開元釋教錄 4.17.2

4.17.2

沙門曇無讖。或云曇摩懺。亦云曇謨讖。蓋取
梵音不同故也。涼云法豐。中印度人。婆羅門
種。讖六歲父亡。母以傭織養讖。見沙門達摩
耶舍（此言法稱）道俗宗敬豐於利養。其母羨之。故
以讖為弟子。十歲與同學數人讀呪。聰敏出
群。讀經日得萬餘言。初學小乘兼覽五明諸
論。講說精辯莫能詶抗。後遇白頭禪師。共讖
論議。習業既異交諍十旬。讖雖攻難鋒起。而
禪師終不肯屈。讖服其精理。乃謂禪師曰。頗
有經典可得見不。禪師即授以樹皮涅槃經
本。讖尋讀驚悟方自慚恨。以為坎井之識久
迷大方。於是集眾悔過。遂專業大乘。至年二
十所誦大小乘經二百餘萬言。讖從兄善能
調象騎。殺王所乘白耳大象。王怒誅之。令曰。
敢有視者夷三族。親屬莫敢往讖哭而葬之。
王怒欲誅讖。讖曰。王以法故殺之。我以親而
葬之。並不違大義。何為見怒。傍人為之寒心。
其神色自若。王奇其志氣遂留供養。讖明解
呪術。所向皆驗。西域號為大神呪師。後隨王
入山。王渴乏須水不能得。讖乃密呪石出水。
因讚曰。大王惠澤所感。遂使枯石生泉。隣國
聞者皆歎王德。于時雨澤甚調百姓稱詠。王
悅其道術深佳優寵。頃之王意稍歇待之漸
薄。讖怒曰。我當以甖水詣池呪龍入甖令天
下大旱。王必請呪。然後放龍降雨則見待何
如。遂持甖造龍。有密告之者。王怒捕讖。讖
懼誅乃齎大涅槃經本前分一夾并菩薩戒經
（地持經也）菩薩戒本奔龜茲。龜茲國多小乘學不信
涅槃。遂至姑臧止於傳舍。慮失經本枕之而
寢。有人牽之在地。讖驚謂是盜者。如此三夕。
聞空中語曰。此如來解脫之藏。何以枕之。讖
乃慚悟別置高處。夜有盜之者舉不能勝。乃
數過舉之遂不能動。明旦讖持經去。不以為
重。盜者見之謂是聖人。悉來拜謝。河西王沮
渠蒙遜聞讖名。呼與相見接待甚厚。蒙遜素
奉大法。志在弘通。請令出其經本讖以未參
土言又無傳譯。恐言舛於理。不許即翻。於是
學語三年方譯。初分十卷。是時沙門慧嵩道
朗獨步河西。值其宣出法藏。深相推重轉易
梵文。嵩公筆受。道俗數百人疑難縱橫。讖臨
機釋滯未嘗留礙。嵩朗等更請廣出餘經謂
大集大雲悲華地持等兼涅槃經總十九部。
讖以涅槃經本品數未足。還國尋求。值其母
亡遂留歲餘。後於于填更得經本。復還姑臧
續譯成四帙焉。讖以玄始三年甲寅創首翻
譯。至十五年丙寅都訖（房云玄始十年訖者此乃涅槃竟時非餘經也准優
婆塞戒經後記云丙寅年出此即十五年中猶出經也讖至義和三年癸酉三月方卒中間六載應更出經錄中不言故
未詳也）讖嘗告遜云。有鬼入聚落必多災疫遜不
信欲躬見為驗。讖即以術加遜。遜見而駭怖
讖曰。宜潔誠齋戒神呪驅之。乃讀呪三日。謂
遜曰。鬼北去矣。既而北境之外疫死萬數。遜
益敬憚禮遇彌崇。會魏太武皇帝聞其道術
遣使迎請。且告遜曰。若不遣讖便即加兵。遜
自揆國弱難以拒命。兼慮讖多術。或為魏謀
己。進退惶惑。乃密計除之。初讖譯出涅槃卷
數已定。而外國沙門曇無發云。此經品未
盡。讖嘗慨然誓必重尋。蒙遜因其行志。乃
偽資發遣厚贈寶貨。未發數日乃流涕告眾
曰。讖業對將至。眾聖不能救矣。以本有心誓
義不容停。行四十里。遜密遣刺客害之。時年
四十九。眾咸慟惜焉。既而遜左右常白日見
鬼神以劍擊。遜至四月寢疾而終（遜以義和三年三月害讖
即其年四月遇疾而終信哉報應不虛如影之隨形也房云讖在處世承和四年卒者非也其義和三年即魏延和二年
歲在癸酉也）初讖在姑臧。有張掖沙門道進。欲從讖
受菩薩戒。讖云。且悔過。乃竭誠七日七夜。至
第八日晨詣讖求受。讖忽大怒。進更思惟。但
是我業障未銷耳。乃戮力三年且禪且懺。即
於定中見釋迦文佛與諸大士授已戒法。其
夕同止十餘人。皆感夢如進所見。進欲詣讖

The śramaṇa Dharmakṣema was also called Tanmoxian or Tanmochen, which was merely due to differences in transliterating the Sanskrit sounds. In the Liang dialect, it means Fafeng ("Abundance of Dharma"). He was a native of Central India and of the brāhmaṇa caste. When Kṣema was six years old, his father died, and his mother supported Kṣema by working as a hired weaver. Seeing that the śramaṇa Dharmayaśas (which means Facheng ["Fame of Dharma"]) was revered by both clergy and laity and was showered with lavish offerings, his mother envied this, and so gave Kṣema [to him] as a disciple. At the age of ten, reading mantras together with several of his fellow students, his intelligence surpassed the crowd; in reading sūtras, he could master over ten thousand words a day. At first he studied the Hīnayāna, simultaneously perusing the various treatises on the five sciences. When expounding and discussing them, his eloquence was so precise and sharp that no one could counter or challenge him. Later, he met a white-haired meditation master with whom he engaged in doctrinal debate. As their learned traditions differed, they contested back and forth for a hundred days. Although Kṣema launched attacks with pointed acumen, the meditation master in the end refused to yield. Kṣema submitted to the subtlety of his principles and said to the meditation master, "Do you happen to have any scriptures that I might see?" The meditation master then handed him a birch-bark manuscript of the Mahāparinirvāṇa-sūtra. As Kṣema read through it, he was startled into awakening and filled with self-reproach, realizing that his frog-in-a-well understanding had long kept him blind to the great expanse. Thereupon, he assembled the congregation to repent of his transgressions, and subsequently dedicated himself exclusively to the Mahāyāna. By the age of twenty, the Hīnayāna and Mahāyāna sūtras he had memorized amounted to over two million words. Kṣema's paternal cousin was skilled at training and riding elephants. He killed a large white-eared elephant ridden by the king. The king was enraged and executed him, issuing an edict that said: "Whoever dares to look upon [the corpse] shall have his clan executed to the third degree." None of the relatives dared go, but Kṣema wept and buried him. Enraged, the king wished to execute Kṣema. Kṣema said: "Your Majesty killed him according to the law; I buried him out of kinship. Neither violates great righteousness. Why should you be angry?" Those beside him shuddered in fear, but his expression remained calm and composed. The king, marveling at his resolve and spirit, kept him and made offerings to him. Kṣema clearly understood incantatory arts, and wherever he applied them, they proved efficacious; in the Western Regions, he was known as the Great Master of Divine Incantations. Later, he accompanied the king into the mountains. The king, parched with thirst, required water but could not find any. Kṣema then secretly muttered an incantation over a rock, and water gushed forth. He thereupon praised [the king], saying: "It is the influence of the Great King's benevolent grace that has caused a spring to arise from dry stone." Neighboring states that heard of this all extolled the king's virtue. At that time, the rains were extremely timely and the common people sang praises. The king was delighted with his arts and favored him with deep respect and generosity. After a while, the king's favor gradually waned and he treated him more coldly. Kṣema angrily said: "I will take a jar of water, go to the pond, and through incantations summon the dragon into the jar, causing a great drought under heaven. The king will surely beg for an incantation; if I only then release the dragon to bring down rain, how will I be treated?" He then took the jar and approached the dragon. Someone secretly informed [the king] of this. The king angrily sought to arrest Kṣema. Fearing execution, Kṣema took the first section of the original manuscript of the Mahāparinirvāṇa-sūtra in one bundle, along with the Bodhisattva-śīla-sūtra (which is the Bodhisattvabhūmi) and the Bodhisattva Prātimokṣa, and fled to Kucha. In the kingdom of Kucha, most followed Hīnayāna studies and did not believe in the Nirvāṇa[-sūtra]. He then arrived at Guzang and stayed at a post-house. Anxious about losing the manuscript of the sūtra, he used it as a pillow to sleep on. Someone dragged him to the ground. Kṣema was startled, thinking it was a thief. This happened for three nights. He heard a voice in the air say: "This is the treasury of the Tathāgata's liberation; why do you use it as a pillow?" Kṣema was ashamed and awakened to [his mistake], placing it separately in an elevated place. At night, a thief came to take it, but could not lift it. He tried lifting it several times, but was unable to move it at all. The next morning, Kṣema carried the sūtra away, not finding it heavy. When the thief saw this, he thought Kṣema was a sage, and came to bow in apology. The King of Hexi, Juqu Mengxun, heard of Kṣema's fame and summoned him to meet, treating him with great hospitality. Mengxun had long revered the Great Dharma and was intent on propagating it; he requested that he produce [a translation of] his manuscript of the sūtra. Because Kṣema had not yet mastered the local language and lacked interpreters, he feared that his words would deviate from the principles, and would not agree to translate it immediately. Thereupon, he studied the language for three years before translating the initial section of ten fascicles. At that time, the śramaṇas Huisong and Daolang were peerless in Hexi. Encountering his propagation of the Dharma treasury, they held him in deep esteem and helped translate the Sanskrit text, with Master Song taking it down with his brush. With hundreds of clergy and laity raising difficult points from all angles, Kṣema resolved their perplexities on the spot without ever being stumped. Song, Lang, and others further requested him to translate extensively the other sūtras—namely the Mahāsaṃnipāta, Mahāmegha, Karuṇāpuṇḍarīka, Bodhisattvabhūmi, and others, together with the Nirvāṇa-sūtra, totaling nineteen works. Because the chapters in the manuscript of the Nirvāṇa-sūtra were incomplete, Kṣema returned to his native country to seek [the rest]. Finding that his mother had died, he stayed for over a year. Later, he obtained further manuscripts of the sūtra in Khotan, and returned to Guzang to continue translating, completing it into four cases. Kṣema began the translation in the third year of Xuanshi (jiayin) [414 CE], and concluded everything in the fifteenth year (bingyin) [426 CE] (Fei Changfang says that it was concluded in the tenth year of Xuanshi, but that was only when the Nirvāṇa[-sūtra] was finished, not the other sūtras; according to the postscript to the Upāsaka-śīla-sūtra, it was produced in the bingyin year, which shows that he was still translating sūtras during the fifteenth year. Kṣema died only in the third month of the third year of Yihe (guiyou) [433 CE]; during the six years in between, he must have translated more sūtras, but as the catalogues do not record them, the details remain unclear). Kṣema once told Mengxun: "Ghosts have entered the settlement; there will surely be many pestilences." Mengxun did not believe it and wished to see it for himself as proof. Kṣema then applied his arts to Mengxun; Mengxun saw them and was terrified. Kṣema said: "You should purify your sincerity through fasting, and expel them with divine mantras." He then chanted mantras for three days and said to Mengxun: "The ghosts have gone north." Soon afterward, beyond the northern border, those dying of pestilence numbered in the tens of thousands. Mengxun feared and respected him all the more, and treated him with even greater courtesy. It happened that Emperor Taiwu of the Wei heard of his esoteric arts and sent an envoy to invite him, notifying Mengxun: "If you do not send Kṣema, we will immediately launch military forces." Mengxun considered his own state too weak to resist the order, yet feared that Kṣema possessed many arts and might plot against him on behalf of the Wei. Anxious and undecided between advancing and retreating, he secretly plotted to eliminate him. Earlier, when Kṣema translated the Nirvāṇa-sūtra, the number of fascicles had already been fixed, but the foreign śramaṇa Dharmavṛddhi said that the chapters of this sūtra were not yet complete. Kṣema had lamented this and vowed that he would seek them out again. Mengxun took advantage of his intention to travel and falsely provided travel funds to send him off, lavishly gifting him precious goods. A few days before departing, [Kṣema] wept and said to the assembly: "My karmic retribution is about to arrive; even all the sages cannot save me. Yet because of my original heartfelt vow, duty does not permit me to halt." When he had traveled forty li, Mengxun secretly sent assassins to murder him. He was forty-nine years old at the time. The assembly all wept and mourned him. Soon afterward, those in Mengxun's entourage constantly saw ghosts and spirits striking him with swords in broad daylight. In the fourth month, Mengxun fell ill in bed and died (Mengxun murdered Kṣema in the third month of the third year of Yihe, and in the fourth month of that same year fell ill and died; truly, retribution is never in vain, following just as a shadow follows the form! Fei Changfang's statement that Kṣema died in the fourth year of Chenghe during [Mengxun's son's] reign is incorrect; that third year of Yihe corresponds to the second year of Yanhe of the Wei, the year guiyou). Earlier, while Kṣema was in Guzang, the śramaṇa Daojin of Zhangye wished to receive the bodhisattva precepts from Kṣema. Kṣema said, "Repent your transgressions first." [Daojin] then devoted himself with utmost sincerity for seven days and seven nights. On the morning of the eighth day, he went to Kṣema to ask to receive them, but Kṣema suddenly flew into a great rage. Daojin reflected further: "It is only that my karmic hindrances have not yet been extinguished." He then strove vigorously for three years, simultaneously meditating and repenting. Thereupon, in the midst of concentration, he saw Śākyamuni Buddha, together with the various Great Beings, transmitting the precepts to him. That night, over ten people staying in the same quarters all had dreams matching what Daojin had seen. Daojin was about to go to Kṣema