卷二傳九梁郡築戈村寺釋慧木尼

宋尼慧木者，姓傅氏，十一出家，受持小戒，居梁郡築弋邨寺，始讀大品，日誦兩卷。師慧超，嘗建經堂，木往禮拜，輒見屋內東北隅有一沙門，金色黑衣，足不履地，木又於夜中臥而誦習，夢到西方，見一浴池，有芙蓉華，諸化生人，列坐其中；有一大華，獨空無人，木欲登華，攀牽用力，不覺誦經，音響高大，木母謂其魘驚，起喚之。木母篤老，口無復齒，木恆嚼哺飴母，為以過中，不得淨漱，故年將立，不受大戒。母終亡後，木自除草開壇，請師受戒。忽於壇所見天地晃然，悉黃金色，仰望西南，見一天人，著繏衣，衣色赤黃，去木或近或遠，尋沒不見。凡見靈異，秘不語人。木兄出家，聞而欲知，乃誑誘之曰：『汝為道積年，竟無所招，比可養髮，當訪出門。』木聞甚懼，謂當實然，乃粗言所見。唯靜稱尼聞其道德，稱往為狎，方便請問，乃為具說。木後與同等共禮無量壽佛，因伏地不起，咸謂得眠，蹴而問之，木竟不答，靜稱復獨苦求問，木云：『當伏地之時，夢往安養國見佛，為說小品，已得四卷，因被蹴即覺，甚追恨之。』木元嘉十四年時已六十九。

2.9 (Tsai no.22a) Shih Hui-mu

[A second version of Hui-mu's life taken from the sixth-century collection titled Ming hsiang chi (Records of mysterious omens)]

The nun Hui-mu of the Sung dynasty was surnamed Fu. She entered the religious life at age eleven but accepted only the ten rules [of a novice in the monastic life]. She lived in Chu-ko Village Convent in Liang Commandery.

When Hui-mu first read the Larger Perfection of Wisdom, she was able to chant from memory two chapters a day [a total of more than twenty thousand words]. Her teacher, Hui-ch'ao, had built a scripture hall, and once, when Hui-mu went in to offer worship, she saw in the northwest corner of the room a Buddhist monk wearing the gold-colored robe of a Buddhist monastic, and his feet were not touching the ground.

Another time when Hui-mu, in the middle of the night, was lying down and memorizing scriptures, she had a dream in which she traveled to the west, where she saw a pool filled with lotus blossoms, and sitting inside each lotus was a person who had been born there [by metamorphosis]. One large flower, however, was empty. Hui-mu, wanting to climb up onto the flower, grabbed hold of it with all her strength but, without realizing what she was doing, also began to chant scripture in a loud voice. Because her mother, hearing the chanting, thought that Hui-mu was having a nightmare, she woke her daughter up.

Hui-mu's mother was very old, and, because she had lost all her teeth, Hui-mu always thoroughly chewed her mother's food first so that her mother could eat. Doing this, however, meant that Hui-mu had to eat after noon as well as before thereby transgressing the monastic rule of not eating after mid-day. For that reason, even though Hui-mu had grown up and come of age to be able to accept the full obligation of the monastic life, she did not do so.

After her mother died, Hui-mu herself cleaned and prepared the ground for the placing of the ceremonial platform used for receiving the monastic rules, and she asked her teacher to bestow them. Suddenly, the space around the platform glowed with dazzling light, all a golden color. Hui-mu looked toward the southwest, where she saw a heavenly being who wore a trimmed robe of russet-gold color. He seemed now close and now far away, but, when she sought after him, he had disappeared.

The extraordinary things that happened to her she kept secret, but, when her elder brother became a monk, he heard rumors and wanted to find out for sure, so he tricked her, saying, "You have been living the religious life many years now, but with no results. Therefore, you might as well let your hair grow and become a wife." When Hui-mu heard this, she felt great dread and thought she should tell the truth about everything, so she gave a rough description of what she had seen.

When the nun Ching-ch'eng heard of her Way and virtue, she went to Hui-mu for the purpose of becoming well acquainted with her, the more easily to ask about the unusual phenomena Hui-mu had experienced, and Hui-mu told her everything in detail.

Later, Hui-mu and her companions in religion were worshipping the Endless-Life Buddha [Amitāyus]. Because Hui-mu did not get up after a prostration, the others thought she had fallen asleep. Someone kicked her and asked, but Hui-mu said nothing at all. When Ching-ch'eng again begged and entreated her, Hui-mu said, "While I was prostrate on the ground [worshipping the Buddha], I had a vision of going to the Western Paradise and seeing Amita Buddha, who was explaining the Smaller Perfection of Wisdom [to me]. He had already gone as far as the fourth chapter when, to my very deep regret, I was kicked awake."

In the fourteenth year of the yüan-chia reign period (437), Hui-mu was sixty-nine years old.