Bodhidharma achieved enlightenment, becoming the 28th Indian Patriarch in that lineage , and then, in accordance with instructions from Prajñātāra, he traveled to China to transmit the Mahayana teachings.
After a perilous three-year sea voyage, he finally reaches Canton (China), whereupon he makes his way to the court of the Liang Dynasty in Nanking (Nanjing) and speaks with Emperor Wu (Liáng Wǔdì ). The pious monarch, one of China's most fervent patrons of Buddhism, is told that his building of temples, ordaining of monks, carving of Buddha statues, and copying of sutrus has no karmic merit .
The emperor is puzzled and perhaps annoyed, so Bodhidharma makes a quick getaway, heading northward to Shaolin Temple on Mt Song in the state of Wei. To reach his destination, he must cross the mighty Yangtze River. At Shaolin Temple, he meditates for nine years in a cave, gaining the name Wall-Gazing Brahman.
Bodhidharma's new meditation technique attracts few students, but one of them, Huìkě, is so eager to become Bodhidharma's student that he stands outside the cave in the snow and waits a long time for the master's attention and then Huìkě cuts off his own left arm and presents it to the master to demonstrate his determination to attain enlightenment (this scene is also represented in artwork). Huìkě eventually becomes Bodhidharma's successor. Despite two unsuccessful attempts by rivals to poison Bodhidharma, the sage knowingly takes poison on their third attempt, and dies at the age of 150. Three years later, in the Pamir mountains, a Chinese diplomat named Sòng Yún is returning to China from a trip to the West when he meets Bodhidharma, who is on his way back to India, walking barefoot and carrying one shoe in his hand. When the diplomat finally gets home, and tells this story, the master's grave is opened and all that is found is one shoe. Bodhidharma is thereafter considered a type of Taoist Immortal, one who feigned his own death.
0 comments:
Post a Comment