佛說觀佛三昧海經 5.6

5.6

The Buddha told Ānanda: "The Avīci hell is eight thousand yojanas in length and breadth, an exact square. It has seven layers of iron walls and seven layers of iron nets. Below are eighteen tiers; all around in seven tiers are knife forests, and within the seven layers of walls are further sword forests. Below are eighteen tiers, and each tier has eighty-four thousand layers. In its four corners are four great bronze dogs; their bodies are forty yojanas in width and length, with eyes like flashing lightning, fangs like sword trees, teeth like knife mountains, and tongues like iron thorns. Fierce fire bursts forth from all the hairs on their bodies, and their smoky stench is such that nothing foul in the world can serve as an analogy for it. There are eighteen hell-wardens, with rākṣasa heads, yakṣa mouths, and sixty-four eyes from which iron pellets burst forth scattering like ten-li carts. Their canine teeth project upwards to a height of four yojanas; from the tips of the teeth streams of fire burn the iron carts before them, causing each wheel rim of the iron carts to transform into one hundred million firebrands, knife edges, blades, swords, and halberds, all emerging from the fire. These flowing fires burn the city of Avīci in this manner, making the city of Avīci red like molten copper. Upon the heads of the hell-wardens are eight ox heads, and each ox head has eighteen horns; from the tip of each horn bursts a mass of fire, and the masses of fire further transform into eighteen rims; the rims of fire further change into flaming knife-wheels, about the size of cartwheels, wheel upon wheel in succession amid the blazing flames, filling the city of Avīci. The bronze dogs open their mouths and spit their tongues onto the ground; their tongues are like iron thorns, and when the tongues are extended, they transform into immeasurable tongues filling the ground of Avīci. Within the seven layers of walls are seven iron banners; from the tops of the banners fire surges like gushing springs, and its molten iron splatters and bursts, filling the city of Avīci. Over the thresholds of the four gates of Avīci are eighty caldrons; boiling copper surges forth and overflows from the gates, filling the city of Avīci. Between each tier are eighty-four thousand great iron pythons spitting venom and fire, their bodies filling the city; the serpents roar like celestial claps of thunder, raining great iron pellets to fill the city of Avīci. The tortures of this city are eighty-four thousand billions, and the bitterest among the bitter are assembled in this city. There are fifty billion bugs, each bug having eighty-four thousand beaks; from the tips of the beaks fire streams down like rain, filling the city of Avīci. When these bugs descend, the fierce fires of Avīci blaze intensely, their red light and flames illuminating eighty-four thousand yojanas; surging upward from the Avīci hell, they strike beneath the Mount of Scorched Water in the great ocean; drops of ocean water, about the size of cart-axles, turn into large iron spikes filling the city of Avīci."