法苑珠林 8.71

8.71

爾時世尊告諸菩薩言。吾當為汝分別廣說。汝今當知。乃往過去無量百千萬億阿僧祇劫。復過是數。此世界名大莊嚴。劫名大寶。有佛名寶燈焰王如來。佛壽半劫正法化世住於一劫。像法化世住於二劫。於像法中有一大王。名曰光德。十善化民如轉輪王。爾時大王教諸人民誦毘陀論。時學堂中有千童子。年各十五。聰敏多知。聞諸比丘讚佛法僧。有一童子名蓮華德。白善稱比丘言。云何名佛法僧。比丘答言。

Then the World-Honoured One said to the bodhisattvas: 'I shall explain it broadly for you in detail. You should know now: in the past, countless hundreds of thousands of myriads of koṭis of asaṃkhyeya kalpas ago, and even beyond that number, there was a world named Great Adornment, and the kalpa was named Great Treasure. There was a Buddha named Tathāgata Ratnadīpa-jvālādhipati. The Buddha's life span was half a kalpa, the saddharma transformed the world and remained for one kalpa, and the semblance Dharma transformed the world and remained for two kalpas. In the semblance Dharma, there was a great king named Prabhāguṇa, who transformed the people with the ten virtues like a cakravartin. At that time, the great king taught the people to chant the Vedic treatises. In the academy at that time, there were a thousand youths, each fifteen years of age, intelligent and widely knowledgeable. Hearing the bhikṣus praise the Buddha, Dharma, and Saṃgha, one youth named Padmottara asked the bhikṣu Subhadra: "What is meant by the Buddha, Dharma, and Saṃgha?" The bhikṣu replied:'