[1] An account is given of the kingdom of Shen-shen in the 96th of the Books of the first Han dynasty, down to its becoming a dependency of China, about B.C. 80. The greater portion of that is now accessible to the English reader in a translation by Mr. Wylie in the ‘Journal of the Anthropological Institute,’ August, 1880. Mr. Wylie says:—‘Although we may not be able to identify Shen-shen with certainty, yet we have sufficient indications to give an appropriate idea of its position, as being south of and not far from lake Lob.’ He then goes into an exhibition of those indications, which I need not transcribe. It is sufficient for us to know that the capital city was not far from Lob or Lop Nor, into which in lon. 38° E. the Tarim flows. Fâ-hien estimated its distance to be 1500 le from Tʽun-hwang. He and his companions must have gone more than twenty-five miles a day to accomplish the journey in seventeen days.
[2] This is the name which Fâ-hien always uses when he would speak of China, his native country, as a whole, calling it from the great dynasty which had ruled it, first and last, for between four and five centuries. Occasionally, as we shall immediately see, he speaks of ‘the territory of Tsʽin or Chʽin,’ but intending thereby only the kingdom or Tsʽin, having its capital, as described in the first note on the last chapter, in Chʽang-gan.
[3] So I prefer to translate the character 僧 (săng) rather than by ‘priests.’ Even in Christianity, beyond the priestly privilege which belongs to all believers, I object to the ministers of any denomination or church calling themselves or being called ‘priests;’ and much more is the name inapplicable to the Śramaṇas or bhikshus of Buddhism which acknowledges no God in the universe, no soul in man, and has no services of sacrifice or prayer in its worship. The only difficulty in the use of ‘monks’ is caused by the members of the sect in Japan which, since the middle of the fifteenth century, has abolished the prohibition against marrying on the part of its ministers, and other prohibitions in diet and dress. Săng and săng-keâ represent the Sanskrit saṅgha, which denotes (E. H., p 117), first, an assembly of monks, or bhikshu saṅgha, constituted by at least four members, and empowered to hear confession, to grant absolution, to admit persons to holy orders, & c.; secondly, the third constituent of the Buddhistic Trinity, a deification of the communio sanctorum, or the Buddhist order. The name is used by our author of the monks collectively or individually as belonging to the class, and may be considered as synonymous with the name śramaṇa, which will immediately claim our attention.
[4] Meaning the ‘small vehicle, or conveyance.’ There are in Buddhism the triyâna, or ‘three different means of salvation, i.e. of conveyance across the saṃsâra, or sea of transmigration, to the shores of nirvâṇa. Afterwards the term was used to designate the different phases of development through which the Buddhist dogma passed, known as the mahâyâna, hînayâna, and madhyamayâna.’ ‘The hînayâna is the simplest vehicle of salvation, corresponding to the first of the three degrees of saintship. Characteristics of it are the preponderance of active moral asceticism, and the absence of speculative mysticism and quietism.’ E. H., pp. 151–2, 45, and 117.
[5] ‘Śraman’ may in English take the place of Śramaṇa (Pâli, Samana; in Chinese, Shâ-măn), the name for Buddhist monks, as those who have separated themselves from (left) their families, and quieted their hearts from all intrusion of desire and lust. ‘It is employed, first, as a general name for ascetics of all denominations, and, secondly, as a general designation of Buddhistic monks.’ E. H., pp. 130, 131.
[6] The name for India is here the same as in the former chapter and throughout the book,—Tʽeen-chuh (天竺), the chuh being pronounced, probably, in Fâ-hien’s time as tuk. How the earliest name for India, Shin-tuk or duk=Scinde, came to be changed into Thien-tuk, it would take too much space to explain. I believe it was done by the Buddhists, wishing to give a good auspicious name to the fatherland of their Law, and calling it ‘the Heavenly Tuk,’ just as the Mohammedans call Arabia ‘the Heavenly region’ (天方), and the court of China itself is called ‘the Celestial’ (天꜀朝).
[7] Tartar or Mongolian.
[8] Woo-e has not been identified. Watters (‘China Review,’ viii. 115) says:—‘We cannot be far wrong if we place it in Kharaschar, or between that and Kutscha.’ It must have been a country of considerable size to have so many monks in it.
[9] This means in one sense China, but Fâ-hien, in his use of the name, was only thinking of the three Tsʽin states of which I have spoken in a previous note; perhaps only of that from the capital of which he had himself set out.
[10] This sentence altogether is difficult to construe, and Mr. Watters, in the ‘China Review,’ was the first to disentangle more than one knot in it. I am obliged to adopt the reading of 行堂 in the Chinese editions, instead of the 行當 in the Corean text. It seems clear that only one person is spoken of as assisting the travellers, and his name, as appears a few sentences farther on, was Foo Kung-sun. The 行堂 which immediately follows the surname Foo 符, must be taken as the name of his office, corresponding, as the 行 shows, to that of le maître d’hôtellerie in a Roman Catholic abbey. I was once indebted myself to the kind help of such an officer at a monastery in Canton province. The Buddhistic name for him is uddesika=overseer. The Kung-sun that follows his surname indicates that he was descended from some feudal lord in the old times of the Chow dynasty. We know indeed of no ruling house which had the surname of Foo, but its adoption by the grandson of a ruler can be satisfactorily accounted for; and his posterity continued to call themselves Kung-sun, duke or lord’s grandson, and so retain the memory of the rank of their ancestor.