法苑珠林 35.39

35.39

又釋迦佛初成道時乃至涅槃。唯服麁布僧伽梨及白㲲三衣。未曾著蠶衣繒帛。何為惡比丘等謗黷我云。毘尼教中開許著之。初成道時愛道比丘尼。手執金縷袈裟。持施與我。我不敢受。令持施僧。況我三界大師服著蠶衣。我於三藏教中雖聽用繒綵供養佛法僧。然本非是蠶口出絲綿。我此閻浮洲及以大洲之外。有千八百大國。並有繒帛絲綿。皆從女口出之。非是蠶口中出。由不殺害眾生命故。福業所感故。從女口中出。問何以得知。答曰。若欲須絲作衣時即須然香至桑樹下。便有二化女子。從彼樹下出形。如八歲女。從口中吐絲。彼國人等但設繀車。從女口中取絲。轉至繀車上。取足便止。化女即滅。我聽著繒綵者。是此女絲及天繒綵。本非害生取絲而用。云何謗我害生取絲用邪。

"Furthermore, from the time Śākyamuni Buddha first attained awakening until his nirvāṇa, he wore only the coarse-cloth saṃghārāṭī and three white cotton robes; he never wore garments of silkworms or woven silks. Why do evil monks and the like slander and defile me, saying that permission to wear them was granted in the teachings of the Vinaya? When I first attained awakening, the bhikṣuṇī Mahāprajāpatī held a gold-threaded kāṣāya in her hands and brought it to offer to me; I did not dare to accept it and told her to offer it to the saṃgha. How much less would I, the great teacher of the tridhātu, wear garments of silkworms! Although in the teachings of the Tripiṭaka I permitted the use of silks to make offerings to the Buddha, Dharma, and Saṃgha, originally it was not silk fiber coming out of the mouths of silkworms. In this continent of Jambudvīpa, as well as beyond the great continent, there are one thousand eight hundred great kingdoms, and they all have woven silks and silk fibers that all come out from women's mouths; they do not come out from the mouths of silkworms. Because they do not kill the lives of sentient beings, and through the sympathetic resonance of meritorious karma, [the silk] comes out from women's mouths. If asked how this is known, the answer is: when there is a need for silk to make robes, they must light incense and go beneath a mulberry tree. Thereupon, two magically transformed girls appear from beneath that tree, shaped like eight-year-old girls, who spit out silk from their mouths. The people of those kingdoms merely set up reeling frames, take the silk from the girls' mouths, and transfer it onto the reeling frames; once they have taken enough, they stop, and the transformed girls immediately disappear. That I permitted the wearing of silks refers to the silk of these girls and celestial silks; originally, it was never taking silk by harming living beings and using it. How can they slander me, claiming that I harmed living beings to take silk and use it?"