India — A General Account印度總述

Looking closely at the name Tianzhu, opinions are tangled and at odds. In old days men said Shendu, and some said Xiandou. Now, following the correct sound, it should be called India. The people of India name their countries by the land they live in, and every region has its own customs. But when they take up the general name from afar and speak of what is fair in it, they call it India. India, in the language of the Tang, is "the moon." The moon has many names, and this is one of them. All living things turn in the wheel without rest, and in the long night of ignorance there is none to call the dawn. It is as when the white sun has hidden and the moon of night follows after. Though the stars give light, how can it be like the brightness of the clear moon? For this reason the land is likened to the moon. Truly it is because the sages of that land follow one another in their tracks, guiding the common people and ordering all things, as the moon shines down. For this meaning it is called India. The clans and surnames of India are divided into many kinds, and the Brahmans are held especially pure and noble. Men followed that fair name, and it was handed down until it became custom. So, without speaking of the division of borders, they call the whole of it the country of the Brahmans.

As for the bounds of its territory, they may be told. The borders of the Five Indias are more than ninety thousand li around. On three sides is the great sea, and to the north it turns its back on the Snow Mountains. It is broad in the north and narrow in the south, shaped like a half moon. The fields are marked off and divided into more than seventy countries. The season is very hot, and the land has many springs and much damp. In the north the hills and mounds run on and on, and the ridges are salt. In the east the streams and plains are rich and moist, and the furrows are fat. In the south the grass and trees grow thick. In the west the soil is barren and full of gravel. This is the general shape of it, and it may be told in brief.

The name for measuring length is the yojana. A yojana is the distance a holy king of old marched his troops in one day. Old accounts say that one yojana is forty li. By the custom of the country of India it is thirty li, and what is set down in the holy teaching is only sixteen li. To go to the smallest number, one yojana is divided into eight krosha. A krosha is the farthest that the lowing of a great ox can be heard, and so it is called krosha. One krosha is divided into five hundred bows, one bow into four cubits, and one cubit into twenty-four fingers. One joint of a finger is divided into seven barley grains, and so on through a louse, a nit, a mote in a crack, an ox hair, a sheep hair, a rabbit hair and copper water, each divided by seven in turn, down to fine dust. Fine dust divided into seven is the finest dust. The finest dust cannot be split again, for to split it is to return to emptiness, and so it is called the utmost minuteness.

The turning of the dark and the bright, and the stations where the sun and the moon lodge, are called by different names, but the seasons and the times are no different. The names of the months are set by the lodging of the stars. The shortest time is called the kshana. A hundred and twenty kshana make one takshana, sixty takshana make one lava, thirty lava make one muhurta, five muhurta make one time, and six times together make one day and one night. Lay people divide the day and the night into eight times. While the moon waxes to the full is called the white half, and while it wanes to the last day is called the black half. The black half is fourteen days or fifteen days, because the months are small or great. The black half goes first and the white half follows, and together they make one month. Six months together make one course. When the sun travels on the inner side it is the northern course, and when it travels on the outer side it is the southern course. These two courses together make one year, and the year is again divided into six seasons. From the sixteenth day of the first month to the fifteenth of the third month it grows warm. From the sixteenth of the third month to the fifteenth of the fifth month the heat is full. From the sixteenth of the fifth month to the fifteenth of the seventh month is the time of rain. From the sixteenth of the seventh month to the fifteenth of the ninth month is the time of growth. From the sixteenth of the ninth month to the fifteenth of the eleventh month it grows cold. From the sixteenth of the eleventh month to the fifteenth of the first month the cold is full. In the holy teaching of the Tathagata the year has three seasons. From the sixteenth of the first month to the fifteenth of the fifth month is the hot season. From the sixteenth of the fifth month to the fifteenth of the ninth month is the rainy season. From the sixteenth of the ninth month to the fifteenth of the first month is the cold season. Some make four seasons, which are spring, summer, autumn and winter. The three months of spring are called Chaitra, Vaishakha and Jyeshtha, and here they are from the sixteenth of the first month to the fifteenth of the fourth month. The three months of summer are called Ashadha, Shravana and Bhadrapada, and here they are from the sixteenth of the fourth month to the fifteenth of the seventh month. The three months of autumn are called Ashvayuja, Karttika and Margashirsha, and here they are from the sixteenth of the seventh month to the fifteenth of the tenth month. The three months of winter are called Pausha, Magha and Phalguna, and here they are from the sixteenth of the tenth month to the fifteenth of the first month. Therefore the monks of India, following the holy teaching of the Buddha, keep the retreat in the season of rain, some in the first three months and some in the latter three months. The first three months are here from the sixteenth of the fifth month to the fifteenth of the eighth month, and the latter three months are here from the sixteenth of the sixth month to the fifteenth of the ninth month. Those of former ages who translated the scriptures and the rules of discipline said sometimes "sitting through the summer" and sometimes "sitting through the year's end." All this came of the different customs of the border lands, which did not reach the correct sound of China, or else the speech of a region had not yet been made one with it, and so there were errors in the translating. Again, if one traces the days and months when the Tathagata entered the womb, was first born, left the house, became Buddha and entered nirvana, there are differences in them all. That account is in a later record.

As for the towns and villages, the gates and the streets, the square walls rise broad, and the roads and lanes wind about on crooked paths. The markets stand along the way, and the flags of the wine shops line the road. Butchers, fishermen, players, executioners and scavengers of dung have their dwellings marked and are driven outside the town, and when they go to and fro along the lanes they keep to the left of the road. As for the making of houses and the building of walls, the land is hot, low and damp, so the town walls are mostly laid up of brick, and the walls of the houses are sometimes woven of bamboo and wood. Houses and towers are built of boards with flat roofs, plastered with lime and covered with brick. The other tall buildings are made as they are in China. Some are thatched with reeds or straw, some are of brick or of board. The walls are dressed with lime, and the floors are spread with cow dung to make them clean, with flowers of the season scattered over them. This is what differs. The monasteries are built with great strangeness of design. Towers rise at the four corners, and the halls are of three storeys. The rafters, beams and ridgepoles are carved in strange shapes, and the doors, windows and walls are painted in many colors. The houses of the common people are rich within and plain without. The inner room and the main hall differ in height and breadth. The terraces and upper storeys are not bound to one form. The doors open to the east, and the morning seat faces east. For sitting and resting they all use corded couches. Royal kin, great men, gentlemen, commoners and powerful houses differ in their ornament, but the measure of it is the same. The king's seat at audience is higher and broader still, with pearls set into it here and there, and it is called the lion couch. Fine cotton is spread upon it, and the feet rest on a jeweled stool. All the many officers carve strange creatures as they please and adorn them with rare treasures.

Clothes and ornaments are not cut to any fixed pattern. They hold dear what is fresh and white, and think little of mixed colors. The men wind a cloth about the waist and draw it under the arm, passing it across so that the right shoulder is bare. The women let a skirt hang down and cover both shoulders together. On the crown they make a small topknot and let the rest of the hair fall. Some shave the moustache, which is a strange custom. On the head they wear a wreath of flowers, and on the body they hang strings of jewels. What they wear is jiaosheye cloth and cotton cloth and the like. Jiaosheye is the silk of the wild silkworm. Zoumo cloth is of the hemp kind. Kanboluo cloth is woven of fine sheep's wool. Helali cloth is woven of the hair of wild beasts. The hair of these beasts is fine and soft and can be spun, and so it is prized and used for clothing. In North India the land is bitterly cold, and they make short narrow garments much like the dress of the Hu. The dress of those of other ways is confused and of many strange makes. Some wear the tail feathers of peacocks. Some hang ornaments made of skulls. Some go without clothing and bare the body. Some cover themselves with grass and boards. Some pull out the hair and cut off the moustache. Some have tangled hair and a knotted topknot. There is no fixed garment, and the red and the white are not constant. The robes of the sramana are only the three robes, the samkaksika and the nivasana. The cutting of the three robes is not the same in every school. In some the border is wide or narrow, in some the patches are small or large. The samkaksika covers the left shoulder and hides both armpits. It is open on the left and closed on the right, and is cut long enough to pass the waist. The nivasana has no belt or loop, so when it is put on the cloth is gathered into pleats and bound with a cord. The pleats differ in every school, and the color is yellow or red, not the same. The Kshatriya and the Brahman live pure and simple, white and clean and sparing. The kings and the great ministers have clothing and ornaments quite different. A wreath of flowers and a jeweled crown adorn the head, and bracelets and strings of jewels are worn on the body. The rich merchants and the great traders have bracelets only. Most people go barefoot, and few wear any shoe. They dye their teeth red or black. They cut the hair even and pierce the ears. Their noses are high and their eyes large. Such is their look.

Their keeping of cleanliness is not a thing they force upon their will. Whenever there is food, they first wash. What is left over is not eaten again, and a dish one has eaten from is not passed to another. Vessels of clay and wood are thrown away after one use. Vessels of gold, silver, copper and iron are rubbed bright each time they are used. When the meal is done, they chew a willow twig to make the mouth clean. Before the washing and rinsing are finished, they do not take hold of one another or touch. Whenever they make water, they always wash. They anoint the body with sweet scents, which are sandalwood and saffron. When the king is about to bathe, drums are beaten and strings and songs are played. When they offer sacrifice and bow in the shrines, they bathe and wash.

Looking closely at their writing, it was made by Brahma. The rule he handed down at the beginning had forty-seven letters. They meet with things and join to make words, and they turn and are used according to the matter. They have flowed out into branches, and their source has grown ever wider. With the land and with the people they have changed a little, but in the main they are not different from the root and source. Yet Central India is especially exact and correct. The tone of its speech is harmonious and refined, the same in sound as the speech of heaven. Its breath and rhythm are clear and bright, and it is the standard for men. The neighboring lands and other countries have learned what is wrong and made it their teaching. They race after a thin custom, and none keeps the pure manner.

For recording words and writing down affairs there are officers in charge of each. The histories and the edicts together are called niluobitu. Good and evil are both set down, and calamities and good omens are all written.

In opening the minds of children and drawing them forward, they first teach the twelve chapters. After the seventh year they are given by degrees the five great treatises of knowledge. The first is the knowledge of sounds, which explains words and glosses letters and sets out the divisions of things. The second is the knowledge of crafts, which is skill and art, machines, the dark and the bright, and the reckoning of the calendar. The third is the knowledge of medicine, which is the charms that ward off evil, and drugs and needles and moxa. The fourth is the knowledge of causes, which examines and settles what is right and what is false, and tests the true against the untrue. The fifth is the inner knowledge, which searches out to the end the causes and fruits of the five vehicles and their wonderful truth.

The Brahmans study the four treatises of the Veda. The first is life, which is the nourishing of life and the ordering of the nature. The second is sacrifice, which is the offering of sacrifice and the making of prayer. The third is peace, which is rite and ceremony, divination, the art of war and the ordering of armies. The fourth is art, which is strange powers, skills and numbers, charms and the way of medicine.

The teacher must search out to the full what is fine and subtle and pierce through what is deep and hidden. He shows the great meaning and tells it again in subtle words. He leads and urges, carving the rotten wood and pressing on the thin. If a pupil is quick and wide in understanding but slack in will and ready to run off, the teacher binds him fast and shuts the gate, and lets him go only when his study is done.

At the age of thirty, when the will is set and the learning done, they take office and salary, and first repay the virtue of the teacher. There are some among them who know much of old things and love what is refined, who withdraw and live hidden and upright, who float and sink outside the world and roam beyond affairs, whom neither favor nor disgrace can startle, and whose name is heard far off. Even when the king honors them and holds them high, he cannot bend their steps. Yet the country holds understanding and wisdom heavy, and the custom holds what is high and bright dear. The praise being great, the summons by rite is heavy as well. Therefore men make their will firm and their study deep. They forget weariness and roam among the arts. They seek the Way and lean on benevolence, and do not count a thousand li far. Though the house be rich, the will is that of a traveler. For the food of mouth and belly they go about begging and so live. They hold it noble to know the Way, and are not ashamed to lack wealth. But those who take pleasure in play and are idle in study, who steal their food and wear fine clothes, have no goodly virtue and have not studied in season. Shame and disgrace come upon them together, and an ugly name is spread abroad.

The truth and teaching of the Tathagata were given so that each kind might understand. Since the holy one went, long ages have passed, and the true Law has grown thick in some places and thin in others. Each is left to the mind of his own understanding, and all alike gain the awakening that comes of hearing and knowing. The schools stand facing one another like peaks, and their disputes are like waves. The different studies each keep their own gate, but though the roads differ they arrive at the same place. There are eighteen schools, and each boasts its own sharpness. The two vehicles, the Greater and the Lesser, are separate in where they dwell. Among them some sit silent in thought, and some walk and stay and stand. Their meditation and their wisdom are far apart, and noise and quiet are much unlike, so rules of restraint are made for each according to the company he lives in. Whether it be the rules of discipline or the treatises, if it is a scripture of the Buddha, he who expounds one part is freed from the work of the monastery. For two parts, an upper room and furnishings are added. For three parts, an attendant is appointed to wait on him. For four parts, a lay servant is given him for his errands. For five parts, he rides in a carriage drawn by an elephant. For six parts, men go before and behind him and guard him about. As his way and virtue are high, so the honors given him differ. From time to time they gather to expound and debate, and weigh which is better and which worse, marking off good from bad, casting down the dark and raising the bright. If a man weighs the subtle words and lifts up or presses down the wonderful truth, if his refined speech is full and fair and his fine argument quick, then he is set upon a jeweled elephant, and those who go before and behind him are like a forest. But if the gate of meaning opens on emptiness and the edge of his words is dulled, if his truth is scant and his talk long, if his meaning goes astray while his words run smooth, then his face is smeared with red earth and his body sprinkled with dust, and he is driven out into the open field and thrown into a ditch. By this they mark the pure from the foul, and show as well the worthy from the foolish. The people know to delight in the Way, and every house is diligent in the will to learn. To leave the house or to return to the world is as each likes. If a man falls into fault and breaks the rules of discipline, the company of monks sets his punishment. For a light fault the company rebukes him. For the next, the company does not speak with him. For a heavy one, the company does not dwell with him. Not to dwell with him is to cast him out and not count him one of them. When he leaves that dwelling place he has nowhere to put himself, and the hardship of wandering is bitter, so some return to the clothes of a layman.

As for the difference of clan and surname, there are four streams. The first is the Brahman, whose conduct is pure. He keeps the Way and lives upright, and his hold on himself is white and clean. The second is the Kshatriya, the royal stock. Age after age they rule as lords, and their will is benevolence and forbearance. The third is the Vaishya, the merchants. They trade what there is for what there is not, and follow gain near and far. The fourth is the Shudra, the farmers. They put out their strength in the fields and labor with their own bodies in sowing and reaping. These four surnames are separate streams of the clear and the muddy. In marriage and in the making of kin, the flying and the crouching keep to different roads, and the branches of the clan within and without are not mixed by marriage. A woman marries once and never marries again. The other mixed surnames are many in kind and number. Each gathers with its own sort, and they are hard to set out in full.

The kings age after age are Kshatriya only. Killings and usurpations arise from time to time, and men of another surname take the honored seat. The fighting men of the country are chosen out of the bold and the strong. The son takes up the father's work, and so they come to the end of the art of war. In peace they guard the palace all about, and on campaign they lead the army as the first rank. There are four kinds of soldiers, which are foot, horse, chariot and elephant. The elephant is clothed in hard armor, and sharp iron is set on its tusks. One general rides at ease upon it and gives the commands, and two soldiers at the left and right drive it for him. The chariot is drawn by four horses. The commander of the soldiers rides in it, and soldiers are ranged about to guard it, holding the wheels and gripping the hubs. The horsemen scatter to defend, and give chase to the fleeing at command. The foot soldiers defend lightly, and the bold and brave are chosen to fill their ranks. They carry great shields and hold long halberds, and some take sword and blade and press forward in the ranks. Of all their weapons there is none that is not sharp. The spear, the shield, the bow, the arrow, the knife, the sword, the axe, the great axe, the ge halberd, the shu club, the long lance and the wheel rope are all handed down from father to son.

As for their customs, their nature is hasty and quick, but their purpose is very upright and plain. They do not take wealth by any shift, and in what is right they yield more than enough. They fear the guilt that is paid in the world of darkness, and think light of the business of this life. Trickery does not pass among them, and they take an oath for a pledge. Their rule and their teaching hold plainness high, and their custom is still harmonious. When wicked and perverse small men break the law of the country from time to time and plot danger against the ruler, and the traces of it are made plain, they are always shut up in prison and no death is laid on them. They are left to live or die, and are not counted among men. Those who offend against rite and right, and go against loyalty and filial duty, have the nose cut off, or the ears cut off, or a hand cut off, or a foot cut off, or they are driven out of the country, or cast away in the wild borders. For other faults, wealth is paid to redeem the offense. In trying a case and looking into the testimony, no beating is used. They are questioned and answer as they are asked, and the sentence is weighed evenly from the facts. If a man denies what he has done and, ashamed of his fault, covers over his wrong, then, when they would find out the truth and the case must be examined, there are four ways, which are water, fire, the scale and poison. With water, the accused and a stone are put into a bag tied together and sunk in a deep stream, and the true and the false are weighed. If the man sinks and the stone floats, he has offended. If the man floats and the stone sinks, he has hidden nothing. With fire, iron is made red hot and the accused is set upon it and made to tread it with his feet. He is made to lay his palm on it and to lick it with his tongue. If the charge is false, he takes no harm. If it is true, he is burned. A weak man who cannot bear the heat is given a flower not yet open and made to scatter it toward the flame. If the charge is false, the flower opens. If it is true, the flower is scorched. With the scale, the man and a stone are balanced, and light and heavy give the proof. If the charge is false, the man goes down and the stone rises. If it is true, the stone is heavy and the man light. With poison, the right thigh of a black ram is cut open, and according to the share that the accused has eaten, poisons are mixed and put into the right thigh. If the charge is true, the poison works and he dies. If it is false, the poison fails and he comes to himself again. By setting up these four examples, they close the road to a hundred wrongs.

The form of showing respect has nine degrees. The first is to speak words of greeting. The second is to bow the head to show respect. The third is to raise the hands in a high salute. The fourth is to join the palms and hold them level. The fifth is to bend the knee. The sixth is to kneel long. The seventh is to set the hands and knees on the ground. The eighth is to bend all five limbs. The ninth is to throw the whole body on the ground. Of these nine degrees, the utmost is a single bow. To kneel and praise virtue is called giving full respect. From far off they touch the forehead to the ground and bow with joined hands. Near at hand they lick the feet and stroke the heels. Whenever they offer words and receive a command, they lift the skirt and kneel long. When an elder receives a bow he must speak words of comfort. He strokes the crown of the head, or pats the back, and teaches and guides with kind words to show that he is close and warm. A sramana who has left the house, when he receives such respect, only utters a good wish, and does not let the man kneel and bow. According to what they revere, they often walk around it, some only once and some three times. When they have a long-held wish and a request of their own, they make the number as they please.

Whenever sickness comes, they cut off grain for seven days. Within that term many are healed. Only if the sickness does not mend do they take medicine. The natures and kinds of medicine differ in name and sort, and the skill of the physicians differs in how they read the signs.

When a man dies and the mourning begins, they wail and weep together, tear their clothes and pull out their hair, beat the forehead and strike the breast. Of rules for mourning dress nothing is heard, and there is no fixed term of mourning. In sending off the dead and burying them there are three rites. The first is burning, where firewood is heaped and lit. The second is burial in water, where the body is sunk in the stream and carried away. The third is burial in the field, where it is left in the woods for the beasts to eat. When a king dies, they first set up the heir to be king, so that he may preside over the mourning and the sacrifice and settle high and low. A title of virtue is set up while a man lives, and after death no posthumous name is debated. To the house of mourning no one goes to eat. After the burial they return to their usual way and keep no taboo. All hold the sending off of the dead unclean, and everyone bathes outside the city wall before going in. As for those who are old and full of years, whose time of death draws near, who are bound by long sickness and fear the end of their span of life, they grow weary of the dusty world and wish to leave mankind. They think light of life and death and would go far from the road of the world. Then their kin and friends play music and hold a feast of farewell, and they float a boat and beat the oars and cross the river Qingqie. In midstream the man drowns himself, and they hold that he thus gains birth in heaven. About one in ten has not yet cast off this base view. The monks who have left the house are forbidden to wail aloud. At the death of father or mother they recite the scripture of the day and repay the kindness. To follow the far dead and be careful at the end is truly to gain blessing in the world of darkness.

Since the rule and the teaching are generous, the business of the state is also simple. Households are not written in registers, and no forced labor is laid on the people. The king's land is divided into four great parts. The first meets the needs of the state and supplies the grain for sacrifice. The second is granted in fief to the ministers and officers who assist him. The third is given as reward to those who are wise and understanding, deep in learning and high in talent. The fourth plants the field of blessing and provides for the followers of the several other ways. Therefore what is levied is light and the labor and taxes are small, and each man rests in the work of his house and tills the share allotted to him. Whoever borrows the king's land to farm it pays one part in six as tax. Merchants who follow gain and come and go with their wares pay a light duty at the barriers on the fords and roads, and then pass on. When the state builds anything, it does not use labor for nothing, but pays the worth of it according to the work done. For garrison duty and campaigns, and for the guard of the palace, men are gathered as the business requires, and a reward is offered and men awaited. Governors, assisting ministers, the many officers and their aides each have their share of land, and eat from their own fiefs.

The wind and the soil being different, the yield of the land is different too. The flowers, grasses, fruits and trees are of many kinds and strange names. They are the anmoluo fruit, the anmiluo fruit, the modujia fruit, the badaluo fruit, the jiebita fruit, the amoluo fruit, the zhendujia fruit, the wutanbaluo fruit, the maozhe fruit, the naliluo fruit and the bansuo fruit. All of this kind are hard to set down in full, and only those the world prizes are named here in brief. The jujube, the chestnut, the wild persimmon and the persimmon are not heard of in India. Pears, crab apples, peaches, apricots, grapes and the like are planted here and there from the country of Jiashimiluo onward. The pomegranate and the sweet orange are grown in every country.

They break the fields and work at farming, sowing and reaping, plowing and weeding. They sow and plant in season, each as he is diligent or idle. Of what the land brings forth, rice and barley are the most plentiful.

For vegetables there are ginger, mustard, melons, gourds, the huntuo vegetable and the like. Onions and garlic are few, and few eat them. If anyone in a house eats them, he is driven outside the city wall.

Milk and curds, butter and cream, sugar and rock candy, mustard oil and all kinds of cakes and parched grain are their everyday food. Fish, mutton, roe deer and deer are served from time to time as meat dishes. The ox, the donkey, the elephant, the horse, the pig, the dog, the fox, the wolf, the lion, the monkey and the ape, all these haired kinds, are as a rule not eaten. Those who eat them are ashamed, and everyone holds them foul. They are made to live apart outside the city wall, and their traces are rarely seen among men.

As for the differences of wine and the kinds of its taste, what is made from grapes and sugar cane is drunk by the Kshatriya. Thick liquor brewed with yeast is drunk by the Vaishya and the like. The sramana and the Brahman drink the juice of grapes and sugar cane, which is not called wine. The mixed surnames and the low clans make no distinction at all.

The vessels they use differ in skill and plainness, but their household gear lacks nothing in season. They use the kettle and the cauldron, but they do not know the steamer. Many vessels are of baked clay, and red copper is little used. They eat from one dish, mixing the many flavors, and take their measure with the fingers. They have almost no spoons or chopsticks. Only for the old and the sick do they use a copper spoon.

Gold, silver, brass, white jade and fire pearls are the yield of that land, and they are heaped up in great store. Rare treasures of many kinds and strange names come from the shores of the sea, and are easily bought and sold. What they use for money is gold coin, silver coin, cowrie pearls and small pearls, and with these they exchange what they have for what they have not.

The borders and bounds of India have been set out in full, and the differences of its climate and soil are here in outline. The whole has been strung on one thread, and the general shape roughly told. The differing governments and strange customs will be set down country by country.