法苑珠林 61.14

61.14

宋蜀齊后山有釋玄暢。姓趙。河西金城人。少時家門為胡虜所滅。禍將及暢。虜師見暢。而止之曰。此兒目光外射。非凡童也。遂獲免。仍往涼州出家。其後虜虐剪滅佛法害諸沙門。唯暢得走。以元嘉二十二年閏五月十七日。發自平城路由代郡上谷。東跨太行經歷幽冀。南轉將至孟津。唯手把一束楊枝一把葱葉。虜騎追逐將及。欲及之乃以楊枝擊沙。沙起天暗。人馬不能得前。有頃沙息騎已復至。於是投身河中。唯以葱葉內鼻孔中。通氣度水。以八月一日達于揚州。洞曉經律深入禪要。占記吉凶靡不誠驗。宋文帝深加歎重。請為太子師。後遷憩荊州止長沙寺。舒手出香。掌中流水。莫之測也。迄宋之季年。乃飛舟遠舉。西適成都。初止大石寺。乃手畫作金剛密迹等十六神像。至昇明三年。又游西界觀瞻岷嶺。乃於岷山郡北部廣陽縣界見齊后山。遂有終焉之志。仍倚巖傍谷結草為庵。弟子法期見有神人乘馬著青單衣繞山一匝還示造塔之處。以齊建元元年四月二十三日。建剎立寺。名曰齊興。正是齊大祖受錫命之辰。天時人事萬里懸合。時傅琰西鎮成都。欽暢風軌待以師敬。暢立寺之後。乃致書於琰曰。

At Mount Qihou in Shu of the Song period there was the śramaṇa Xuanchang, surnamed Zhao, a man of Jincheng in Hexi. When he was young, his family was wiped out by the Hu barbarians. Disaster was about to overtake Chang when a barbarian general saw Chang and halted, saying, "This boy's gaze radiates outward; he is no ordinary child." He thus obtained escape, and thereupon went to Liangzhou to renounce worldly life. Later, the barbarian tyrant suppressed and eradicated the Buddha-Dharma and harmed many śramaṇas; only Chang was able to flee. On the seventeenth day of the intercalary fifth month in the twenty-second year of the Yuanjia reign era, he set out from Pingcheng, taking the route through the Dai commandery and Shanggu, striding east across the Taihang Mountains, passing through Youzhou and Jizhou, and turning south as he was about to reach Mengjin. He held only a bundle of willow branches and a fistful of scallion leaves in his hands. When the barbarian cavalry in hot pursuit were about to overtake him, he struck the sand with the willow branches; the sand flew up, darkening the sky, so that men and horses could not advance. After a short while the sand settled, and the cavalry reached him again. He thereupon cast himself into the river, inserting only the scallion leaves into his nostrils to breathe and cross the water. On the first day of the eighth month he arrived in Yangzhou. He had a penetrating understanding of the sūtras and vinaya and deeply penetrated the essentials of meditation; his prognostications of fortune and misfortune never failed to be verified. Emperor Wen of the Song deeply admired and esteemed him, inviting him to be the tutor to the Crown Prince. Later he moved to rest in Jingzhou, residing at Changsha Temple. Stretching out his hand, incense came forth; water flowed from within his palm, which none could fathom. Reaching the final years of the Song, he took a swift boat on a distant journey, heading west to Chengdu. At first he resided at Dashi Temple, where he painted by his own hand sixteen divine images, including Guhyapada-vajra. In the third year of the Shengming reign era, he traveled to the western border to view the Min range; within the borders of Guangyang County in the northern part of Minshan Commandery, he saw Mount Qihou, and thereupon formed the aspiration to spend the rest of his days there. Relying on the crags and bordering the ravine, he wove grass to make a hermitage. His disciple Faqi saw a divine being riding a horse and wearing a plain blue unlined robe circle the mountain once, who returned to point out the place to build a stūpa. On the twenty-third day of the fourth month in the first year of the Jianyuan reign era of the Qi dynasty, he erected the pillar and established a temple, naming it Qixing. This was precisely the morning when the Great Ancestor of the Qi received the imperial bestowal; the heavenly season and human affairs coincided across ten thousand li. At that time, Fu Yan was garrisoned in the west at Chengdu; admiring Chang's conduct and demeanor, he treated him with the respect due to a teacher. After Chang established the temple, he sent a letter to Yan, which read: