法苑珠林 55.67

55.67

We have heard that when the white horse journeyed east, the Tripiṭaka first arose; when the blue ox departed west, the two chapters [of the Daodejing] originated from then on. One elucidated the dark and profound to transform the people; the other clarified emptiness and void to save living beings. Examining this in historical registers, it is as clear as pointing to one's palm. The proclamation and manifestation of the ancestral doctrine indeed occurred in this world. The eras of the translations of the Śākyan teachings are clear and distinct, fully recorded in documents and histories, so that the common people are not deceived. When it comes to the profound books of the Daoists, however, this is not so. Only the two chapters of Laozi were personally expounded by Li Dan; the rest of their scriptures and teachings are all mixed with ordinary human contrivances. Why is this? In the Western Han period, Wang Bao forged the Dongxuan jing. In the Eastern Han period, Zhang Ling forged the Lingbao jing, as well as Daoist texts of petition-rituals and sacrificial offerings amounting to twenty-four fascicles. During the Wu period, Ge Xiaoxian forged the Shangqing jing. In the Jin period, the Daoist Wang Fu forged the Mingwei huahu jing, and Bao Jing forged the Sanhuang jing. In the Qi period, the Daoist Chen Xianming forged the Zhen buxu pin jing in sixty-four fascicles. In the Liang period, Tao Hongjing forged the Taiqing jing and rituals for various sacrifices in ten fascicles. When Emperor Wu of the Northern Zhou suppressed the two teachings, there was the former Daoist of Huazhou, Zhang Bin, who was appointed by edict as the regional inspector of his home province; the former Daoist of Chang'an, Jiao Zishun (also named Daokang), who was selected to be a Senior General of the Opening of the Office; the former Daoist of Fufeng, Ma Yi; and the Administrative Assistant of Yongzhou, Li Yun. In the fifth year of Tianhe, these four men gathered at Yuzhen Temple within the old capital, ransacked Buddhist sūtras, and forged more than one thousand fascicles of apocryphal Daoist scriptures. At that time, Suo Jiao, a native of Wannian county, was mounting the scrolls, and wherever he saw passages from Zhen Luan’s Xiaodao lun, he excised and eliminated them all. Recently, at the end of the Daye era, there was the Daoist Fu Huixiang of the Wutong Abbey who did not speak for three years; he thereupon altered the Nirvāṇa Sūtra into the Chang'an jing. At that time, a ban was imposed forbidding Daoists to leave the city gates; when a family saw a Daoist wearing yellow garments underneath, they arrested him and delivered him to the defense command. When the matter of forging scriptures came to light, it was memorialized by the Minister of the Department of State Affairs, Wei Wensheng, and an imperial edict ordered him executed outside the Jinguang Gate. This is a recent affair verified by everyone's eyes and ears. Furthermore, Zhen Luan’s Xiaodao lun states: 'Daoists falsely annotated three hundred and fifty fascicles of the masters' writings, making them Daoist scriptures.' Moreover, examining the Catalogue of the Xuandu Abbey, they falsely took book titles from the Yiwenzhi and deceitfully annotated eight hundred and eighty-four fascicles, making them Daoist scriptures. Based on this, their falsehood and absurdity are fully evident. Furthermore, in the first year of the Linde era, Guo Xingzhen and other Daoists of the abbeys in the Western Capital, seeing that Xingzhen was employed under imperial edict, falsely invoked the celestial majesty to mislead and confuse the common people. Fanning the flames among one another, they selected and assembled the Daoists Li Rong, Yao Yixuan, and Liu Dao of the Dongming Abbey, together with the Daoists Tian Renhui, Guo Gaizong, and others of the Huisheng Abbey. They compiled all the forged scriptures produced by Daoists ancient and modern that had previously fallen into obscurity and were not in circulation, and revised them anew. Secretly plagiarizing the Buddhist scriptures, they extracted the essential summaries, altered sentences and phrases, and swapped out the Buddha’s words. The numerical categories of persons and dharmas—such as the three realms (tridhātu), the six paths (ṣaḍgati), the five aggregates, the twelve sense bases, the eighteen elements, and the thirty-seven factors of awakening—all doctrinal gates, great and small, were stolen and inserted into Daoist scriptures to serve as Chinese classics. Formerly, in Daoist scriptures, the sacrificial rites always used dried venison and clear wine; now they have newly altered them to insert dried dates and fragrant water. Wherever the language of Daoist scriptures was crude and plain, or contained mixed and repulsive passages, they removed them all. For example, during the Daye era, the Daoist Fu Huixiang of the Wutong Abbey altered the Nirvāṇa Sūtra into the Chang'an jing, and was executed and its circulation halted; now they have taken it up again and changed it into the Taishang lingbao yuanyang jing. They also altered other Buddhist sūtras, giving them separate titles such as the Shengmouni jing, or calling them the Taiping jing, and so on. In Daoist scriptures there were originally no names such as upāsaka, upāsikā, dānapati, virtuous person, or dakṣiṇā; now all these Daoists have stolen and used them. We do not know whether these terms are Chinese or Sanskrit: if they are Chinese, why are there no writings of them in the various histories? If they are Sanskrit, what meanings do these words convey in translation? Zhuangzi and Laozi were not men of the Western regions; hence we know these were stolen and used, and the true and the false can be determined. As for Laozi, according to old accounts, he was merely the archivist beneath the pillar in the Zhou dynasty, holding an audience tablet and declaring himself a subject, no different from the secular world. Today they install him in separate abbeys resembling saṃghārāmas, painting the Heavenly Worthy and Laozi with gold, just as Buddhist sūtras of old referred to the Buddha as the Heavenly Worthy, which they again stole and used. From the Han and Wei dynasties down to the Fu and Yao eras, monks were all called 'daoshi' (men of the Way); they again stole this term for their own use, while the old name for Daoists was jijiu (libationer). In Daoist scriptures there were originally no adamantine vajra-guardians or lions; now at the front gates of abbeys they imitate the Buddhists in setting them up. It is unknown whether such adamantine vajra-guardians and lions ever existed in the Han lands! Now they suddenly fabricate them recklessly. In the inner teaching, the Buddhist sūtras depict the World-Honoured One and Mahākāśyapa as completely golden, and making them according to the scriptures is in accordance with the Dharma. Furthermore, the Buddhist sūtras describe Sudatta buying the park to build a saṃghārāma for the Buddha, all in accordance with the holy teachings; and so it spread throughout the ten directions. Moreover, when the World-Honoured One attained enlightenment, he evoked five hundred vajra-guardians, five hundred white elephants, and five hundred lions; all such things were done in accordance with the holy teachings. According to the Buddhist sūtras, the vessels of offering and magnificent treasures manifested by the Buddhas, Bodhisattvas, Brahmā kings, and Śakra of this world and other worlds are immeasurable, boundless, and cannot be fully described; all are fully recorded in the sūtra texts. Of those made today, not one in ten thousand succeeds. In the current two fascicles of Laozi’s Five Thousand Characters, where was there ever such magnificence? If it comes from other scriptures, those other scriptures are not authentic. In this way, those who altered Buddhist sūtras and stealthily inserted them into Daoist scriptures number nearly several thousand fascicles. In the sūtras spoken by the Buddha, all are prefaced with 'Thus have I heard,' along with the time of preaching and the place of preaching, to bear witness to the sūtra and generate faith. That is to say:"