Chapter 1114: Nothing to Find

“Brother Zhuang, Nakagawa said that this time he came to China, he wants to worship every Buddha, these three Buddha statues are going to be worshipped, he asked us to go around first.”

After Yan interpreter said Zhuang Rui’s words to Nakagawa, Nakagawa gibbered and said something else, both knees always kneeling on the ground facing the seven or eight meters high Buddha in front of him, his appearance was very pious.

Zhuang Rui thought for a moment and spoke, “Peng Fei, you follow him, Ren and I will go to the back first.”

This Buddhist temple that should have been built in the Sui and Tang dynasties, the architectural style is very rare in the mainland, Zhuang Rui now only wants to have a glimpse, and is too lazy to bother with Zhongchuan, and at that moment explained Peng Fei a few words, and asked him to keep an eye on Zhongchuan.

Peng Fei and Zhuang Rui have been together for several years, there has been a tacit understanding between the two of them, he understands Zhuang Rui’s meaning, he nodded and said: “Brother Zhuang, you can rest assured! With me watching, he can’t play any tricks.”

“Alright, pay attention, we’ll go to the back and turn around a little bit and come back, we’ll survey it properly tomorrow.”

Today is already more than four o’clock, looking at the sun has gone down in the west, the light is already a bit gloomy, also wrong is not Zhuang Rui these all day and tomb corpses deal with the people, if you do a timid, simply do not dare to walk around in this place of no one.

However, the night can not see anything, Zhuang Rui only want to understand the general composition of the ancient temple building, in order to tomorrow into the survey, see if you can also find what valuable objects out?

After explaining to Peng Fei, Zhuang Rui and Dr. Ren and a few graduate students of Beijing University, directly from the Maharishi Treasure Hall inside a dilapidated side door out.

Outside the side door of the Maharishi Treasure Hall, there is a small courtyard, and at the end of the courtyard there is also a building, except that there is no plaque on it, but directly carved with the words “Maituo Pavilion”.

“This …… this is actually a stone pavilion ……”

Walked close, Zhuang Rui and other talents found that the original this Maituo Pavilion, surprisingly all carved from the mountain stone.

In the west, especially near Dunhuang, stone pavilion is not rare, the famous Mogao Caves are all carved out of the mountain, but in the desert to see in addition to the yellow sand outside of the stone, is let a person is very surprised.

“Zhuang Rui, you find no, here the terrain gradually in the upward, should be in the past is also a mountain, let’s go in to see it!”

Temples in the Sui and Tang dynasties and even some earlier periods were mostly built on mountains, like the White Horse Temple in Luoyang and the Shaolin in Songshan, it seems that this abandoned ancient temple hasn’t been taken out of this category either.

After carefully surveying the periphery of the stone pavilion, Dr. Ren sighed: “The ancients really didn’t ask about the ghosts and gods! To spend so much to build a temple just to seek peace of mind, how much financial and material resources must be wasted?”

This Maitreya Pavilion is very exquisite construction, on top of which there are half of the cliff, making it look like a flying pavilion in the air, such as hanging like hanging in general.

Open the long ago rusty fence iron door, can clearly see, in the pavilion in the wall carved with a Maitreya statue, barefoot dirt face, smile, the form is very realistic.

In the middle of the stone pavilion, but a patio, Zhuang Rui took a flashlight, dark see not low, estimated that at least more than ten meters deep.

The patio around the stone is very smooth, must be the early years of the temple in the monks to fight the water led to, but the water in the well has long since dried up, otherwise this is not to become an empty temple.

Zhuang Rui a look back, found in the stone pavilion back door frieze carved with “QiongYiDiCui” four big words, can not help but sigh: “QiongYiDiCui, meaning is good, I think that year this is also a shade of green trees, the ancient wood slanting birth of the location, just that will who also can not imagine there will be a today’s decline, right? ”

“This is just like the change of dynasties, there is always the rise and fall of victory and defeat, but such a thousand year old temple is buried in the desert, it is really a pity.”

Although it has not been able to glimpse the panoramic view, but just from these two halls can be seen on its scale, if put into the Central Plains or Jiangnan area, I’m afraid that the reputation will also be in the Songshan Shaolin above.

Because it is getting late, Zhuang Rui and his entourage did not delay, continue to go to the back door, just this way down to find that the thousand years of ancient temples of the big, but also far beyond their imagination.

After the Maitreya Pavilion, followed by a thousand Buddha Pavilion, Panglong Pavilion, Lohan courtyard, Zhongtian courtyard, call the immortal pavilion, better pavilion, Longquan Pavilion, nearly eight or nine to Zen courtyard, between the corridor shuttles, layer after layer of pavilion.

Although the eye has long been dilapidated, but can be imagined in its incense at the peak of the time, from the Western countries and domestic people, gathered here to worship Buddha’s grand situation.

When Zhuang Rui and his entourage walked to the last place of the ancient temple, Zhuang Rui looked at a large area of grass in front of the open space, sparse six ancient towers, can not help but blurt out: “This …… here is the tower of relics?”

Sheri tower is placed after the monks of great virtues of relics used, and “relics” as a personal definition of the crystallization of the achievements of the cultivation, the status of the Buddha’s door is crucial, but also explains the practitioner has achieved the results of the testimonials.

Like 2,500 years ago after Shakyamuni Buddha nirvana, disciples in the cremation of his remains, from the ashes of a parietal bone, two shoulder blades, four teeth, a middle finger bone relics and 84,000 beads of the real body of the relics, Buddha’s legacy of these things, has always been regarded as a holy relics and the most precious treasure of the Buddhist sect, scrambling to offer.

The Sixth Patriarch of Zen, Huineng, and the modern masters such as Hongyi, Yinguang, Taixu, and Zhangjia, all left behind a considerable number of relics after their deaths, which were worshipped and dedicated by the Buddhists of later generations.

In ancient times, generally speaking, non-extremely important temples, is not allowed to build the tower of relics, most of them are built by the emperor’s edict, here there is the existence of the tower of relics, I think a thousand years ago, during the heyday of Buddhism, a Buddhist important place.

After Dr. Ren circled around a few hexagonal cone-shaped, 4-meter-high stupas for a few times, his face showed a hint of disappointment and spoke, “It’s a stupa no less, but I’m afraid that the stupas of the high priests and virtues of the past generations have all been moved away.”

Monk’s relics have always been extremely important Buddhist treasures, not to mention that on these relic towers there are also the names of the seated monks written in Sanskrit as well as their biography, if there are relics within the tower, then this discovery is enough to cause a sensation within the world of Buddhism.

After hearing Dr. Ren’s words, Zhuang Rui slightly released the aura in his eyes, and sure enough, the tower was empty, and there was no relic-like object present, which must have been taken away by the monks when they relocated the monks’ relics.

Zhuang Rui looked at the sky, the sun has almost set the horizon, the night has completely descended, so he opened his mouth and said: “Let’s go! Let’s go back, this place is considered abandoned, but it can be developed into a tourist attraction, just don’t know if the local government is willing to make an investment.”

This place is too far away from the place where human beings live, alone in the desert to walk for three days, plus there is quicksand in the middle of the road, want to develop it, I’m afraid to spend an astronomical amount of money, so Zhuang Rui has this to say.

After returning to the gate of the ancient temple, Mangzi and Erdan and the others have already burned a fire on the ground, using the dead branches of poplar, these brothers have followed Zhuang Rui for a period of time, and also realized that they can’t dismantle those temple buildings to make a fire for cooking.

“Zhuang Rui, there are not even a few ordinary tables and chairs left here, there is not much value in excavation, let’s go back tomorrow!” Cooking these things Zhuang Rui and others can’t get on, simply sit by the campfire to discuss the next step of the trip.

Zhuang Rui took out a pack of cigarettes, scattered to the crowd, nodded and said: “OK, from here out, we will enter the prairie, now also on the Xixia and Mongolia period of the tomb preserved some of the integrity of it, hopefully we can find a it!”

Zhuang Rui’s main purpose of this trip, is to host a field archaeological excavation, as their future doctoral dissertation reference basis, just this way to travel to the ancient tombs found, either by the excavation, or like the Mausoleum of the First Emperor of Qin Shi Huang that can not be excavated, Zhuang Rui is now also a little anxious.

Originally expected to be able to find some objects in this thousand years old temple, just Zhuang Rui just passed through each temple and pavilion, are carefully surveyed with the aura, but found that the valuable things here, was moved a little bit left.

Thinking of this, Zhuang Rui suddenly remembered something, opened his mouth and shouted to Mangzi who was busy by the bonfire, “Brother Mangzi, ask you something.”

“Brother Zhuang, what is it?” Mangzi turned back with uncertainty.

“Brother Mangzi, didn’t you say earlier that there were only three or five monks in this temple? That’s unlikely ah! A temple of this size can accommodate at least two to three hundred monks, right?”

Mangzi and Zhuang Rui said before, this is only a small temple, but what we see in front of us, obviously and this “small” word is not related.

After hearing Zhuang Rui’s words, Mangzi also scratched his head with a confused face, and after half a day’s thought, he said: “I don’t know about this ……! But the old people in the town used to say that there were really just three or five monks here, and when they moved away, they even passed through the town!”

“Zhuang Rui, don’t get entangled, it is estimated that many monks left the temple a long time ago, and only a few are left to stay, maybe the times are too long ago, it is the people in the town who don’t know about it.”

Dr. Ren gave a very reasonable explanation, Zhuang Rui thought about it and nodded his head in agreement, but in his heart he always felt that there was something wrong.

“Brother Mangzi, let’s burn some meat soup at night! These days of not being able to drink soup, my mouth is blistering.” Just as Zhuang Rui was thinking in his heart, Peng Fei’s voice suddenly came from his ears.

“Hm? Right, what did they do just now?”

Zhuang Rui heard Peng Fei’s words before realizing that these people actually came out from within the temple, and could not help but froze for a moment, they had just wandered around inside for at least an hour or so, and did not see Peng Fei these brothers.