經律異相 5.40

5.40

“Good sons, when I entered the great city of Rājagṛha to beg for alms in sequential order, Devadatta instructed King Ajātaśatru to release the mad, drunken elephant Dhanapāla, intending to harm me and my disciples. At that time, I immediately entered the concentration of loving-kindness and extended my hand to show it to him, whereupon five lions emerged from my five fingers. Seeing them, the elephant was terrified in mind; losing control of its feces and urine, it threw its entire body to the ground and reverently bowed to my feet. Good sons, at that time there were in truth no lions upon my fingers; it was merely through the power of cultivating the wholesome root of loving-kindness and compassion that I brought it to submission (derived from the fourteenth fascicle of the Mahāparinirvāṇa-sūtra).”