經律異相 47.46

47.46

There was an elephant king named Uposatha (Shanzhu). His body was pure white and rested evenly on seven points. In strength he was able to fly through the air. He had a red head, multicolored body hair, and six tusks that were slender and pointed. He had eight thousand elephant kings as his retinue and lived beneath a sāla tree on Mount Gandhamādana. The king of sāla trees had eight thousand bathing ponds, fifty yojanas in length and breadth. Their waters were clear and cool, with moats made of the seven jewels. Multicolored flowers of five hues gathered and clustered within the ponds. When the elephant king thought to enter a pond, the eight thousand elephants arrived in accordance with his thought. Some held parasols and fans, while others chanted praises and led the way before him. Some elephant kings washed his tail, back, thighs, and feet; some pulled up flower roots and gave them to the king to eat; and some gathered flowers and scattered them over the king. The eight thousand elephants also bathed and amused themselves together. When they excreted feces and urine, the yakṣa demons moved it outside the mountains and forests. (The Sarvāstivāda-vinaya states that at Lake Anavatapta there is the palace of the elephant king Uposatha. The Ekottarika-āgama states that by the side of Mount Gandhamādana there are eighty-four thousand white elephants.) The lowest of the elephants mounted by Śakra Devānām Indra is mounted by a wheel-turning sage king and is called the elephant jewel. Within the Golden Cliff Mountains there are eighty thousand rocky caves, and eighty thousand elephants rest and abide within them. Their bodies are pure white, their heads are multicolored, their mouths have great tusks, and gold fills the spaces between their teeth. (Extracted from the Dīrgha-āgama, fascicle 18; also extracted from the Ekottarika-āgama and the Loutan jing.)