露不淨之想。復興心說心。為卒暴亂錯不定心。今當改無造惡緣。時彼田主。聞道人教。以手揮淚。咽哽難言。然彼田主。於迦葉佛十千歲中。修不淨想。尋時分別。三十六物。惡露不淨。爾時比丘及彼田主。即彼曠野大畏塜間得須陀洹道（出比丘求證人經）。

When the Buddha was in Śrāvastī, there was a certain monk who went daily outside the city to the wilderness and charnel grounds along a road that passed through another person’s field. Seeing him, the field's owner became angry: “What sort of religious practitioner is this, who comes and goes daily without cultivating virtue?” He then questioned the monk: “What kind of mendicant are you, freely crisscrossing through my field until a human path has formed?” The monk replied, “I have a dispute and have come seeking witnesses.” At that time, the field's owner, connected by past karma, was due to be saved; so he followed the monk, secretly shadowing his steps. He saw that in the charnel ground, corpses and skeletons were scattered about, bloated and foul-smelling, devoured by birds and beasts, strewn all over the place. Some had been completely eaten, others only partially, resembling ash-colored doves, with maggots swarming over them, emitting a stench unbearable to approach. Crows, magpies, foxes, dogs, old vultures, and horned owls were eating the human corpses. The monk raised his hand and said to that man, “These birds and beasts are my witnesses.” The man asked, “Why are these birds and beasts witnesses? With whom are you, monk, currently disputing?” The monk replied: “The sickness of the mind has many outpourings and afflictions. I contemplate these skeletons, discerning their foul discharges, and then return to my cell to contemplate my own body from head to foot, finding it no different from them. Yet this mind races in ten thousand directions, chasing after illusions and falsities, and phenomena such as sights, sounds, scents, tastes, and subtle touch. I now wish to recognize the origin of the mind. You, mind, must now give rise to this thought: do not lead me into the hells and the hungry ghosts! I am currently an ordinary worldling, not yet freed from the fetters; yet this thief of a mind refuses to obey my command. For this reason, I go daily to the wilderness, expounding for it the notion of foul discharges and impurity. I again admonish the mind: ‘You are a hasty, violent, chaotic, erroneous, and unsettled mind; you must change now and not create evil conditions!’” When the field owner heard the monk’s instruction, he wiped away tears with his hands, choking with grief and unable to speak. For ten thousand years during the time of Kāśyapa Buddha, that field owner had cultivated the contemplation of impurity; he immediately discerned the thirty-six bodily constituents and their foul discharges and impurity. At that moment, both the monk and the field owner attained the path of a srotaāpanna right there in that great, fearsome charnel ground in the wilderness (extracted from the Sūtra on the Monk Seeking Witnesses).