Interpretation of FA Xian

Faxian

FA Xian, a monk in the later Qin and Eastern Jin Dynasties, was a native of Pingyang County.

He is a famous monk in the history of Chinese Buddhism, an innovator of Buddhism, the first master to seek Buddhist scriptures abroad, an outstanding traveler and translator.

In 399, Faxian started from Chang'an (now the site of Chang'an City in the Han Dynasty) and went to Tianzhu via the western regions to seek commandments. He traveled to more than 30 countries and collected a large number of Sanskrit classics. It took 14 years before and after that, and returned to his country in the ninth year of Yixi.

The introduction of Buddhist culture into China by FA Xian and Xuan Zang had a great influence on Chinese history and culture.

Spratly Islands shows its hidden sand as a souvenir.

Life of the characters

Becoming a monk in childhood

Born in Pingyang County, Faxian, originally surnamed Gong, witnessed the mutual substitution of later Zhao, ran Wei, Qian Yan and Former Qin forces in his early years. He had three brothers who died young in childhood. His parents worried that he would die young too. When he was only about three years old, they called him a monk.

At the age of ten, my father died. His uncle, considering that his mother was widowed and hard to live, asked him to return to secular life. At that time, Faxian was very devout in Buddhism. He said to his uncle, "I didn't become a monk because I had a father. I just became a monk because I had to leave the secular world." His uncle didn't force him either. Soon, his mother died, and he went back to the temple after the funeral.

At the age of 20, Faxian received the Great Commandment (a ritual performed by monks to prevent physical and mental errors when they enter adulthood). Since then, he has been more faithful to Buddhist belief and more rigorous in his behavior. He is sometimes praised as "wise in his mind and conduct, and clean up the rituals".

Determined to serve Buddha

"You Lu" Original: often lament the law of the missing, vow to seek. The biography of eminent monks completely copied the original text of Youlu. Although the classics and laws are mentioned together here, the key point is law. The original text of Youlu is also copied in Gujin Yijing Tuji, as are Kaiyuan Shijiao Lu and Zhenyuan Xinding Shijiao catalogue.

There is another formulation in the annals of the three treasures of the past dynasties and the internal records of the Tang Dynasty: "there is no theory of all classics and laws in Jin Dynasty.". It's too vague to get to the point. Faxian's words are of course the most authoritative. The first sentence of the biography of FA Xian is: "Fa Xian was in Chang'an in the past, and he regretted that the law was incomplete." Here we only mention the law collection, not the theory of scriptures. He wrote in the Indian city of barenfeld: "the Dharma shows its original intention and wants to make the commandments circulate in the Han area." It can be seen that he never forgets the commandments. This is completely in line with the trend at that time. Frodoro, who specializes in the Department of law, was very popular in China. In the biography of eminent monk Liang, Volume 2, biography of Frodo, there is such a saying: "first, though the Scriptures and dharmas are preached, the laws are not explained." (refer to Ren Jiyu, ed. history of Chinese Buddhism, Vol. 2, pp. 580-582) the reason why Faxian was abandoned is to seek Indian Buddhist precepts to help the poor Chinese Buddhism.

The original text of Youlu: in the third year of Jin Long'an, he and his classmates Huijing, Daozheng, Huiying and Huiwei came from Chang'an. Jin Long'an three years is equivalent to ad 399, after the first year of Qin Hongshi. The first year of Hongshi was in the reign of Jihai. It is a mistake in the first year of Hongshi that all the editions of faxianzhuan handed down today are written as "the second year of Hongshi". It is correct that volume 3 of biography of eminent monks, Volume 7 of the three treasures of the past dynasties, Volume 3 of Datang neidian record, Volume 2 of ancient and modern translated classics and volume 3 of Kaiyuan Shijiao record are all written as "the third year of Long'an in the Eastern Jin Dynasty". At this time, dao'an had been dead for more than ten years, and Roche had been in Chang'an for two years.

Travel to the West

In 399, the third year of Long'an in the Eastern Jin Dynasty, FA Xian had spent more than 60 years in the Buddhist circle. After more than 60 years of experience, Faxian deeply felt that the translation of Buddhist scriptures could not meet the needs of the great development of Buddhism. In particular, due to the lack of commandments, the majority of Buddhists can not follow, so that the upper monks are extravagant and do all kinds of evil. In order to maintain the "truth" of Buddhism and correct the current malpractice, Faxian decided to go west to Tianzhu (ancient India) to seek the precepts.

In the spring of this year, together with Huijing, Daozheng, Huiying and Huiwei, Faxian got up from Chang'an and started a long and arduous journey westward. The next year, they went through Xiqin and Nanliang established by Xianbei people in Hexi to Zhangye (now Zhangye in Gansu Province) under the management of duanye, the king of Beiliang. They met Zhiyan, Huijian, sengshao, Baoyun and sengjing, forming a "parade group" of ten people. Later, another Huida was added, a total of eleven people. The "tour group" went west to Dunhuang (now Dunhuang in Gansu Province), with the financial support of Dunhuang's prefect Li Zhen, and left Yangguan to cross the Shahe (bailongdui desert) in the West. Faxian and other five people followed the messengers first, Zhiyan and Baoyun followed. The climate of bailongdui desert is very dry, and there are hot wind and quicksand from time to time. Faxian later described the scene here in his "the kingdom of Buddha" and said: "there are no birds above and no animals below. When you look at the extreme eyes and want to measure the place, you don't know what to draw up. Only the dead bones are the standard ears." Risking their lives, they walked 17 days and nights, 1500 miles, and finally crossed the Shahe River to Shanshan, the first oasis city to the west of bailongdui. It was also the hometown of Loulan in the Han Dynasty. The earliest inhabitants were the primitive Mediterranean Afghan Indo European. After the collapse of the Kushan empire in northern India, there was a group of exiled nobles with Gandharan language, so they would look both eastern and western. Ordinary people's clothing has been largely sinicized, mainly made of wool or hemp. However, the land near Loeb daze is poor and the output is very low due to the serious salinization. Although it supports the splendid culture, repeated competition also creates great suffering for the indigenous people here. Just before the arrival of FA Xian, this small country was also implicated by the former Liang Dynasty's western expedition and the former Qin Dynasty's attack on kuci.

Then they passed through Shanshan state (now Ruoqiang in Xinjiang) and went to Pengyi state (now Yanqi in Xinjiang). The local residents are also typical Indo European, and the name comes from the Sanskrit ajini, the God of fire in Hinduism. However, Hinayana Buddhism from India is also popular, and the Brahmi alphabet in India is used as the writing system. Although the national treasury reserves are not sufficient, the residents here are good at riding and shooting, so they often plunder the wealth of the past business travel with their courage.

They lived in Pengyi for more than two months, and Baoyun and others arrived. At that time, because of the Hinayana belief (Indian Buddhism is divided into two schools of Hinayana and Mahayana), Faxian and his party belonged to Mahayana, so they received a cold reception in the country, and even had no food and accommodation. As a last resort, Zhiyan, Huijian and Huiwei returned to Gaochang (Turpan, Xinjiang) to raise funds. Seng Shao followed the monks of the western regions to Qubin (in today's Kashmir).

The seven men, including FA Xian, were supported by Fu Gongsun, a former Qin emperor, who was left behind in Lu Guang's expedition to kuci. They began to move southwest and cross the taklima desert. Taklima desert is located in the center of Tarim Basin (Tarim, originally meaning "zhiliu" in ancient Turkic language), but the meaning of Taklimakan has not been determined. Generally speaking, there are three justifiable explanations: 1. The hometown of grapes; 2. The original homeland; 3. The homeland of the tuhuoluo people). It is extremely dry, with great temperature difference between day and night and changeable climate. It's very hard for pedestrians to get here. As Faxian said: "there is no inhabitant on the road, it is difficult to walk in sand, and no one can compare the sufferings." After walking for a month and five days, faxianyi finally walked out of the desert and reached Khotan (today's Hotan, Xinjiang). Khotan was a major center of Buddhism in the western regions at that time. They watched the Buddhist "walking statue" ceremony here and lived there for three months.

This ancient city-state of the Cypriots is also a frequent stronghold of mixed blood between the East and the West. Although still speaking the Iranian branch, it was combined with the military and civilian in the mainland who moved to the west very early. The local king of weichi family also used the title of king of all kings of Persia family, and acted as a bully in southern Xinjiang. Finally, it merged four small city states nearby and developed into a regional small power with a population of 80000 and 30000 soldiers.

Nurtured by the local fertile land and Hotan River, Khotan is so peaceful that it can support tens of thousands of monks. Because there were many merchants on the Silk Road, temples also played the role of pawnshops, banks, hotels and receptions. The mature temple economy gives monks the financial resources to spread their beliefs and receive fellow monks from the East. The local people treat Mahayana and Hinayana equally, so Faxian gets good treatment.

At that time, it was Buddha's birthday. Faxian found that the king of Khotan had a movable holy elephant cart. The Buddha statues above are draped with silk curtains and decorated with seven Buddhist treasures. There are two gold and silver Bodhisattvas on the left and right. When the Buddha is about to enter the city, the maids will scatter petals from the gate. Royal ministers will also wear new clothes and worship the Buddha with flowers barefoot. This kind of worship ceremony with the characteristics of Western classical civilization undoubtedly impressed FA Xian deeply.

More importantly, the monks had seen many unheard of scriptures just after they arrived in Khotan. These contents are enough for them to learn and digest for a long time. However, Faxian believed that only by crossing the Congling mountains could he get access to the real Buddhism, instead of being satisfied with second-hand goods in the western regions.

Then the team went on, passed through ziheguo, crossed Congling, crossed xintouhe and arrived at najieguo. After passing Congling, Faxian saw a completely different new world. When passing through the later famous wahan corridor, he called the cold wind and glacier poisonous dragons. The cold climate of four seasons is also an experience that Faxian has never experienced. If you don't make it at the right time, you will be easily swept away by the strong wind. Most of the stone ladders are located in the mountains, below which is the wanzhang cliff. As long as the traveler visits down, he will lose the courage to take the second step. Therefore, the local only known as the snow mountain people's plug