The white fox raised his head and glanced at me, his eyes clear and pure, but then, I fell into a trance.
I was wondering why there was a white fox in this room. A burst of smoke came and obscured my vision. When I saw clearly again, the scene in front of me had changed.
The person crawling in front of the Buddha is not a white fox, but He Yuchen.
She was dressed in snow-white clothes and was kneeling down to worship.
I breathed a sigh of relief. It seemed that I might have been dazzled just now.
But I didn't say anything. I walked behind her and stood there silently, watching her pray to Buddha.
She used the five-body prostrating technique, and her whole body was completely prostrate on the ground, which is commonly known as "kowtow to the big head".
I used to go to Kek Lok Temple often, and I also listened to the great monks lecture on scriptures and discuss Dharma.
The five-body prostrations are one of the Buddhist etiquettes. They are also divided into five rounds of prostrations, prostrations, foot-receiving salutes, head-and-face salutes, and prostrations.
According to Volume 2 of "The Records of the Western Regions of the Tang Dynasty", there are nine types of rituals practiced in India. The ninth type is to bow down to the ground with five body parts, which is the highest of all rituals. Usually only worshiping Buddhas and Bodhisattvas is used to express piety.
When I stood behind He Yuchen, she paused slightly. She should have known that someone was coming, but she was not affected and continued to bow and bow.
After watching for a while, I counted almost thirty times silently, but she wasn't finished yet.
I finally couldn't hold it back and asked.
"How many times do you need to bow and salute like this?"
She still didn't look back or stop, clasped her hands together and prostrated again.
"Buddhist scriptures say that if a person has one hundred and eight kinds of troubles, he must worship Buddha and Bodhisattva one hundred and eight times."
"Is it like this every day?"
"This happens every day, without interruption."
"Aren't you tired of praying like this?"
She didn't answer my question this time, but spoke slowly.
"When the person who salutes with his right knee touches the ground, he wishes to enable all living beings to achieve enlightenment."
"When the person who salutes touches the ground with his left knee, he wishes that all sentient beings will not have wrong views on the teachings of outsiders and will be able to establish themselves in the path of perfect enlightenment."
"When the person who is doing the salute touches the ground with his right hand, he may wish to be like the World Honored One sitting on the Vajra Seat, and the earth will shake, showing auspicious signs, and he will realize the great Bodhi."
"When the person who is doing the salute touches the ground with his left hand, he wishes to keep all sentient beings away from the heretics, and uses the four methods of taking in those who are difficult to tame, so that they can enter the right path."
"When the person doing the salute touches his head to the ground, he hopes that all sentient beings will be free from arrogance and arrogance, and will achieve the goal of not seeing the top."
The early morning sunlight poured in from the window and reflected on her body, making her snow-white clothes shine.
She looked like a Bodhisattva in the mist.
I didn't quite understand what she said just now, but for some reason, when I looked at her, a trace of sadness arose in my heart.
This girl, who is younger than me, must also be a person with a story, right?
I asked her why she was so religious?
She smiled faintly and replied to me: I didn't succeed in cultivation in my previous life, so I have to give myself a chance in this life.
I stopped talking and waited silently.
After a while, she finally finished, then stood up, took a towel, and wiped the sweat from her temples.
A burst of woman's unique body fragrance floated over.
"You came to me to become my disciple specifically to save your aunt, right?"
She suddenly told me the reason for my visit, which surprised me. I thought to myself, she was too powerful. She knew it before I even said it?
I asked curiously: "You actually already know it. Did the Immortal family tell you?"
She smiled sweetly: "Mama Hu called me last night and said."
oh……
I laughed too embarrassedly, but suddenly I didn't know how to speak.
So I rubbed my hands and asked, "Then...do you agree?"
She put down the towel, tilted her head and looked at me, and said, "You can become a disciple, but my conditions are very strict. Can you do it?"
"You can just say it, you're welcome."
"If you want to be my apprentice, the first requirement is that you must be an unmarried man, and you are not allowed to get married or fall in love in the future. Can you do it?"
I was immediately stunned and thought to myself, what the hell is this condition? I’m just acting out, I’m not a monk!
Seeing that I was silent, He Yuchen curled up the corners of his mouth and shook his head slightly.
"I know that no one can meet this condition, so you'd better go."
She turned around and was about to leave. I thought of my aunt, gritted my teeth, and stepped forward to stop her.
"What if I can promise you?"
"It's impossible. As time goes by, you will definitely forget what I said. Moreover, even if you don't get married, how can you not be in love?"
"I...I don't understand. You don't want to accept a disciple at all, so you set such harsh conditions?"
I really don’t understand, how in the world can this be true?
In these days, even if the temple recruits monks, the job is from 9 to 5. As long as you don’t eat meat during work, you can do whatever you like after get off work.
She looked at me: "You don't need to ask why, just answer whether you agree or not."
I thought about it carefully and then answered honestly.
"I agree now, but I may not be able to bear it in the future. So, if I can't accept you as my teacher, then I'll think of other ways. Thank you."
It's easy to lie, but I don't want to lie to her, and I don't want to lie to myself.
As soon as I walked to the door, she suddenly called to me.
"Okay, okay, I'm not that perverted. I'm testing you. In fact, this is not my condition."
I stopped and turned around.
"Then what are your conditions?"
"It's very simple. If you want to be my apprentice, you have to bear my karma. If I am in trouble in the future, can you help me with all your life?"
After she said this, she walked up to me and looked at me without blinking.
"Can you do it? If you can, you have to swear."
My heart couldn't help but clench in my throat, because I knew that once I agreed to this sentence, I would be responsible for her karma in the future.
Thinking of what Uncle Ma and Mother Hu said, I hesitated, but then I remembered that my aunt was in danger, so I risked my life!
I nodded heavily, then raised my hand and said seriously.
"I swear, after becoming a disciple, I will bear the karma and karma together with you. Your business is my business. If someone bullies you, I will help you with all my life, for the rest of my life..."
As soon as I said this, she suddenly reached out her hand and gently pressed it on my mouth.
"Okay, that's enough, I promise to take you in."
I was overjoyed, but she said to me calmly: "You don't have to help me in every life, this life is enough, because I don't want to have an afterlife."
She had said this before, and she mentioned it again today, and I couldn't help but wonder.
"Why don't you hope for an afterlife?"
"You will know about this problem in the future. But I want to remind you that even if you take action, asking your old king to pray for longevity may not be successful. Because, life and death are determined by fate."
She suddenly changed the topic, I was startled, and then smiled bitterly.
"I also know that life and death are fateful, but I don't want to give up. I want to try. She is my only relative."
"Don't you have other relatives?"
"Yes, there are many more, but after my family's accident, those people disappeared. My aunt is the only one who is good to me."
"I see."
She was silent for a moment, and then asked me to go back and make some preparations. She and Hu Ma would prepare some materials today and help me set up the ceremony at midnight.
When leaving the Buddhist hall, she picked up another scripture, knelt in front of the Buddha, and recited it devoutly.
That is the "Ksitigarbha Bodhisattva's Original Vow Sutra".
"...Buddha told Mañjuśrī, for example, in the three thousand great thousand worlds, all the vegetation, jungles, rice, hemp, bamboo, reeds, and dust on mountains and rocks, one by one, can be counted as one Ganges river, one Ganges sand, one sand one boundary, one boundary Within one calamity, every dust is one calamity, and within one calamity, all the accumulated dust is a calamity..."
