諸經要集 2.109

2.109

Also, the Mahāsaṃnipāta Sūtra says: The Buddha said: All living beings in the present age and in future ages should have deep faith in the Buddha, the Dharma, and the Saṅgha. Those living beings, among humans and devas, will always receive supreme and wonderful retribution, and before long they will enter the City of Fearlessness. Thus, even making offerings to a single person who has left household life for my sake, or one who has shaved their hair and beard in reliance on me and wears a scrap of kāṣāya without receiving the precepts—making offerings to such a person also yields merit, even up to entering the City of Fearlessness. For this reason, I speak thus: If there is another person who leaves household life for my sake, does not maintain the prohibitive precepts, but has shaved their hair and beard and wears a scrap of kāṣāya, and anyone unlawfully torments and harms them, they will even destroy the dharmakāya and saṃbhogakāya of the Buddhas of the three periods of time, and cause the three evil destinies to be filled to overflowing. The Buddha said: If there are living beings who leave household life for my sake, shave their hair and beard, and put on the kāṣāya, even if they do not maintain the precepts, all of them have already been sealed by the seal of nirvāṇa. If there are those who, having renounced household life, do not maintain the precepts, and someone unlawfully causes them disturbance, reviles, slanders, strikes, binds, slashes, or cuts them with hands, knives, or sticks, or robs them of their robes and bowls and various requisites of life, that person thereby destroys the true saṃbhogakāya of the Buddhas of the three periods of time and gouges out the eyes of all devas and humans. That person, seeking to submerge the True Dharma and the lineage of the Triratna of all Buddhas, prevents all devas and humans from obtaining benefit and causes them to fall into hell, causing the three evil destinies to increase and overflow. At that time, the Great Brahmā King, Lord of the Sahā World, said to the Buddha: 'If someone shaves their hair and beard for the Buddha's sake and puts on the kāṣāya, but does not receive the prohibitive precepts, or having received them violates them, how much sin does a kṣatriya king incur if he harasses, reviles, strikes, or binds them?' The Buddha said: 'Great Brahmā, I shall now briefly explain it to you. If a person were to cause the blood of the bodies of ten thousand koṭis of Buddhas to flow, what do you think: would that person's sin be great?' The Great Brahmā King said: 'If a person causes the blood of the body of even a single Buddha to flow, they incur the offense of the immediate retribution [of the Avīci Hell], which is immeasurable and beyond reckoning, falling into the great Avīci Hell—how much more so if they cause the body blood of ten thousand koṭis of Buddhas to flow! There is no one who could comprehensively expound that person's sinful karma and retribution, except the Tathāgata alone.' The Buddha said: 'Great Brahmā, if someone disturbs, reviles, strikes, or binds one who has shaved their hair for my sake and wears a scrap of kāṣāya, whether not receiving the prohibitive precepts or receiving them and violating them, the sin incurred is far greater than that. Why is this? Such a person is still able to show the path of nirvāṇa to devas and humans. Such a person has already attained respectful faith in their heart toward the Triratna, surpassing all ninety-five non-Buddhist paths. That person will surely quickly enter nirvāṇa, surpassing all householders and laypeople, except for householders who have attained patience (kṣānti). Therefore, devas and humans should make offerings to them, how much more so to those who can fully receive and maintain the prohibitive precepts and whose three karmas are in accord! If any kings and all ministers who administer justice see anyone who has renounced household life within my Dharma commit great sinful karma—committing great killing of living beings, great theft, great violation of the brahmacarya, great false speech, and other unwholesome deeds—they should merely expel them from the country, not allowing them to reside in the monastery and engage in the affairs of the Saṅgha. They must not whip and beat them, nor should they inflict punishment upon their bodies with verbal karma of revilement. If they deliberately violate the Dharma and punish them, such people will fall away from liberation, receive birth in low classes, be separated from all wholesome paths of humans and devas, and definitively head toward the Avīci Hell. How much more so if they whip and beat one who has renounced household life for the Buddha's sake and fully maintains the precepts!'