What are the legends about cloth-bag monks?

At the end of the Western Han Dynasty in China, Buddhism was introduced from India to China along the Silk Road and spread and developed rapidly. At the same time, the belief of Maitreya Bodhisattva was introduced into China with Buddhism. The contents of Maitreya belief are recorded in The Prajna Sutra of Daoxing, The Prajna Sutra of Guang Guang, The Maha Prajna Sutra and The Vimalakīrti Sutra translated in Jin Dynasty. People know from Buddhist scriptures that Maitreya came to the real world to become a Buddha, save the world and relieve all suffering. A cloth-bag monk evolved in the Five Dynasties. He emphasized that "the heart is the Buddha", attached importance to the soul and self-purification, and said that Buddha and Bodhisattva were in the real world. This is the embodiment that Buddhism emphasizes that Buddhism is inseparable from real life in the world and practice.

Bag Buddhists advocate compassion to help the world, save the suffering and benefit all beings, guide the world to restrain greed and be tolerant of others, and eliminate many right and wrong and hate love in the world by "putting down your belly" and "putting down your smile". This attitude of the cloth bag monk is of positive significance to maintaining family harmony and neighborhood harmony. The cloth bag monk's thought catered to the preferences of people from all walks of life in China at that time and won a wide range of believers. Therefore, there are many mysterious legends related to the cloth bag monk among the people.

Legend has it that one morning at the end of the Tang Dynasty, villager Zhang was working in the field when he suddenly heard a wisp fluttering. He looked around and saw a huge lotus floating in the river not far away, which was slowly drifting upstream against the current.

Zhang Zhongtian didn't believe his eyes. He blinked hard and found that the golden lotus suddenly disappeared, and only a fat boy was lying on a bundle of firewood. At that time, he didn't think much. He quickly put the bundle of firewood in front of him and picked up the little boy. The child did not cry, but smiled at him.

Seeing that the child has a round head, big ears and good looks, Zhang took the child home, discussed with his wife and decided to adopt the child. Later, they went to the Lin Yue Temple near Changting Village, and asked the worry-free Zen master to give the child a name called "Qi Ben". Naive and lively, playful and active, it brought endless joy to the Zhang couple. What makes Zhang and his wife happy is that Dou, who has not been pregnant for many years, has a woman and a man.

Qi went to the temple to worship Buddha with his parents since childhood, and he became interested in the temple's tall buildings, magnificent halls, towering Buddha statues and solemn Buddhist activities. Over time, unconsciously, this also produced a sincere belief in Buddhism, and put forward the requirements of becoming a monk to parents.

Mr. and Mrs. Zhang believe in Buddhism and have no objection to their son becoming a monk. Therefore, Qi Jie, aged 17, became a monk in Lin Yue Temple, and his legal name was "Shi Qi Jie". In the practice of Lin Yue Temple, Zhi's mind experienced profound enlightenment and produced great wisdom and great awareness beyond the world of mortals. Later, he began to travel around the world and enlighten the world with Zen machines. Strangely, Monk Qi carries a big cloth bag everywhere he goes. Someone asked him his method number, and he replied with a poem:

I have a cloth bag, which is empty; All over the country, keep pace with the times.

Therefore, people call him a "cloth bag monk". He has a distinctive appearance, a wrinkled nose, a big belly and a short figure. His behavior is also very strange. When the weather is dry, he wears high-toothed clogs, and when the weather is wet, he wears wet sandals. People know that the weather changes as a result. He has no fixed abode and sleeps everywhere. In winter, he lies in the snow, but he doesn't touch a piece of snow. He often goes to the market to beg for food. No matter whether the meat is good or bad, he eats it on his lips and puts a little into a cloth bag.

What's even more peculiar is that where he begs, the business there will become particularly prosperous. He laughs at everyone. His words are impermanent, but they are effective. In a few years, people will know him.

The monk's cloth bag looks small, but no matter how many things he holds, he will never be satisfied. Even a batch of big wood he collected in Fujian to expand the temple can be put into bags. He also picked up the rubbish discarded by people and put it in the bag. People sometimes laugh at his bag as a garbage bag, so he smiled and said, "Sometimes when you are ready, what is useless becomes useful."

Sometimes, some people throw dead fish into the monk's cloth bag. He was not angry, but smiled and accepted it, carried it to the river and poured it into the water. At this time, the fish actually swam into the water alive.

Someone poured rotten food into his bag. After a while, it was fresh and delicious. The monk in the cloth bag couldn't finish it himself, so he asked the children to eat as much as possible. Watching the children eat with relish, the cloth bag monk sat there laughing. So many children like to play with him.

A rogue, accustomed to causing trouble, thought that the monk in the cloth bag could be cheated honestly, so he set his cloth bag on fire. Strangely, the next day, the monk with a cloth bag still came and went as before. The rogue thought that the cloth bag must have been rebuilt, so he took it away and burned it. Time and time again, the cloth bag monk forbeared generously, but when the hooligan went to grab the cloth bag for the fourth time, he could not lift the empty cloth bag with all his strength. Only then did the rogue know that the monk in the cloth bag was not a mortal, so he knelt at his feet and begged for forgiveness.

The cloth bag monk taught him: "Good is rewarded with good, and evil with evil. It's not like you don't report it. You will report everything then. " From then on, the villain turned over a new leaf and never dared to do evil again.

Many years later, Qi Qi, a cloth bag monk, sat on a stone in Lin Yue Temple and read a poem:

Maitreya Buddha is really Maitreya Buddha, with hundreds of billions of members.

Show it to the world all the time, but the world knows nothing.

Then he smiled and died peacefully. After the death of the cloth bag monk, it caused a sensation in the Buddhist world, and people suddenly realized that he was the embodiment of Maitreya Buddha.

In the Northern Song Dynasty, Song Zhezong named the cloth bag monk "Master Ding Ying". 1 104, the abbot of Lin Yue Temple built a pavilion in the temple to worship Maitreya Buddha and Bodhisattva, and Song Huizong named the pavilion "Chongning". Since then, temples all over the world have begun to worship cloth-bag monks.

Cloth-bag monks have magic in plain, beauty in ugliness, solemnity in humor, and compassion in teasing, which embodies the tolerant, kind, intelligent, generous and optimistic character of the Chinese nation and also contains people's expectations for a better future. Therefore, the cloth-bag monk is not only revered by people at home, but also widely worshipped abroad.