Avalokitesvara at Three Places: Jungsaengsa三所觀音 衆生寺

An old tradition of Silla says this.

The Chinese emperor had a favorite woman whose beauty was without equal. Saying that among paintings past and present there were few to match her, he commanded a skilled painter to paint her likeness.〔The painter's name has been lost in transmission; some say it was Zhang Sengyou. If so, he was a man of Wu who held office under Liang, so the emperor would be one from between Liang and Chen in China. That the tradition calls him a Tang emperor is only because the people of Haedong call all of China Tang. In truth it is not known which dynasty's emperor he was, so both are kept here.〕

That man carried out the command and completed the painting, but he let his brush slip by mistake and a red spot was left below the navel. He tried to fix it but could not. In his heart he suspected that the red mark must be one she was born with.

When the work was done and presented, the emperor looked at it and said, "The form is a true likeness indeed. But the mark below the navel is something hidden within. How did you know of it and paint it too?"

The emperor was greatly angered, put him in prison, and was about to punish him. The prime minister said, "That man is honest in heart. I beg you to pardon him."

The emperor said, "If he is worthy and honest, let him paint the image I saw in my dream last night and present it. If it does not differ, I will pardon him."

The man painted an image of the Eleven-Faced Avalokitesvara (十一面觀音像) and presented it, and it matched what the emperor had seen in the dream. At this the emperor relented and pardoned him.

After the man escaped death, he made a pact with the scholar Bunjeol (芬節), saying, "I hear that the country of Silla honors and believes in the Buddha's teaching. If I board a boat with you and cross the sea, and there together we practice Buddhist works and bring wide benefit to a benevolent country, would that not be good?"

At last they came together to the country of Silla, and so they made the image of Great Compassion at this temple. The people of the country looked up to it, prayed, and received blessings beyond counting.

At the end of Silla, in the Tiancheng (天成) years, the jeongbo (正甫) Choe Eunham (崔殷諴) had long been without a child. He went before the image of Great Compassion at this temple and prayed, and a child was conceived and a son born.

Before the child was three months old, Gyeon Hwon of Baekje attacked the capital, and the city fell into chaos.

Eunham came carrying the child and said before the image:

"The soldiers of the neighboring country have come suddenly and the matter is urgent. Carrying an infant, we cannot escape together. If in truth this child was given by the great sage, I beg you to lend the power of great compassion, shelter and rear him, and let father and son meet again."

He wept in grief, wept three times and pleaded three times, then wrapped the child in swaddling cloth, hid him under the lion throne, and left, looking back again and again.

After half a month, when the raiders had withdrawn, he came to look for him. The child's skin was as if freshly bathed, his face and body were lovely, and the smell of milk still lingered in his mouth.

He carried him home and raised him. When he grew up his intelligence and wisdom surpassed other men. This was Seungno (丞魯), whose office rose to jeonggwang (正匡).

Seungno fathered the nangjung Choe Suk (崔肅), and Choe Suk fathered the nangjung Jean (齊顔), and from then on the line never broke. Eunham followed King Gyeongsun into this dynasty and became a great clan.

Also, in the tenth year of Tonghe (統和), in the third month, the monk Seongtae (性泰), who was in charge of the temple, knelt before the bodhisattva and said:

"Your disciple has long stayed at this temple, serving the incense diligently day and night without slackening. But the temple has no fields to yield anything, and there is no way to keep up the incense and the offerings, so I have come to take my leave, meaning to move elsewhere."

That day he dozed off and in a dream the great sage said to him, "Master, stay as you are and do not go far away. I will gather donations to cover the cost of the offerings."

The monk woke in joy, and in the end he stayed and did not leave.

Thirteen days later two men suddenly arrived at the gate with loads on horses and oxen. The temple monk went out and asked, and they said this:

"We are people from the region of Geumju (金州). Some time ago a monk came to us and said, 'I have long lived at Jungsaengsa in the Eastern Capital, and since the four necessities are hard to come by, I have come to seek donations.' So we collected from the neighborhood, got six seok of rice and four seok of salt, and have brought them here."

The monk said, "No one from this temple has gone out to seek donations. You seem to have heard wrongly."

The men said, "That monk brought us here. When we reached the side of Singyeonjeong (神見井), the well over there, he said, 'The temple is not far. I will go ahead and wait,' so we followed after him."

The temple monk led them in before the Dharma hall. The men looked up at the great sage in reverence and said to one another, "This is the very monk who came seeking donations."

They did not cease from wonder and amazement. And so the rice and salt they offered never stopped, year after year.

Also, one evening a fire broke out at the temple gate, and the villagers ran to put it out. When they went up into the Dharma hall and looked, the image was nowhere to be found; then they saw it was already standing in the middle of the courtyard. They asked who had carried it out, and all said they did not know. From this they knew the divine majesty of the great sage.

Also, around the thirteenth year of Dading (大定), the gyesa year, a monk named Jeomsung (占崇) came to live at this temple. He did not know letters, but his nature was pure at heart, and he served the incense diligently.

A certain monk wanted to take his place and complained to the chinui cheonsa (襯衣天使), the royal commissioner: "This temple is a place where the state prays for grace and upholds blessings. Someone who can read should be chosen to take charge of it."

The commissioner agreed, and to test the man he handed him a prayer text (疏文) upside down.

Jeomsung opened it as it came to his hand and read it off like flowing water.

The commissioner was impressed. He withdrew, sat in a room, and had him read it again, but Jeomsung shut his mouth and said nothing.

The commissioner said, "Master, you are truly one whom the great sage protects."

In the end he did not take his place from him.

The recluse Kim Inbu (金仁夫), who lived at the temple together with Jeomsung at that time, passed this on to the elders of the village, and it was written down and handed on.