經律異相 46.29

46.29

In the past, a man travelling afar spent the night alone in an empty house. In the middle of the night, a ghost carrying a corpse came and placed it in front of him. Another ghost followed behind, furiously shouting: "The corpse is my property; why did you suddenly carry it here?" The first ghost said, "It is my property; I carried it here myself." The second ghost said, "It was truly I who carried this corpse here." The two ghosts each took hold of a foot and a hand, disputing over it. The first ghost said, "There is a person here; we may ask him." The second ghost then asked, "Who carried this corpse here?" The man thought: "These two ghosts possess great strength. Whether I speak the truth or lie, either way I cannot escape death." He said to them, "The first ghost carried it here." The second ghost became greatly enraged, seized the man's hand, pulled it out, and threw it to the ground. The first ghost took an arm from the corpse and attached it to him, and it immediately adhered. In this manner, both arms, both legs, his head, and his torso—his entire body—were all exchanged. Thereupon the two ghosts together devoured the man's exchanged body, wiped their mouths, and departed. The man thought: "The body born of my father and mother, I saw with my own eyes completely devoured by the two ghosts. Now this body of mine is entirely the flesh of another. Do I now definitively have a body, or do I have no body?" He walked to a Buddhist stūpa and asked the monks, explaining the above matter in detail. The monks said: "From the beginning, there has always been no self; it is merely due to the conjunction of the four great elements that it is reckoned to be one's self. Your original body and this present one are no different." The monks ordained him into the Way, and he attained arhatship (drawn from the *Mahāprajñāpāramitopadeśa*, fascicle 12).