法苑珠林 96.23

96.23

During the Putong era of the Liang, at Little Zhuangyan Temple, there was Dhyāna Master Daodu. His moral conduct was upright and pure, and he clearly understood the Mahāyāna. The Liang Emperor respected him as equal to the four fruits [of arhatship]. The Dhyāna Master often felt disgust for this body, regarding it as like a poisonous tree: 'If life is impermanent, casting the corpse into a śītavana to give to birds and beasts would fulfill dānapāramitā and also be a wholesome deed; the eighty thousand families of worms within cannot be burned away, so this is not what is encouraged.' Thereupon, he gradually gathered firewood and progressively reduced his intake of food. On the third day of the eleventh month in the seventh year of Putong, the bell rang of its own accord; the temple community was frightened, not knowing what omen it was. On the eighth day of that month, the bell rang of its own accord again, whereupon he forged wholesome bonds with the great assembly. After that, he ate no more food, using only a water bottle to draw clear water, drinking one sheng per day. On the morning of the twenty-fifth day, the assembly went together to look at the bottle, and it emitted five-colored radiant beams of light and swirling fragrant mists. At dawn on the twenty-ninth day, the temple abbot Sengquan and several others climbed to the dhyāna chamber; from afar they saw purple light shining outward from the niche. As dusk approached that day, a flock of birds, five or six hundred in number, suddenly gathered together in a single tree, and after a moment flew westward. That night, when the first watch had just ended, multicolored lights illuminated the temple's rooms and buildings. In the fifth watch, a sound like roaring fire was heard cracking atop the mountain; people ran in alarm to look, and saw the Dhyāna Master with palms joined within the fire. He was sixty-six years of age. The Regional Inspector, Prince of Wuling, sent people to sweep and collect the remains at that spot and built a stūpa there. Later, the sound of a stone chime was heard on the mountain peak, its tone exceedingly clear and penetrating. At the place where he had previously burned his body, there had been a large tree that had been withered and dead for over ten years; when the Dhyāna Master entered the mountain, he often sat beneath it, and the following spring it finally put forth branches and leaves. (This single proof is from the Liang Gaoseng zhuan.)