經律異相 50.4

50.4

阿鼻地獄者（梁言無遮。又言無間。又言猛火入心）縱廣正等八千由旬。七重鐵城七層鐵網。下有十八隔。周匝七重。皆是刀林。復有七重劍林。四角有四大銅狗。廣長四十由旬。眼如掣電。牙如劍樹。齒如刀山。舌如鐵刺。一切身毛皆然猛火。其烟臭惡。有十八獄卒。口如夜叉。六十四眼散迸鐵丸。狗牙上出高四由旬。牙端火流燒煎鐵車。輪輞出火。鋒刃劍戟燒阿鼻城赤如融銅。獄卒八頭六十角。角杪火然。火化成銅復成刀輪。相次在火焰間。滿阿鼻城。城內有七鐵幢。火涌如沸鐵流融迸涌出四門。上有十八釜。沸銅涌漫滿於城中。二隔間有八萬四千鐵蟒大蛇。吐毒火中身滿城內。其蛇哮吼如天震雷。雨大鐵丸五百。又五百億蟲。八萬四千嘴頭火流如雨而下。滿阿鼻城。此蟲若下猛火大熾照八萬四千由旬獄上。衝大海沃燋山下貫大海底渧如車軸。若有殺父害母罵辱六親。命終之時銅狗化十八車。狀如寶蓋。一切火焰化為玉女。罪人遙見心喜欲往。風刀解時寒急失聲。寧得好火安在車上然火自爆。即便命終。坐金車瞻玉女。皆捉鐵斧斬截其身。屈伸臂頃直落阿鼻。從上隔如旋火輪至於下隔。身遍隔內。銅狗大吼嚙骨唼髓。獄卒羅剎捉大斧截以叉叉頸令起遍體火焰滿阿鼻獄。閻羅王大聲告勅。癡人獄種。汝在世時。不孝父母邪慢無道。汝今生處名阿鼻獄。獄卒復從下隔更上上隔。經歷八萬四千隔挂身而過至鐵網際。一日一夜即閻浮提六十小劫。盡一大劫。作五逆罪。臨命終時。十八風刀如鐵火車解截其身。以熱逼故便作是言。得好色華清涼大樹於下遊戲不亦樂乎。作此念時八萬四千諸惡劍林。化作寶樹華果茂盛行列在前。大熱火焰化為蓮華。罪人疾於暴雨坐蓮華上。鐵嘴諸蟲從火華起穿骨入體躁動。一切劍枝。削於肉骨。無量刀林當上而下。火車鑪炭十八苦事一時來迎。此相現時陷墜地下。從下隔上身如華敷遍滿下隔下火熾然。至於上隔身滿其中。熱惱急故張眼吐舌。萬億融銅百千刀輪。從空中下頸入足出。一切苦事過於上說百千萬倍。具五逆者受罪五劫。復有眾生。犯四重禁虛食信施誹謗邪見不識因果。斷學般若毀十方佛。偷僧祇物婬妷無道。逼淨戒尼姊妹親慼。造眾惡事。此人罪報。臨命終時。風刀解身偃臥不定如被楚撻。其心荒越發狂癡想。見己室宅男女大小。一切皆是不淨之物。屎尿臭處盈流于外。獄卒羅剎以大鐵叉擎。阿鼻獄及諸刀林。化作寶樹及清涼池。火焰化作金葉蓮華諸鐵嘴蟲化為鳧雁。苦痛之聲猶如歌詠。罪人聞此吾當遊中。坐火蓮華。眾物競分。狗食其心。俄爾之間。身如鐵華滿十八隔。此等罪人經八萬四千大劫。復入東方十八隔中。如前受苦。南西北方亦復如是。謗方等經。具五逆罪。破壞僧祇。污比丘尼。斷諸善根。具眾罪者身滿阿鼻獄。四支復滿十八隔中。此阿鼻獄但燒如此獄種眾生。劫欲盡時東門即開。見東門外。清泉流水華果林樹一切俱現。是諸罪人從下隔見明火暫歇。從下隔起婉轉腹行。𢫫身上走到上隔中。手攀刀輪。時虛空中雨熱鐵丸。走於東門既至門閫。獄卒羅剎手捉鐵叉逆刺其眼。鐵狗囓心悶絕而死。南西北門亦復如是。經歷半劫。

The Avīci Hell (in the Liang language, 'unobstructed', also called 'incessant', or 'fierce fire entering the heart') is exactly eight thousand yojanas in length and breadth. It has seven layers of iron walls and seven tiers of iron nets. Below, there are eighteen compartments, encircled in seven folds, all of which are forests of knives. There are further seven folds of forests of swords. At the four corners are four great copper dogs, forty yojanas wide and long; their eyes are like flashing lightning, their fangs like sword-trees, their teeth like mountains of knives, their tongues like iron thorns. All the hair on their bodies burns with fierce fire, its smoke foul and stench-ridden. There are eighteen hell wardens whose mouths resemble yakṣas, their sixty-four eyes scattering iron pellets; their dog-like fangs protrude upwards four yojanas high, and streams of fire from the tips of their fangs scorch and boil iron carts. Fire bursts from the wheel-rims, and sharp-bladed swords and halberds burn the city of Avīci so that it is red like molten copper. The wardens have eight heads and sixty horns; fires burn at the tips of their horns, and the fire transforms into copper, and again into knife-wheels, which in succession amid the blazing flames fill the city of Avīci. Inside the city are seven iron banners; fire wells up like boiling liquid iron, and molten iron spurts out of the four gates. Above, there are eighteen cauldrons, overflowing with boiling copper to fill the city. Between two compartments are eighty-four thousand great iron pythons, spitting venom into the fire, filling the interior of the city with their bodies; their roaring is like heavenly thunder, raining down five hundred great iron pellets. Furthermore, five hundred billion worms, each with eighty-four thousand beaks from whose tips streams of fire pour like rain, fill the city of Avīci. When these worms descend, fierce fire flares intensely, illuminating eighty-four thousand yojanas above the hell, surging against the great ocean and Mount Wojiao, piercing straight through down to the bottom of the ocean like axle-trees dripping. If anyone kills their father, harms their mother, or curses and reviles their six close kin, at the time of their death the copper dogs transform into eighteen carts, shaped like jewelled canopies; all the flames transform into jade maidens. Seeing them from afar, the sinners are pleased at heart and wish to go thither. When the wind-knives dismember them, freezing cold in their distress makes them lose their voices; they wish only to obtain good fire and be comfortably placed on the cart to warm themselves by the fire. Immediately upon dying, they sit in the golden carts and gaze at the jade maidens, but all [the maidens] take iron axes and hack their bodies to pieces. In the time it takes to bend or extend an arm, they fall straight into Avīci. From the upper compartment, like a whirling wheel of fire, they reach the lower compartment, their bodies filling the compartment. The copper dogs roar loudly, biting bones and sucking marrow. The rākṣasa hell wardens take great axes to chop them, and use pitchforks to spear their necks and make them stand up, their entire bodies engulfed in flames filling the Avīci Hell. King Yama declares with a loud voice: 'Foolish men, seed of hell! When you were in the world, you were unfilial to your parents and perverse, arrogant, and without principle. The place where you are born now is called the Avīci Hell!' The wardens again take them from the lower compartment up to the upper compartment, passing through eighty-four thousand compartments, their suspended bodies passing through all the way to the border of the iron net. A single day and night is sixty small kalpas in Jambudvīpa, lasting for an entire great kalpa. Those who commit the five heinous crimes, at the point of death, eighteen wind-knives like iron fire-carts dismember and hack their bodies. Because they are oppressed by the heat, they make this thought: 'If I could obtain beautiful flowers and cool, great trees to play beneath, would that not be delightful?' When they make this thought, eighty-four thousand evil forests of swords transform into jewelled trees, their flowers and fruits lush and arrayed before them; the intensely hot flames transform into lotus blossoms. The sinners, swifter than torrential rain, sit upon the lotus blossoms. The iron-beaked worms arise from the fiery blossoms, boring through their bones and entering their bodies, writhing about. All the sword-branches shave away their flesh and bones; boundless forests of knives descend from above; and the eighteen painful matters such as fire-carts and burning coals all arrive at once to greet them. When this appearance manifests, they sink into the earth. From the lower compartment their bodies spread out like blooming flowers, filling the lower compartment, while the fire below blazes fiercely. Reaching the upper compartment, their bodies fill it; because the burning distress is acute, their eyes open wide and their tongues protrude. Tens of billions of [streams of] molten copper and hundreds of thousands of knife-wheels descend from the sky, entering at the neck and exiting at the feet. All these painful matters exceed what was described above by hundreds of thousands of times. Those who have committed all five heinous crimes suffer punishment for five kalpas. Furthermore, there are sentient beings who violate the four grave prohibitions, vainly consume the offerings of the faithful, slander [the Dharma] with false views, do not recognise cause and effect, sever the study of prajñā, defame the Buddhas of the ten directions, steal the property of the Saṅgha, act lustfully without principle, violate pure-precepted nuns, sisters, and female relatives, and commit all manner of evil deeds. As the karmic retribution of such people, at the point of death, wind-knives dismember their bodies; they toss and turn on their beds without rest, as though being flogged. Their minds are wildly disordered and they give rise to mad and foolish thoughts, seeing their own chambers, men and women, young and old, as nothing but impure things, with feces, urine, and foul stenches overflowing outside. The rākṣasa wardens lift them up on great iron forks. The Avīci Hell and the various forests of knives transform into jewelled trees and cool ponds; the flames transform into golden-leaved lotuses; the various iron-beaked worms transform into ducks and geese; and the sounds of bitter pain seem like melodious songs. When the sinners hear this, they think: 'I shall sport therein.' Sitting upon the fire-lotuses, the various creatures vie to tear them apart; dogs eat their hearts. In an instant, their bodies, like iron flowers, fill the eighteen compartments. These sinners undergo eighty-four thousand great kalpas, and then re-enter the eighteen compartments in the eastern direction, suffering pain as before; and so too in the south, west, and north. Those who slander the Vaipulya sūtras, commit all five heinous crimes, destroy the Saṅgha, defile bhikṣuṇīs, sever all wholesome roots, and possess all manner of sins fill the Avīci Hell with their bodies, and their four limbs also fill the eighteen compartments. This Avīci Hell burns only such sentient beings who are the seed of hell. When the kalpa is about to end, the eastern gate opens; outside the eastern gate, clear springs, flowing water, and forests of flowering and fruiting trees all appear at once. When these sinners see from the lower compartment that the bright fire has temporarily subsided, they rise from the lower compartment, crawling on their bellies and slithering along, scrambling upward until they reach the upper compartment. Their hands clutch the knife-wheels; meanwhile, hot iron pellets rain down from the sky. They run toward the eastern gate, and once they reach the threshold, the rākṣasa hell wardens take iron pitchforks in hand and stab them straight through the eyes; iron dogs gnaw their hearts, and they swoon and die. The south, west, and north gates are also like this, lasting for half a kalpa.