IX. GUṆAVARMAN : 367-431 A.D.
Life translated from Kao Seng tchouan of Houei-Kiao, composed in A.D. 519, the most complete of the Chinese biographies of this monk.
Summary: Guṇavarman was a kṣatriya of the royal line of Kashmir. He was remarkably intelligent, and of a thoughtful disposition. He renounced the world at twenty, and became a master of the āgamas, and earned the name ‘Master of the Law of Tripiṭaka’. When he was thirty the king of Kashmir died without an heir, and the ministers pressed Guṇavarman to rule the kingdom, but he declined. He retired to the forest and carefully hid himself away from others.
He then went to Ceylon, developed his religious practices, and then went over to Cho-po (Java ?). There the king’s mother had a dream regarding him on the night preceding the day of Guṇavarman’s arrival; the queen-mother respectfully received him and the king became a Buddhist after his mother and the religion spread. Guṇavarman then wrought many miracles. What follows is a translation of the Chinese text from Chavannes’ rendering.
“Then, the famous monks of the capital,[^1] the śramaṇas Houei-kouan, Houei-ts’ong and others, heard of the good work (of Guṇavarman) and thought of telling their sovereign about it; in the ninth month of the first year Yuan-kia (424), they spoke out their ideas in an interview with the emperor Wen, and proposed that they would go and ask Guṇavarman to come (to China). The emperor then issued a decree requiring the prefect of Kiao tcheou (Hanoi) to take steps for the transport by boat of (Houei-)Kouan and his colleagues; he sent at the same time the śramaṇas Fa-tchang, Tao-Tcho’ng, Tao-tsiun and others that they might go down there and request (Guṇavarman to come); they carried also (imperial) letters to Guṇavarman and the king of Cho-po (Java ?), Po-to-kia,[^2] expressing a lively desire to see Guṇavarman come to the Song territory and spread the religious teaching there. Guṇavarman, considering it important to spread the holy doctrine, had no fear of travel, and before the imperial envoys came, he had already embarked on the boat of a merchant, the Hindu Nandi, with the intention of going to a small kingdom; but he found a favourable wind, and arrived at Kouang-tcheou (Canton). This explains the following passage in his posthumous writing: ‘When I was already en route, I was carried by the wind, and I arrived in the Song territory’. The emperor Wen, learning that Guṇavarman had reached (the province of) Nan-hai, issued a new decree requiring the prefects and governors to see that Guṇavarman was supplied with provisions and sent to the capital.
“The route passed Che-hing;[^3] Guṇavarman spent over a year there. At Che-hing is the mountain Hou-che, a solitary eminence of which the peaks are scarped and abrupt; Guṇavarman said that it resembled the Gṛdhrakūṭa, and they changed its name and called it the Peak of the Vulture; outside the temple on this mountain, there was a hall of dhyāna in a separate spot; this hall was many li distant from the temple, and no noise was heard there; yet, when the Ghaṇṭā began to resound Guṇavarman was already there; if he came in the rain, he was not wet; if he walked in the mire, he was not soiled. There was then no one, cleric or layman, that did not feel an increasing and respectful admiration for him.
“In the temple was the hall Pao-yue (ratnacandra). On the northern wall of this hall, Guṇavarman painted with his own hand the image of Lo-yun (Rāhula) and the scene of Dīpaṅkara and the young student spreading his hair.[^4] When the figures were completed, as the evening came on, they gave out a lustre which ceased only after a long time.
“The prefect of Che-hing, T’sai Mao-tche evinced the greatest admiration for Guṇavarman; later, when he was at the point of death, Guṇavarman came in person to see him, and comforted him by preaching the law. Subsequently, a relation (of T’sai Mao-tche) saw him in a dream with a multitude of the clergy expounding the law in a temple; that surely was an effect produced by the force of the conversion made by Guṇavarman.
“This mountain was once infested by a large number of tigers; from the time Guṇavarman settled there, he went by day and returned by night, and if now and then he met a tiger, he touched his head with his baton, stroked him and then went away; then the travellers who went by the mountains and on the rivers found no obstacle to their going and coming. Among them seven or eight out of ten were touched by this kindness and became converted.
“Once Guṇavarman was engaged in a meditation in a separate hall from which he did not come out for many successive days. The clerics of the temple sent a śramaṇera to observe him; he saw a white lion standing erect alongside of a column; everywhere in the chamber bloomed the flowers of the blue lotus. The śramaṇera was frightened and raised a loud cry and entered (the hall) to chase the lion; but then there was only a void, and nothing more to be seen. Many were the miracles of this unparalleled nature that Guṇavarman wrought.
“Meanwhile the emperor Wen reiterated to (Houei-)Kouan and his colleagues, the order to request Guṇavarman once more to come at once. Then Guṇavarman proceeded by boat to the capital and reached Kien-ye (Nanking) in the first month of the eighth year Yuan-kia (431). The emperor Wen went out to receive him and made solicitous enquiries of him. He (Emperor) profited by the occasion and put him this question: ‘I, your disciple, have a constant desire to observe the prohibitions and to abstain from killing; but as I have necessarily to subordinate my sentiments to those of others, I am unable to give effect to my intentions. O, Master of the Law, since you have not found 10,000 li too great a distance to traverse for converting this kingdom, what will be your instruction to me?’ Guṇavarman answered: ‘Wisdom is in the heart, not in acts; religion originates in yourself and not from others. Besides, kings and ordinary men have entirely different codes of conduct; for the ordinary man, his person is of little value and his reputation is inconsiderable; his commands are not feared; if he does not conquer himself and lead a life of asceticism, what is he good for? As for the sovereign, the country bounded by the four seas is his house; the thousands of the people, his children; when he speaks a good word, all men and women rejoice; when he conducts an excellent government, men and gods are reconciled thereby; punishments no longer shorten lives; forced labour no more exhausts the strength (of the people); it causes the wind and rain to come in proper time, winter and summer to correspond to their proper periods, all sorts of cereals to increase in abundance, the mulberry and the hemp to flourish. To observe abstinence in this manner, is an abstinence which is also lofty; to shun killing likewise, is a benevolence which is also manifold. How could it be possible by curtailing the nourishment of half a day or by saving the life of some one animal for one to find that he has accomplished this noble and salutary work?” The emperor then softly struck the table and said with a sigh: ‘The laity go wrong in ultimate principles; the clergy embarrass themselves in the doctrine of what is near at hand. Those who go astray on ultimate principles hold empty discourses on absolute wisdom; those that embarrass themselves in a doctrine of what is near at hand allow themselves to be fettered by the written rules. But regarding the language you employ, Master of the Law, we can well say that it is that of an open and intelligent man; it is worth while for all to talk with you about what concerns heaven and earth’. Then he ordered that Guṇavarman should reside in the temple Tche-houan (Jetavana vihāra), and he provided liberally for his maintenance; the dukes, kings and all persons of distinction paid their respects to him.
“Then Guṇavarman began to expound in this temple the Saddharmapuṇḍarīka sūtra and the Daśabhūmi sūtra. On days when he started to preach, sedan chairs and canopies of officials blocked the road; the spectators who went there and came back in succession rubbed shoulders with one another and walked close on one another’s heels. Guṇavarman had marvellous natural resources; his admirable dialectic was divinely eminent; sometimes he had recourse to an interpreter and, by a series of dialectical discussions, obscure points became clear.
“Afterwards, Houei-yi, (monk) of the temple Tche-houan asked him to publish (the book called) P’ou-sa chan kie; (Guṇavarman) began by issuing twenty-eight sections of it; later, one of his disciples published for him two sections, thus making a total of thirty sections. But before the work was recopied, the sections comprising the Prefaces and the Prohibitions were lost; that is why there are still two different texts (of the work).[^5] This work was also called P’ou-sa kie ti.
“Earlier, in the third year Yuan-Kia (426), the prefect of Sin tchou, Wang Tchong-to, while he was at Pong-tcheng, had requested the foreigner I-che-po-lo (Īśvara) to translate the work called Tsa-sin;[^6] but when the section on Choice was reached, (Īśvara) had to stop the work on account of some difficulty. Now Guṇavarman was requested again to translate and publish the last sections (of this work) which formed thirteen chapters. We get a total of twenty-six chapters if we add the earlier publications, viz., the Sseu fen kie-mo, yeou-p’o-sai won kie lio louen, the yeou-p’o-sai eul che eul kie. In all these translations, the style and the sense were perfect and exact; there was not the least difference between the Sanskrit and the Chinese.
“Meanwhile, the nuns of the temple Ying-fou viz., Houei-kuo, Tsing-yin and others,[^7] addressed to Guṇavarman a request in these terms: ‘It is six years since eight nuns from Ceylon came to the Capital. There have been no nuns before in the territory of the Song. Where shall we find (the rules for) the second assembly[^8] receiving the prohibitions? We fear that the section on prohibitions is not complete.’ Guṇavarman answered them: ‘The system of prohibitions was promulgated at first with the assembly of the great monks in view; supposing that a case other than that of the original type presents itself, nothing prevents the reception of the prohibitions, being due to love of religion.’ The nuns were still afraid that they were not of the prescribed age, and desired at once to receive (the prohibitions) afresh. Guṇavarman told them: ‘Very well! if truly you desire to increase the lustre (of religious life), that will aid the company greatly to enjoy itself (puṇyānumodana). Only the nuns of the western land are also not of the prescribed age; besides, the number of ten persons has not been reached.’[^9] He then induced them to study the language of the Song (Chinese), and, on the other hand, with a notable from the Western countries as intermediary, he requested that more nuns from the foreign land should come to make up the number ten.[^10]
“During that year, in summer, Guṇavarman passed the season of retreat in the lower temple of Ting-lin. There were then devoted people who gathered flowers for spreading them on the mats; only the colours of the flowers placed in the spot where Guṇavarman was seated increased in freshness; all the people adored him as a saint. When summer came to an end, he returned to the temple Tche-houan (Jetavana vihāra). The same year, on the twenty-eighth day of the ninth month, before the mid-day meal was finished, he got up first and went back to his chamber. His disciple went a little later, but he had already died suddenly. He was then sixty-five.
(Ed. Chavannes—Toung Pao II, 5. (1904), pp. 193-206). Cf. Pelliot, BEFEO. iv. pp. 274-5.