2.5 (Tsai no.18) Tao-shou
The nun Tao-shou (Longevity of the
Way) of Jeta Grove Convent in Chiang-ling
No one knows where Tao-shou's family originally
came from. Of pure and gentle character, she was commended for her reverence
and filial piety. When she was yet a child, she accepted the five fundamental
precepts of a Buddhist householder, and not once did she commit an offence
against them.
In the yüan-chia reign
period (424-453) of Sung, Tao-shou was in mourning for her father, and as a
result she grieved herself sick but felt no pain or discomfort. For several
years she remained sickly and skeletal, not responding to any medical
treatment. Therefore she vowed that, if she were cured, she would leave the
household life to become a nun. After making the vow she gradually recovered,
and in fulfillment of her vow she left the household life and became a nun in
Jeta Grove Convent, where her practice of austerities was unequaled.
She chanted the Flower of the
Law Scripture three thousand times and frequently saw glorious omens.
For example, in the middle of the night on the seventh day, ninth
month, of the sixteenth year of the yüan-chia reign
period (439), a jeweled canopy [such as the kind placed over images of the
Buddha] descended and hovered over her.
Published
by The Institute for Advanced Technology in the Humanities, © Copyright 2003
by Anne Kinney and the University of Virginia