法苑珠林 35.45

35.45

The World-Honoured One again addressed Ānanda: "Go to the summit of Mount Sumeru and strike the bell, assembling all the monks of the four quarters to gather at the ordination platform." Those who individually declared that they had attained the four fruits amounted in total to eight million people. They were all ordered to take off their seven-strip robes and put on saṅghāṭīs, and they brought their previous uttarāsaṅgas before the World-Honoured One. The Tathāgata personally received them with his own hands and placed them upon an inverted cauldron. The World-Honoured One took off his own seven-strip robe and placed it upon all the robes. The Tathāgata raised his voice and universally addressed the great assembly of gods, humans, dragons, and spirits: "Over incalculable kalpas, I renounced head, eyes, marrow, and brain, as well as internal and external wealth and treasures, before I obtained the robe of liberation, realized unsurpassed bodhi, and taught and transformed sentient beings. After my nirvāṇa, evil monks will not believe my teaching, will not uphold the prohibitions, and will not protect the robe of liberation; lacking awe-inspiring virtue, they will destroy the Saddharma. Evil bhikṣuṇīs will disobey instructions and commit impure conduct within the vajra-bodhimaṇḍa, just like in a brothel; they will not practice the eight gurudharmas and will disparage monks, swiftly destroying my Saddharma, causing the hosts of gods and humans to diminish and all evils to abound. I now make the four great vows together with you: pitying the evil monks and nuns of future ages, guard these robes so that they are not lost or damaged, and place them inside stūpas to maintain the Buddha-Dharma." When he spoke these words, the earth shook in six ways, and the gods, humans, dragons, and spirits grieved and rejoiced, their voices reaching the trichiliocosm. (The World-Honoured One's five-strip antarvāsas and niṣīdana broadly gave rise to questions and answers, largely identical to those concerning the saṅghāṭī. The World-Honoured One requested all jewels and jades from Brahmā, Śakra, Māra, and others; before seven days had passed, the precious stūpas were all completed, to be transmitted in succession until Maitreya descends, when they are to be entrusted to him for propagation.) Furthermore, when the World-Honoured One first attained the Way and finished converting the five Kauṇḍinya companions, in the seventh year, the śrāvaka disciples gradually increased. There was a monk named Candra, a native of the kingdom of Godāna north of Jambudvīpa, who had come to Central India engaging in trade as his occupation. Encountering the Buddha, he left home and was converted with the call 'Come, good man!' In that country there was neither cloth, silk, nor wool; all the people of the country wore only mottled calfskins as upper garments. In Rājagṛha, this monk Candra saw a mottled calfskin, and requested it from a layperson to make a kāṣāya. That layperson ridiculed him. A monk reported it to the Buddha, and the Buddha summoned and rebuked him. The Buddha addressed the great assembly: "In this Jambudvīpa of mine and the rest of the trichiliocosm, countries like the country of Godāna that use skins for kāṣāyas number twenty thousand in total. I fear that after I enter nirvāṇa, many evil monks will manually kill living beings and take skins to make robes."