TANTRIC BUDDHISM (INCLUDING CHINA AND JAPAN)Rich man! In the city of butchers
Men and women who live happily
Use meat for food
And beer for drink.
They have more leisure than leaders who cheat.
But they'll know the suffering of damnation.
Yama's messengers will lead them away.
They'll see Limbo with their own eyes.
They'll boil in the Iron Cauldron,
Be pressed beneath the Iron Mountain,
Their bodies pierced with iron nails.
Molten brass will be poured down their mouths.
There will be no liberation for a kalpa.
Alas! You poor butchers ...Know this! You that live happily
In your four-square houses!
Above you've gathered human wealth,
Below you've gathered cattle-wealth.
Your grandsons are arranged like gods in rows.
You dine on food of the most delicious kind.
Your bodies are clothed in the softest wool.
Everyone respects you.
If you think these rich elders are happy,
Sooner or later when they get sick
And all the doctors have given them up,
Their friends and relatives will surround them.
The rich ones will gasp for life
And experience the suffering of disease.
The worker-yamas will lead them away.
And they'll come out on a ledge in Limbo.
They'll fetch the scale of virtue and sin
And weigh the white and black stones.
In accordance with the Dharmaraja's terrible words,
They'll be hauled off to hell ...
0 you poor rich folks!
Now that you've the will
Won't you do divine dharma, give charity well,
Make up your minds?
Won't you accomplish and request religious teachings?
Are you not afraid? (p. 58 ff.)With this brief introductory background, we may now tum to an examination
of the biographical content itself. The 'das-log biographies bring together as a