A Record Of Buddhistic Kingdoms - Being An Account By The Chinese Monk Fa-hien Of His Travels In India And Ceylon (a.d. 399-414) By James Legge
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"The Family Name Was
Certainly Gautama," Adding In A Note, "It Is A Curious Fact That
Gautama Is Still The
Family name of the Rajput chiefs of Nagara, the
village which has been identified with Kapilavastu." Dr. Eitel says
that
"Gautama was the sacerdotal name of the Sakya family, which
counted the ancient rishi Gautama among its ancestors." When we
proceed, however, to endeavour to trace the connexion of that
Brahmanical rishi with the Sakya house, by means of 1323, 1468, 1469,
and other historical works in Nanjio's Catalogue, we soon find that
Indian histories have no surer foundation than the shifting sand; - see
E. H., on the name Sakya, pp. 108, 109. We must be content for the
present simply to accept Gotama as one of the surnames of the Buddha
with whom we have to do.
[10] See chap. vi, note 5. It is there said that the prediction of
Maitreya's succession to the Buddhaship was made to him in the Tushita
heaven. Was there a repetition of it here in the Deer-park, or was a
prediction now given concerning something else?
[11] Nothing seems to be known of this naga but what we read here.
[12] Identified by some with Kusia, near Kurrah (lat. 25d 41s N., lon.
81d 27s E.); by others with Kosam on the Jumna, thirty miles above
Allahabad. See E. H., p. 55.
[13] Ghochira was the name of a Vaisya elder, or head, who presented a
garden and vihara to Buddha. Hardy (M. B., p. 356) quotes a statement
from a Singhalese authority that Sakyamuni resided here during the
ninth year of his Buddhaship.
[14] Dr. Davids thinks this may refer to the striking and beautiful
story of the conversion of the Yakkha Alavaka, as related in the
Uragavagga, Alavakasutta, pp. 29-31 (Sacred Books of the East, vol. x,
part ii).
CHAPTER XXXV
DAKSHINA, AND THE PIGEON MONASTERY.
South from this 200 yojanas, there is a country named Dakshina,[1]
where there is a monastery (dedicated to) the bygone Kasyapa Buddha,
and which has been hewn out from a large hill of rock. It consists in
all of five storeys; - the lowest, having the form of an elephant, with
500 apartments in the rock; the second, having the form of a lion,
with 400 apartments; the third, having the form of a horse, with 300
apartments; the fourth, having the form of an ox, with 200 apartments;
and the fifth, having the form of a pigeon, with 100 apartments. At
the very top there is a spring, the water of which, always in front of
the apartments in the rock, goes round among the rooms, now circling,
now curving, till in this way it arrives at the lowest storey, having
followed the shape of the structure, and flows out there at the door.
Everywhere in the apartments of the monks, the rock has been pierced
so as to form windows for the admission of light, so that they are all
bright, without any being left in darkness.
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