Datou didn't know what scripture the Shifa was talking about, but he knew that these words should also be engraved on the back of the box lid. He opened the lid and checked, and sure enough, he saw the Shifa sutra behind the lid of one of the boxes.

The text reads, "My lord, here."

He walked over and picked up a scripture and read it casually. The scriptures in this box were also damp and moldy. It was a little difficult to turn the pages. Fortunately, the handwriting was still clear. What he was most worried about was that these scriptures were written in Sanskrit, because he could see that the scriptures were written in Sanskrit.

I don’t understand Sanskrit, but fortunately the scriptures are written in Chinese, so there is no problem in reading them.

The so-called Xifa, to be precise, should be Xifa, which records the rare and unusual supernatural powers and auspicious signs that happened to the Buddha and his disciples. To put it bluntly, they are some miraculous things, such as which Buddha passed away from his mother’s armpit.

Which Bodhisattva will be born next to you, which Bodhisattva will shine with golden light when preaching, which Arhat will turn into a rainbow when he passes away, and so on, and so on.

Seeing that it was inconvenient to stand and read, Datou pushed a small box nearby and said, "Sir, sit down and read."

"Inappropriate." He shook his head. Although he did not believe in Buddhism, he did not want to sit on Buddhist scriptures.

Hearing the words, Datou hurriedly turned around and ran to the second floor. He brought an empty box down from upstairs and said, "Sir, sit here."

I sat down to read through it. There were quite a lot of scriptures in this box, and I would definitely not be able to finish them all in a short time.

Worried that the darkness in the room would affect reading, Datou wanted to set the wooden frame on fire again. After being stopped and doing nothing, he turned his attention to the black snake coiled at the door. He brought a lot of dry food in his bag, and he had fed the black snake before.

If the snake knows it eats, he will take out the dry food, break it into small pieces and throw it to feed. .??.

At first, he read it very carefully, but after reading some, he speeded up the reading because he found that many of these scriptures exaggerated the truth, and some were even nonsense, and the credibility was not high. If nothing else,

Just saying that the Buddha was born from his mother's armpit is sheer nonsense. He was born wherever he should be. How can he deliberately lie and deceive others in order to highlight his unique holiness?

He had read several Xifa Sutras, and some of the anecdotes in them were indeed eye-opening, but what touched him the most was the extreme enthusiasm revealed in the words. To put it bluntly, Buddhas and Bodhisattvas are good at everything, and the good ones cannot be better.

Even farts are fragrant. Buddhas and Bodhisattvas can do anything. They can tell the past and future lives at a glance, and change the day with a cough.

Although Taoism and Buddhism seem to be on the same page, in fact everyone knows that they are not easy to deal with. Because the doctrines are contradictory and conflicting, it is inevitable that they will not deal with each other. Therefore, Taoists say that Buddhist scriptures are not good, no matter what they say.

Even if it is fair and just, it may also be suspected of slander and attack, but he really can't see it.

If you look at these scriptures, first of all, you have to tell the truth no matter what. Although gods and Buddhas are higher than ordinary people, they cannot have no shortcomings at all. How can you lose your reason and calmness in a fanatical way just because you worship someone? Secondly, gods and Buddhas are also

They are not omnipotent. No matter how powerful the gods are, they cannot know what people are thinking in their hearts. They can only know what people are doing secretly.

They say that Buddhism is tolerant, but that doesn’t seem to be the case. Buddhism demands that the world’s people have no distracting thoughts. Even if they see a beautiful woman on the road and admire them, it is a heinous crime. They have to recite sutras to atone for their sins. After a long time, there is no need to do anything else.

I am busy reflecting and blaming myself every day.

In contrast, Taoism is more humane. It does not distinguish good from evil based on empty thoughts, but only determines merit and demerit based on true words and deeds. You must know that as long as you are a human being, you will have selfish thoughts. If selfish thoughts are also wrong, then there will be no good people in the world.

Yes, all damned sinners.

Although I don’t quite agree with these scriptures, I still patiently read them one by one. Everything has a yin and yang side. We can question the authenticity of the visions and wonders mentioned in these Buddhist scriptures, but we cannot deny that most of the actions performed by Buddhists are good deeds.

, and there are indeed many eminent monks with great wisdom and great supernatural powers.

He is familiar with Shangqing classics and when he reads Buddhist scriptures, he cannot help but make secret comparisons in his mind. There is a saying that one family does not belong to the same family. It may be due to different standpoints. He still feels that Taoist classics are more authentic, if nothing else.

, just talking about the content of the scriptures, Taoists rarely worship a specific immortal enthusiastically and push it to a state of perfection and omnipotence. Taoists believe that immortals are also human beings, and they also have human nature, joy, anger, sorrow, and joy.

Seeing that his brows were furrowed, Da Tou did not dare to disturb him, but at the fourth watch he cautiously asked him if he wanted to drink water. After shaking his head, Da Tou returned to the door, sat on the threshold and looked at the black snake.

The reason why I read the scriptures is to find clues about supernatural powers. However, Buddhism emphasizes that the four elements are empty. They do not consciously practice certain Taoist techniques like Taoist priests. Monks will immediately develop some supernatural powers after their great enlightenment.

Yes, to put it bluntly, even the monks themselves don’t know what kind of magical powers they will have in the future. The reason why this happens is because they do not practice Buddhism to obtain magical powers. From this perspective alone, it is indeed consistent with the idea that the four elements are empty.

Selfless and selfless.

At some point, Datou suddenly said, "Sir, it's gone."

"Huh?" He looked up blankly.

"That snake

Let’s go.” He pointed to the door.

Following what the big head pointed, he turned to look outside the door and saw the black snake winding its way eastward.

"I want to follow it and see where it is going." Datou asked for instructions.

At this time, it was already bright outside, and he nodded in agreement, "Go ahead, be careful."

After receiving permission, Da Tou followed him out.

He took his eyes back and continued to read the Buddhist scriptures.

After looking at it for a while, I suddenly came back to my senses. No, these Buddhist scriptures record strange things that happened to the Buddha and his disciples. What I need is the experience and insights of the great monks who have obtained supernatural powers, and similar things

Naturally, it will not be recorded in the official Buddhist scriptures.

Thinking of this, I put down the Buddhist scriptures in my hands and opened the wooden boxes one by one. I looked at the words behind the lids. There were eighteen large and small wooden boxes on the ground. In addition to the twelve volumes of Tripitaka, there were three boxes with no words on the lids.

Text.

Different from other boxes, although these three boxes also contain books, they are not scriptures, but temple annals recording the history of Wuxiang Temple.

When he saw the temple records, he felt like he had found a treasure. This was what he needed.

Wuxiang Temple is a thousand-year-old temple. So many things have happened in the temple over the years, and many eminent monks have appeared. The temple chronicles record the major events that happened in the temple and the eminent monks who appeared in the past dynasties.

These temple chronicles are neatly stacked according to the age, with specific dates on the book covers. We did not start reading from the beginning of the temple construction, but found the part of the temple chronicles before and after the Huichang Buddhist tragedy three hundred years ago, because according to the Song Dynasty

According to Cai and others' clues, three hundred years ago there appeared in Wuxiang Temple a virtuous and eminent monk who was good at using magical powers to subjugate demons.

Even though it spans a hundred years, there are still more than 30 volumes of relevant temple chronicles. When I read them one by one, I found no useful clues at first. Most of the records in the temple chronicles were how much incense was donated to a certain pilgrim and when it was done.

What rituals are performed to pray for blessings and disasters for the court and the people, and what are the new buildings in the temple, and so on.

But there are also some interesting things. More than three hundred years ago, during the Southern and Northern Dynasties, Yizhou, where Wuxiang Temple is located, belonged to Nanliang. At that time, the emperor of Liang was Xiao Yan. Xiao Yan advocated Buddhism and learned that Bodhidharma, a monk from the Western Regions, was in Wuxiang.

I went to Wuxiang Temple in person to meet the Bodhidharma monk from the Western Regions.

Monk Bodhidharma is described in the temple chronicles as proficient in martial arts, knowledgeable and eloquent. Monk Bodhidharma has been living in Wuxiang Temple for more than a month. In addition to debating Buddhism with the monks in the temple, he also

I once competed in martial arts, but the results of the competition were not recorded in the temple records. If I won, it would definitely be written down. If I didn't write it down, of course I couldn't beat him.

The temple chronicles also record the meeting between Emperor Xiao Yan and Monk Bodhidharma. Xiao Yan came here in good spirits and returned in disgrace. The reason was that Monk Bodhidharma did not like him. Xiao Yan built a large temple in the southern country.

He believed that his merits were immeasurable and he never wanted to talk to Bodhidharma about this matter. However, Bodhidharma said that he had a good intention but was not sincere and had no merit at all.

These words must have choked Xiao Yan, who not only walked away in anger, but also notified the abbot before leaving, asking them to drive away Bodhidharma and prevent this arrogant and rude monk from the Western Regions from staying in the Liang Kingdom.

Since big events don't happen every day, another interesting story is recorded on the following page. Although the emperor issued an order to expel guests, Wuxiang Temple was still very polite to Bodhidharma. They did not forcefully drive him away, but asked him politely.

Find out where to go next.

Bodhidharma did not make it difficult for Wuxiang Temple, so he took the initiative to leave. He only said that there was a fellow named Tuoba who served as the abbot from Shaolin. He wanted to leave here and go north to meet him.

Knowing that Bodhidharma was going north to Shaolin, Wuxiang Temple sent monks to escort him all the way to the river. There were many rivers and lakes in China. In ancient times, rivers referred to the two largest rivers in China, and other rivers were usually called water.

.

A group of people by the river were overtaken by an envoy sent by Xiao Yan. Xiao Yan may have come to his senses and knew that this person was an enlightened monk and wanted to invite him back. However, Bodhidharma had already decided to go and stepped on a tree.

Reeds cross the river from south to north.

After this incident, there were many pages that were lackluster, but they did mention the blood relics of the Buddha. According to the records of the temple, two important pieces of information can be obtained. One is that Wuxiang Temple does enshrine the true body relics of the Buddha, and how many of them there are.

Blood relics. Second, these relics had been in the temple many years ago and were not brought by Bodhidharma.

According to the temple records, the Buddha's relics were brought out during the Buddha's birthday celebration. This shows that the Buddha's blood relics were not placed outside on weekdays. As for where they were placed, the temple records did not mention it.

Afterwards, nothing major happened for a long time, and I felt less interested and less energetic.

After going through several temple chronicles again, useful clues finally emerged. Xiao Yan was in chaos in his later years. During this period, a monk named Xu Yin appeared in Wuxiang Temple. This man was extremely talented and had extraordinary understanding.

At the age of ten, he understood the essence of Buddhism and gained supreme supernatural power.
Chapter completed!