His life is destined to be a glorious legend through the ages:
Li Shimin, Taizong of the Tang Dynasty, who is known as the "Emperor of the Ages", commented on him as "pine wind and water moon, not enough to compare with his Qinghua; The pearl of fairy dew, the ...... of its runonly through the ages, but not right";
The great Chinese thinker Lu Xun called him "the backbone of the nation", and the founding father of India, Jawaharlal Nehru, listed him as one of the four great men in the history of the world;
He was originally a person, but both China and India worshipped him as a god, and even in India, people put his parietal bone relics with Shakyamuni's Buddha relics; He is an epic hero, but he is also a real man of flesh and blood, who has traveled thousands of miles alone and completed the feat of earth-shattering, weeping ghosts and gods to the west; He used his brilliant life to tell the world that the charm of love can certainly make people intoxicated, and the will to believe can also make people feel intoxicated.
He has walked through history, into the modern age, and will continue to move into the future – he has become a symbol of adventurers and a disseminator of Buddhism.
He is Tang Seng - Xuanzang.
Xuanzang (600 664 AD), a famous monk of the Tang Dynasty. His common surname is Chen, his name is Yi, and he is a native of Luozhou Wushi (now Yanshi, Henan). Ignoring the government's ban and want, he smuggled through Yumen Pass, traveled 108,000 miles west alone, lasted 19 years, went to India to obtain the true scriptures, and spent his life translating 1,335 volumes of the scriptures. He has traveled all over India, as far as Japan, the Korean Peninsula, and the world. His ideas and spirit have now become the common wealth of the people of China, Asia and the world.
Xuanzang traveled west to seek the law and went through many difficulties and dangers. He got lost in the desert and did not enter a drop of water for four days and five nights; He was robbed several times, one of which was almost sacrificed to the gods as an offering by robbers; The peaks of the Tianshan Mountains, the avalanche is sudden, the danger is full of dangers, and it is impossible to prevent ......He overcame difficulties and obstacles again and again, and also defeated fame and fortune again and again: the flattery of kings, the dignity of prime ministers, the highest honors, the beauty of ** - he regarded all of this as part of his practice, and even had to go on a hunger strike in order to continue his journey west.
Xuanzang had only one thought in his heart: "Go to the apocryphal scriptures, seek the true scriptures, don't go to Tianzhu, and never return to the east." ”
The pious, diligent, and wise Xuanzang eventually gained supreme fame in India and became the most knowledgeable Buddhist master in all of India. As far back as the 9th century, a Japanese monk who went to India to seek Dharma had already discovered that Xuanzang had been depicted as a half-Buddha and half-immortal figure on the murals of many monasteries in India. He wore straw sandals on his feet, and soared above the clouds.
On the twenty-fifth day of the first month of the nineteenth year of Zhenguan (645 AD), the Zhuque Street of Chang'an City was crowded with people, and people rushed to welcome the Tang monk Xuanzang who returned from his travels in India.
After returning to Chang'an, Xuanzang rejected Zaifu's high position, and devoted himself to translating the scriptures for 19 years, never stopping his pen until he passed away, leaving more than 1,000 volumes of Buddhist scripture translations. These sutras were widely disseminated to Japan, Korea, and Southeast Asian countries, and made a great contribution to the revival of Buddhism in the East.
In Chinese history, there is no real historical figure like Xuanzang, who has been elevated to a mythical figure known to women and children - Tang Seng. Tang Seng was originally the collective name of all monks in the Tang Dynasty. However, because Xuanzang's brilliance is extremely brilliant, just as the sky is not full of stars under the sun, for thousands of years, in the minds of the Chinese, Tang Monk refers to him! Xuanzang also has another name - Tang Sanzang. Tang Sanzang was originally an honorific title for all the mages of the Tang Dynasty who were proficient in the scriptures, laws, and treatises on the Sanzang classics. Now, Tang Sanzang is referring to him! This alone is enough to prove Xuanzang's lofty position in Chinese history. Xuanzang left to the Chinese people far more than those Buddhist scripture translations, but also an open mind that embraces all rivers, a spirit of pursuing truth and perseverance!