經律異相 1.3

1.3

The Tathāgata manifested traces in response to conditions, expounding the teachings according to capacity; he reached not only gods and humans, but nagas and ghosts as well. His conversion began with Kauṇḍinya and his path concluded with Subhadra. His texts accumulated by myriads, and his bamboo slips piled up to fill a great chiliocosm. Coming from the west to the east, they were indeed difficult to fathom completely. When Liu Xiang collated the books, the profound words had long been concealed; when Emperor Ming of the Han was moved by a dream, the spiritual evidence became ever more manifest. From then on, transmission and translation followed one another in succession; although the profound scriptures of the Tripiṭaka were roughly comprehensive, the varied teachings of the nine divisions had never been classified and gathered together.