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After crossing the river, (the travellers) immediately came to the kingdom of Woo-chang,(1) which is indeed (a part) of North India. The people all use the language of Central India, "Central India" being what we should call the "Middle Kingdom." The food and clothes of the common people are the same as in that Central Kingdom. The Law of Buddha is very (flourishing in Woo-chang). They call the places where the monks stay (for a time) or reside permanently Sangharamas; and of these there are in all 500, the monks being all students of the hinayana. When stranger bhikshus(2) arrive at one of them, their wants are supplied for three days, after which they are told to find a resting-place for themselves.
There is a tradition that when Buddha came to North India, he came at once to this country, and that here he left a print of his foot, which is long or short according to the ideas of the beholder (on the subject). It exists, and the same thing is true about it, at the present day. Here also are still to be seen the rock on which he dried his clothes, and the place where he converted the wicked dragon.(3) The rock is fourteen cubits high, and more than twenty broad, with one side of it smooth.
Hwuy-king, Hwuy-tah, and Tao-ching went on ahead towards (the place of) Buddha's shadow in the country of Nagara;(4) but Fa-Hsien and the others remained in Woo-chang, and kept the summer retreat.(5) That over, they descended south, and arrived in the country of Soo-ho-to.(6)
NOTES
(1) Udyana, meaning "the Park;" just north of the Punjab, the country
along the Subhavastu, now called the Swat; noted for its forests,
flowers, and fruits (E. H., p. 153).
(2) Bhikshu is the name for a monk as "living by alms," a mendicant.
All bhikshus call themselves Sramans. Sometimes the two names are used
together by our author.
(3) Naga is the Sanskrit name for the Chinese lung or dragon; often
meaning a snake, especially the boa. "Chinese Buddhists," says Eitel,
p. 79, "when speaking of nagas as boa spirits, always represent them
as enemies of mankind, but when viewing them as deities of rivers,
lakes, or oceans, they describe them as piously inclined." The dragon,
however, is in China the symbol of the Sovereign and Sage, a use of it
unknown in Buddhism, according to which all nagas need to be converted
in order to obtain a higher phase of being. The use of the character
too {.}, as here, in the sense of "to convert," is entirely
Buddhistic. The six paramitas are the six virtues which carry
men across {.} the great sea of life and death, as the sphere of
transmigration to nirvana. With regard to the particular conversion
here, Eitel (p. 11) says the Naga's name was Apatala, the guardian
deity of the Subhavastu river, and that he was converted by Sakyamuni
shortly before the death of the latter.
(4) In Chinese Na-k'eeh, an ancient kingdom and city on the southern
bank of the Cabul river, about thirty miles west of Jellalabad.
(5) We would seem now to be in 403.
(6) Soo-ho-to has not been clearly identified. Beal says that later
Buddhist writers include it in Udyana. It must have been between the
Indus and the Swat. I suppose it was what we now call Swastene.
In that country also Buddhism(1) is flourishing. There is in it the place where Sakra,(2) Ruler of Devas, in a former age,(3) tried the Bodhisattva, by producing(4) a hawk (in pursuit of a) dove, when (the Bodhisattva) cut off a piece of his own flesh, and (with it) ransomed the dove. After Buddha had attained to perfect wisdom,(5) and in travelling about with his disciples (arrived at this spot), he informed them that this was the place where he ransomed the dove with a piece of his own flesh. In this way the people of the country became aware of the fact, and on the spot reared a tope, adorned with layers(6) of gold and silver plates.
NOTES
(1) Buddhism stands for the two Chinese characters {.} {.}, "the Law
of Buddha," and to that rendering of the phrase, which is of frequent
occurrence, I will in general adhere. Buddhism is not an adequate
rendering of them any more than Christianity would be of {to
euaggelion Xristou}. The Fa or Law is the equivalent of dharma
comprehending all in the first Basket of the Buddhist teaching,—as
Dr. Davids says (Hibbert Lectures, p. 44), "its ethics and philosophy,
and its system of self-culture;" with the theory of karma, it seems
to me, especially underlying it. It has been pointed out (Cunningham's
"Bhilsa Topes," p. 102) that dharma is the keystone of all king
Priyadarsi or Asoka's edicts. The whole of them are dedicated to the
attainment of one object, "the advancement of dharma, or of the Law of
Buddha." His native Chinese afforded no better character than {.}
or Law, by which our author could express concisely his idea of the
Buddhistic system, as "a law of life," a directory or system of Rules,
by which men could attain to the consummation of their being.
(2) Sakra is a common name for the Brahmanic Indra, adopted by
Buddhism into the circle of its own great adherents;—it has been
said, "because of his popularity." He is generally styled, as here,
T'een Ti, "God or Ruler of Devas." He is now the representative of
the secular power, the valiant protector of the Buddhist body, but
is looked upon as inferior to Sakyamuni, and every Buddhist saint. He
appears several times in Fa-Hsien's narrative. E. H., pp. 108 and 46.
(3) The Chinese character is {.}, "formerly," and is often, as in the
first sentence of the narrative, simply equivalent to that adverb. At
other times it means, as here, "in a former age," some pre-existent
state in the time of a former birth. The incident related is "a Jataka
story."
(4) It occurs at once to the translator to render the characters
{.} {.} by "changed himself to." Such is often their meaning in the
sequel, but their use in chapter xxiv may be considered as a crucial
test of the meaning which I have given them here.
(5) That is, had become Buddha, or completed his course {.} {.}.
(6) This seems to be the contribution of {.} (or {.}), to the force of
the binomial {.} {.}, which is continually occurring.
The travellers, going downwards from this towards the east, in five days came to the country of Gandhara,(1) the place where Dharma-vivardhana,(2) the son of Asoka,(3) ruled. When Buddha was a Bodhisattva, he gave his eyes also for another man here;(4) and at the spot they have also reared a large tope, adorned with layers of gold and silver plates. The people of the country were mostly students of the hinayana.
NOTES
(1) Eitel says "an ancient kingdom, corresponding to the region about
Dheri and Banjour." But see note 5.
(2) Dharma-vivardhana is the name in Sanskrit, represented by the Fa
Yi {.} {.} of the text.
(3) Asoka is here mentioned for the first time;—the Constantine of
the Buddhist society, and famous for the number of viharas and
topes which he erected. He was the grandson of Chandragupta (i.q.
Sandracottus), a rude adventurer, who at one time was a refugee in the
camp of Alexander the Great; and within about twenty years afterwards
drove the Greeks out of India, having defeated Seleucus, the Greek
ruler of the Indus provinces. He had by that time made himself king
of Magadha. His grandson was converted to Buddhism by the bold and
patient demeanour of an Arhat whom he had ordered to be buried alive,
and became a most zealous supporter of the new faith. Dr. Rhys Davids
(Sacred Books of the East, vol. xi, p. xlvi) says that "Asoka's
coronation can be fixed with absolute certainty within a year or two
either way of 267 B.C."
(4) This also is a Jataka story; but Eitel thinks it may be a myth,
constructed from the story of the blinding of Dharma-vivardhana.
