Travels of Fah-Hian and Sung-Yun, Buddhist pilgrims : from China to India (400 A.D. and 518 A.D.) / translated from Chinese by Samuel Beal.

  • Faxian
Date:
1869
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Travels of Fah-Hian and Sung-Yun, Buddhist pilgrims : from China to India (400 A.D. and 518 A.D.) / translated from Chinese by Samuel Beal. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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    men of that country says that all tlie thousand Buddhas of the present Kalpa will leave their shadows in this place. About a hundred paces west of this is a place where Buddha during his lifetime shaved his head and pared his nails. Here Buddha, assisted by liis disciples, raised a tower from seventy to eighty feet high) as a model for all future buildings of tlie sort, and this still exists. By the side of this tower is a temple in wliicli about 700 priests reside. In this place also is a tower erected in honor of all the Bahats and Pratyeka Buddhas,1 of whom as many as a thousand in number have dwelt in this place. 1 A Pratyeka Buddha is one who attains tlie condition of Buddha for himself alone (sc. pratyekam [eka] individually.) u Pratyeka Buddha, un Buddha personnel, qui n’a pas la charity universelle et n'op ere que son propre salut.” (E. Burnouf, Sansc. Diet, sub voc.) In the early history of Buddhism these beings (or, this condition of mind) were un- known. The three grades recognised were “ Sravakas (hearers, ^Kovaiai), Arhats, Buddhas. But when the system developed itself the grave question arose, is it possible for a man by the unaided power of his own religious exertions to become perfectly enlightened (Buddha) ? This was neces- sarily answered in the affirmative，but with certain restrictions. Such persons may become Buddhas, but for themselves only, they can benefit no one else; they cannot release any other being from the miseries of suc- cessive existence; they cannot preach, the law, just as a dumb mai】， though he may have seen a remarkable dream cannot explain it to others, or as a savage who enters a city and is sumptuously fed by a citizen, is unable, on his return to the forest to give his fellow savages an idea of the taste of the food he has eaten (M.B. 38). This distinction sprang up under the influence of the doctrine of the successive causes of existence (Nidanas), and was no part of the early Hinayana system (Wasseljew, § 65). In the Sutra of the forty-two Sections, however, this condition of being is recognized, i To feed a hundred learned men is not so meritorious as to feed one virtuous man. To feed a thousand virtuous men is not so