The Country of Molapo摩臘婆國

The country of Molapo is more than six thousand li around. The great capital city of the country is more than thirty li around, and it lies southeast of the Mohe river. The soil is rich and fat, and sowing and reaping are full and plentiful. Grass and trees grow thick, and flowers and fruit bear in abundance. The land is suited above all to winter wheat, and the people eat much bread and parched meal. The people are good and gentle by nature and for the most part quick of mind. Their speech is refined and clear, and their learning and their arts are ample and deep. Within the borders of the five Indias there are two countries that hold learning heavy, Molapo in the southwest and Mojietuo in the northeast. They prize virtue and esteem benevolence, and they are bright and quick and strong in study. Yet this country believes in the false and the true together. The monasteries are several hundred and the monks more than two hundred, and they study the Law of the Zhengliang school of the Lesser Vehicle. The temples of the gods are several hundred and the followers of other ways are truly many, and most of them are of the company that smears itself with ashes.

The record of the country says that sixty years ago there was a king named Shiluoadieduo. His wit and his wisdom were high and clear, and his talent and his learning were rich and quick. He loved and nourished the four kinds of living things and revered and exalted the Three Jewels. From his holy birth to the end of his days there was no look of anger on his face, and his hand never harmed a living thing. Even when his elephants and horses drank, the water was strained before it was given them, for he feared that the nature of the water might be hurt. Such was his benevolence and his mercy. He was on the throne more than fifty years, and the wild beasts grew familiar with men, and all the common people of the whole country killed and harmed nothing. Beside his palace he raised a shrine, exhausting every craft and skill and making its adornment complete, and within it he made images of the seven Buddhas, the World-Honored Ones. Every year he always held a great assembly open to all, calling together the monks of the four quarters and offering them the four kinds of gift, sometimes the three robes and the tools of the Way, sometimes the seven jewels and rare and wonderful things. Age after age his heirs have carried this on, and the fair work has never been broken off.

More than twenty li northwest of the great city one comes to a Brahman town. Beside it there is a sunken pit. In autumn and in summer, when the long rains linger and the flood stands for more than ten days, it is filled; yet though it takes in all the streams, no water gathers in it. Beside it a small stupa has also been raised. It is heard from the records of old that this is the place where long ago a Brahman of great pride sank alive into hell. Long ago there was a Brahman in this town who knew things widely from his birth, and his learning crowned the men of his time. In the books within and the books without he searched the hidden and the subtle to the end, and the counting of the calendar and the writings of mystery lay as plain to him as his own palm. His bearing and his rule of life were pure and high, and his good name was spread far. The king prized and revered him greatly, and the men of the country honored him as their master. His disciples were counted by the thousand, and they tasted the Way and admired his manner. He would always say of himself, "I was born for the world, to set forth the words of the sages and to lead the common man. Among the worthies before me and the wise men after me there is none to match me. Men all bow before the great god Zizai and the god Posou and the god Naluoyan and the Buddha, the World-Honored One, as grass bows before the wind. They hand down their Way, and there is none who does not draw their likeness and vie in doing them reverence. My virtue now goes beyond theirs and my name stands first in this age. If I have nothing to set me apart, by what shall I be made plain?" So he had images of the great god Zizai and the god Posou and the god Naluoyan and the Buddha, the World-Honored One, carved out of red sandalwood, and he made them the four legs of his seat, and wherever he went he carried it on his back. Such was his arrogance. At that time there was in western India a monk named Batuoluolüzhi. He was wonderfully skilled in the art of reasoning and had searched the other treatises to their depth. The manner of his Way was pure and unmixed and the scent of his precepts was strong. He wanted little and knew when he had enough, and he sought nothing of things. When he heard of this he sighed and said, "What a pity. The age has no men, and so that foolish fellow dares to work his wicked virtue." Then he took up his staff and wandered far and came to this country, and he laid before the king the purpose he had long held. The king saw his worn looks and in his heart did not yet revere him, but he thought his will high and forced himself to do him courtesy. So he set out a seat for debate and told the Brahman of it. The Brahman heard and laughed and said, "What man is this, that he dares to hold such a purpose?" He commanded his followers to come to the ground of debate, and several hundred thousand of them waited before and behind and listened. Xian'ai wore worn and old clothes, and he spread out grass and sat upon it. The Brahman straddled the seat he carried with him, and he denied and drove off the true Law and set forth his false school. The clear speech of the monk ran like a stream, going round and coming back again, and after a long while the Brahman gave way and asked his pardon. Then the king said, "Long have you taken a hollow name in vain, deceiving those above you and leading the multitude astray. It is written in the books of old that whoever is beaten in debate should be put to death." And he was about to heat iron and set him upon it. The Brahman, hard pressed and in terror, threw himself upon their mercy and begged to be saved. Xian'ai pitied him and asked the king, saying, "The benevolent teaching of the great king reaches far and satisfies all, and the sound of praise fills the roads. You should spread mercy and nurture and not do a cruel thing. Forgive him what he could not reach, and leave his going and his staying to himself alone." The king had him ride an ass and go round the walled towns to be proclaimed. The Brahman was ashamed of a disgrace that was like death, and in his anger he vomited blood. When the monk heard of it he went and comforted him, saying, "Your learning wraps in what is within and what is without, and the sound of you has reached far and near. In the matter of glory and disgrace you should be clear when to go forward and when to draw back. As for a name, what is real in it?" The Brahman was angry and enraged, and he cursed the monk bitterly and slandered the Greater Vehicle and made light of the sages of old. His voice had not yet died away when the earth split open and he fell in alive, and the trace that he left is here.

From here one goes southwest into where the sea meets, and going northwest two thousand four or five hundred li one comes to the country of Azhali.