A Record of Buddhistic Kingdoms Being an account by the Chinese monk Fâ-hien of his travels in India and Ceylon (A.D. 399-414) in search of the Buddhist books of — Themes and Context

CHAPTER I. From Chʽang-gan to the Sandy Desert. 9

CHAPTER II. On to Shen-shen and thence to Khoten. 12

CHAPTER III. Khoten. Processions of images. The king’s New monastery. 16

CHAPTER IV. Through the Tsʽung or ‘Onion’ mountains to Kʽeeh-chʽâ; probably Skardo, or some city more to the East in Ladak. 21

CHAPTER V. Great quinquennial assembly of monks. Relics of Buddha. Productions of the country. 22

CHAPTER VI. On towards North India. Darada. Image of Maitreya Bodhisattva. 24

CHAPTER VII. Crossing of the Indus. When Buddhism first crossed that river for the East. 26

CHAPTER VIII. Woo-chang, or Udyâna. Monasteries and their ways. Traces of Buddha. 28

CHAPTER IX. Soo-ho-to. Legend of Buddha. 30

CHAPTER X. Gandhâra. Legends of Buddha. 31

CHAPTER XI. Taksahśilâ. Legends. The four great topes. 32

CHAPTER XII. Purushapura, or Peshâwar. Prophecy about king Kanishka and his tope. Buddha’s alms-bowl. Death of Hwuy-ying. 33

CHAPTER XIII. Nagâra. Festival of Buddha’s skull-bone. Other relics, and his shadow. 36

CHAPTER XIV. Death of Hwuy-king in the Little Snowy mountains. Lo-e. Poh-nâ. Crossing the Indus to the East. 40

CHAPTER XV. Bhida. Sympathy of monks with the pilgrims. 41

CHAPTER XVI. On to Mathurâ, or Muttra. Condition and customs of Central India; of the monks, vihâras, and monasteries. 42

CHAPTER XVII. Saṅkâśya. Buddha’s ascent to and descent from the Trayastriṃśas heaven, and other legends 47

CHAPTER XVIII. Kanyâkubja, or Canouge. Buddha’s preaching. 53

CHAPTER XIX. Shâ-che. Legend of Buddha’s Danta-kâshṭha. 54

CHAPTER XX. Kośala and Śrâvastî. The Jetavana vihâra and other memorials and legends of Buddha. Sympathy of the monks with the pilgrims. 55

CHAPTER XXI. The three predecessors of Śâkyamuni in the buddhaship. 63

CHAPTER XXII. Kapilavastu. Its desolation. Legends of Buddha’s birth, and other incidents in connexion with it. 64

CHAPTER XXIII. Râma, and its tope. 68

CHAPTER XXIV. Where Buddha finally renounced the world, and where he died. 70

CHAPTER XXV. Vaiśâlî The tope called ‘Weapons laid down.’ The Council of Vaiśâlî. 72

CHAPTER XXVI. Remarkable death of Ânanda. 75

CHAPTER XXVII. Pâṭaliputtra, or Patna, in Magadha. King Aśoka’s spirit-built palace and halls. The Buddhist Brahmân, Rȧdhasȧmi. Dispensaries and hospitals. 77

CHAPTER XXVIII. Râjagṛiha, New and Old. Legends and incidents connected with it. 80

CHAPTER XXIX. Gṛidhra-kûṭa hill, and legends. Fâ-hien passes a night on it. His reflections. 82

CHAPTER XXX. The Śrataparṇa cave, or cave of the First Council. Legends. Suicide of a Bhikshu. 84

CHAPTER XXXI. Gayâ. Śâkyamuni’s attaining to the Buddhaship; and other legends. 87

CHAPTER XXXII. Legend of king Aśoka in a former birth, and his naraka. 90

CHAPTER XXXIII. Mount Gurupada, where Kâśyapa Buddha’s entire skeleton is. 92

CHAPTER XXXIV. On the way back to Patna. Vârâṇasî, or Benâres. Śâkyamuni’s first doings after becoming Buddha. 93

CHAPTER XXXV. Dakshiṇa, and the pigeon monastery. 96

CHAPTER XXXVI. In Patna. Fâ-hien’s labours in transcription of manuscripts, and Indian studies for three years. 98

CHAPTER XXXVII. To Champâ and Tâmaliptî. Stay and labours there for three years. Takes ship to Singhala, or Ceylon. 100

CHAPTER XXXVIII. At Ceylon. Rise of the kingdom. Feats of Buddha. Topes and monasteries. Statue of Buddha in jade. Bo tree. Festival of Buddha’s tooth. 101

CHAPTER XXXIX. Cremation of an Arhat. Sermon of a devotee. 107

CHAPTER XL. After two years takes ship for China. Disastrous passage to Java; and thence to China; arrives at Shan-tung; and goes to Nanking. Conclusion or l’envoi by another writer. 111

CHINESE TEXT: 高⁠僧⁠法顯傳

LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS, &c.

Sketch-map of Fâ-hien’s travels _To face Introduction, page 1_

I. Dream of Buddha’s mother of his incarnation _To face p. 65_

II. Buddha just born, with the nâgas supplying water to wash him _To face p. 67_

III. Buddha tossing the white elephant over the wall _To face p. 66_

IV. Buddha in solitude and enduring austerities _To face p. 87_

V. Buddhaship attained _To face p, 88_

VI. The devas celebrating the attainment of the Buddhaship _To face the Title_

VII. Buddha’s dying instructions _To face p. 70_

VIII. Buddha’s death _To follow VII_

IX. Division of Buddha’s relics _To follow VIII_

Several times during my long residence in Hong Kong I endeavoured to read through the ‘Narrative of Fâ-Hien;’ but though interested with the graphic details of much of the work, its columns bristled so constantly—now with his phonetic representations of Sanskrit words, and now with his substitution for them of their meanings in Chinese characters, and I was, moreover, so much occupied with my own special labours on the Confucian Classics, that my success was far from satisfactory. When Dr. Eitel’s “Handbook for the Student of Chinese Buddhism” appeared in 1870, the difficulty occasioned by the Sanskrit words and names was removed, but the other difficulty remained; and I was not able to look into the book again for several years. Nor had I much inducement to do so in the two copies of it which I had been able to procure, on poor paper, and printed from blocks badly cut at first, and so worn with use as to yield books the reverse of attractive in their appearance to the student.

In the meantime I kept studying the subject of Buddhism from various sources; and in 1878 began to lecture, here in Oxford, on the Travels with my Davis Chinese scholar, who was at the same time Boden Sanskrit scholar. As we went on, I wrote out a translation in English for my own satisfaction of nearly half the narrative. In the beginning of last year I made Fâ-Hien again the subject of lecture, wrote out a second translation, independent of the former, and pushed on till I had completed the whole.

The want of a good and clear text had been supplied by my friend, Mr. Bunyiu Nanjio, who sent to me from Japan a copy, the text of which is appended to the translation and notes, and of the nature of which some account is given in the Introduction (page 4), and towards the end of this Preface.

The present work consists of three parts: the Translation of Fâ-Hien’s Narrative of his Travels; copious Notes; and the Chinese Text of my copy from Japan.

It is for the Translation that I hold myself more especially responsible. Portions of it were written out three times, and the whole of it twice. While preparing my own version I made frequent reference to previous translations:—those of M. Abel Rémusat, ‘Revu, complété, et augmenté d’éclaircissements nouveaux par MM. Klaproth et Landresse’ (Paris, 1836); of the Rev. Samuel Beal (London, 1869), and his revision of it, prefixed to his ‘Buddhist Records of the Western World’ (Trübner’s Oriental Series, 1884); and of Mr. Herbert A. Giles, of H.M.’s Consular Service in China (1877). To these I have to add a series of articles on ‘Fâ-Hsien and his English Translators,’ by Mr. T. Watters, British Consul at Î-Chang (China Review, 1879, 1880). Those articles are of the highest value, displaying accuracy of Chinese scholarship and an extensive knowledge of Buddhism. I have regretted that Mr. Watters, while reviewing others, did not himself write out and publish a version of the whole of Fâ-Hien’s narrative. If he had done so, I should probably have thought that, on the whole, nothing more remained to be done for the distinguished Chinese pilgrim in the way of translation. Mr. Watters had to judge of the comparative merits of the versions of Beal and Giles, and pronounce on the many points of contention between them. I have endeavoured to eschew those matters, and have seldom made remarks of a critical nature in defence of renderings of my own.

The Chinese narrative runs on without any break. It was Klaproth who divided Rémusat’s translation into forty chapters. The division is helpful to the reader, and I have followed it excepting in three or four instances. In the reprinted Chinese text the chapters are separated by a circle (〇) in the column.

In transliterating the names of Chinese characters I have generally followed the spelling of Morrison rather than the Pekinese, which is now in vogue. We cannot tell exactly what the pronunciation of them was, about fifteen hundred years ago, in the time of Fâ-Hien; but the southern mandarin must be a shade nearer to it than that of Peking at the present day. In transliterating the Indian names I have for the most part followed Dr. Eitel, with such modification as seemed good and in harmony with growing usage.

For the Notes I can do little more than claim the merit of selection and condensation. My first object in them was to explain what in the text required explanation to an English reader. All Chinese texts, and Buddhist texts especially, are new to foreign students. One has to do for them what many hundreds of the ablest scholars in Europe have done for the Greek and Latin Classics during several hundred years, and what the thousands of critics and commentators have been doing of our Sacred Scriptures for nearly eighteen centuries. There are few predecessors in the field of Chinese literature into whose labours translators of the present century can enter. This will be received, I hope, as a sufficient apology for the minuteness and length of some of the notes. A second object in them was to teach myself first, and then others, something of the history and doctrines of Buddhism. I have thought that they might be learned better in connexion with a lively narrative like that of Fâ-hien than by reading didactic descriptions and argumentative books. Such has been my own experience. The books which I have consulted for these notes have been many, besides Chinese works. My principal help has been the full and masterly handbook of Eitel, mentioned already, and often referred to as E.H. Spence Hardy’s ‘Eastern Monachism’ (E.M.) and ‘Manual of Buddhism’ (M.B.) have been constantly in hand, as well as Rhys Davids’ Buddhism, published by the Society for Promoting Christian Knowledge, his Hibbert Lectures, and his Buddhist Suttas in the Sacred Books of the East, and other writings. I need not mention other authorities, having endeavoured always to specify them where I make use of them. My proximity and access to the Bodleian Library and the Indian Institute have been of great advantage.

I may be allowed to say that, so far as my own study of it has gone, I think there are many things in the vast field of Buddhist literature which still require to be carefully handled. How far, for instance, are we entitled to regard the present Sûtras as genuine and sufficiently accurate copies of those which were accepted by the Councils before our Christian era? Can anything be done to trace the rise of the legends and marvels of Sakyamuni’s history, which were current so early (as it seems to us) as the time of Fâ-hien, and which startle us so frequently by similarities between them and narratives in our Gospels? Dr. Hermann Oldenberg, certainly a great authority on Buddhistic subjects, says that ‘a biography of Buddha has not come down to us from ancient times, from the age of the Pali texts; and, we can safely say, no such biography existed then’ (‘Buddha—His Life, His Doctrine, His Order,’ as translated by Hoey, p. 78). He has also (in the same work, pp. 99, 416, 417) come to the conclusion that the hitherto unchallenged tradition that the Buddha was ‘a king’s son’ must be given up. The name ‘king’s son’ (in Chinese 太子), always used of the Buddha, certainly requires to be understood in the highest sense. I am content myself to wait for further information on these and other points, as the result of prolonged and careful research.

Dr. Rhys Davids has kindly read the proofs of the Translation and Notes, and I most certainly thank him for doing so, for his many valuable corrections in the Notes, and for other suggestions which I have received from him. I may not always think on various points exactly as he does, but I am not more forward than he is to say with Horace,—

‘Nullius addictus jurare in verba magistri.’

I have referred above, and also in the Introduction, to the Corean text of Fâ-hien’s narrative, which I received from Mr. Nanjio. It is on the whole so much superior to the better-known texts, that I determined to attempt to reproduce it at the end of the little volume, so far as our resources here in Oxford would permit. To do so has not been an easy task. The two fonts of Chinese types in the Clarendon Press were prepared primarily for printing the translation of our Sacred Scriptures, and then extended so as to be available for printing also the Confucian Classics; but the Buddhist work necessarily requires many types not found in them, while many other characters in the Corean recension are peculiar in their forms, and some are what Chinese dictionaries denominate ‘vulgar.’ That we have succeeded so well as we have done is owing chiefly to the intelligence, ingenuity, and untiring attention of Mr. J. C. Pembrey, the Oriental Reader.

The pictures that have been introduced were taken from a superb edition of a History of Buddha, republished recently at Hang-chau in Cheh-kiang, and profusely illustrated in the best style of Chinese art. I am indebted for the use of it to the Rev. J. H. Sedgwick, University Chinese Scholar.

The accompanying Sketch-Map, taken in connexion with the notes on the different places in the Narrative, will give the reader a sufficiently accurate knowledge of Fâ-hien’s route.

There is no difficulty in laying it down after he crossed the Indus from east to west into the Punjâb, all the principal places, at which he touched or rested, having been determined by Cunningham and other Indian geographers and archæologists. Most of the places from Chʽang-an to Bannu have also been identified. Woo-e has been put down as near Kutcha, or Kuldja, in 43° 25′ N., 81° 15′ E. The country of Kʽieh-chʽa was probably Ladak, but I am inclined to think that the place where the traveller crossed the Indus and entered it must have been further east than Skardo. A doubt is intimated on page 24 as to the identification of Tʽo-leih with Darada, but Greenough’s ‘Physical and Geological Sketch-Map of British India’ shows ‘Dardu Proper,’ all lying on the east of the Indus, exactly in the position where the Narrative would lead us to place it. The point at which Fâ-hien recrossed the Indus into Udyâna on the west of it is unknown. Takshaśilâ, which he visited, was no doubt on the west of the river, and has been incorrectly accepted as the Taxila of Arrian in the Punjâb. It should be written Takshasira, of which the Chinese phonetisation will allow;—see a note of Beal in his ‘Buddhist Records of the Western World,’ i. 138.

We must suppose that Fâ-hien went on from Nanking to Chʽang-an, but the Narrative does not record the fact of his doing so.

LIFE OF FÂ-HIEN; GENUINENESS AND INTEGRITY OF THE TEXT OF HIS NARRATIVE; NUMBER OF THE ADHERENTS OF BUDDHISM.

1. Nothing of great importance is known about Fâ-hien in addition to what may be gathered from his own record of his travels. I have read the accounts of him in the ‘Memoirs of Eminent Monks,’ compiled in A.D. 519, and a later work, the ‘Memoirs of Marvellous Monks,’ by the third emperor of the Ming dynasty (A.D. 1403–1424), which, however, is nearly all borrowed from the other; and all in them that has an appearance of verisimilitude can be brought within brief compass.

His surname, they tell us, was Kung,[1] and he was a native of Wu-yang in Pʽing-Yang,[2] which is still the name of a large department in Shan-hsi. He had three brothers older than himself; but when they all died before shedding their first teeth, his father devoted him to the service of the Buddhist society, and had him entered as a Śrâmaṇera, still keeping him at home in the family. The little fellow fell dangerously ill, and the father sent him to the monastery, where he soon got well and refused to return to his parents.

When he was ten years old, his father died; and an uncle, considering the widowed solitariness and helplessness of the mother, urged him to renounce the monastic life, and return to her, but the boy replied, ‘I did not quit the family in compliance with my father’s wishes, but because I wished to be far from the dust and vulgar ways of life. This is why I chose monkhood.’ The uncle approved of his words and gave over urging him. When his mother also died, it appeared how great had been the affection for her of his fine nature; but after her burial he returned to the monastery.

On one occasion he was cutting rice with a score or two of his fellow-disciples, when some hungry thieves came upon them to take away their grain by force. The other Śrâmaṇeras all fled, but our young hero stood his ground, and said to the thieves, ‘If you must have the grain, take what you please. But, Sirs, it was your former neglect of charity which brought you to your present state of destitution; and now, again, you wish to rob others. I am afraid that in the coming ages you will have still greater poverty and distress;—I am sorry for you beforehand.’ With these words he followed his companions into the monastery, while the thieves left the grain and went away, all the monks, of whom there were several hundred, doing homage to his conduct and courage.

When he had finished his novitiate and taken on him the obligations of the full Buddhist orders, his earnest courage, clear intelligence, and strict regulation of his demeanour were conspicuous; and soon after, he undertook his journey to India in search of complete copies of the Vinaya-piṭaka. What follows this is merely an account of his travels in India and return to China by sea, condensed from his own narrative, with the addition of some marvellous incidents that happened to him, on his visit to the Vulture Peak near Râjagṛiha.

It is said in the end that after his return to China, he went to the capital (evidently Nanking), and there, along with the Indian Śramaṇa Buddha-bhadra, executed translations of some of the works which he had obtained in India; and that before he had done all that he wished to do in this way, he removed to King-chow[3] (in the present Hoo-pih), and died in the monastery of Sin, at the age of eighty-eight, to the great sorrow of all who knew him. It is added that there is another larger work giving an account of his travels in various countries.

Such is all the information given about our author, beyond what he himself has told us. Fâ-hien was his clerical name, and means ‘Illustrious in the Law,’ or ‘Illustrious master of the Law.’ The Shih which often precedes it is an abbreviation of the name of Buddha as Śâkyamuni, ‘the Śâkya, mighty in Love, dwelling in Seclusion and Silence,’ and may be taken as equivalent to Buddhist. It is sometimes said to have belonged to ‘the eastern Tsin dynasty’ (A.D. 317–419), and sometimes to ‘the Sung,’ that is, the Sung dynasty of the House of Liu (A.D. 420–478). If he became a full monk at the age of twenty, and went to India when he was twenty-five, his long life may have been divided pretty equally between the two dynasties.

2. If there were ever another and larger account of Fâ-hien’s travels than the narrative of which a translation is now given, it has long ceased to be in existence.

In the Catalogue of the imperial library of the Suy dynasty (A.D. 589–618), the name Fâ-hien occurs four times. Towards the end of the last section of it (page 22), after a reference to his travels, his labours in translation at Kin-ling (another name for Nanking), in conjunction with Buddha-bhadra, are described. In the second section, page 15, we find ‘A Record of Buddhistic Kingdoms;’—with a note, saying that it was the work of the ‘Śramaṇa, Fâ-hien;’ and again, on page 13, we have ‘Narrative of Fâ-hien in two Books,’ and ‘Narrative of Fâ-hien’s Travels in one Book.’ But all these three entries may possibly belong to different copies of the same work, the first and the other two being in separate subdivisions of the Catalogue.