his words continued to be cited hundreds of years later. A response
　　　　  to this unsettling news was not long in coming.
　　　　  The Shouleng'yan jing purports to be a translation by the otherwise
　　　　  unknown Paramiti or Pramiti (Banlamidi) dating from the twenty-third
　　　　  day, fifth month, first year of Shenlong (June 18, 705) at Zhizhi si
　　　　  in Guangzhou.(80) According to another catalog of Buddhist
　　　　  scriptures, the XU gujin yijing tuji,(81) the man who assisted this
　　　　  alleged monk was a certain ex-official of Empress Wu's court called
　　　　  Fang Rong, toward whom the finger of suspicion has pointed ever
　　　　  since.(82) Internal evidence from the text would suggest that the
　　　　  part of Yijing's text that attacks shao shen would have been known
　　　　  to him, since it was presented to Empress Wu. Fang is described as
　　　　  "a disciple of the Bodhisattva Vinaya:' which might mean nothing
　　　　  more than that he had received those particular precepts, hardly
　　　　  uncommon for laymen in the Tang. But, suppose that he had some
　　　　  particular interest in the validity of those precepts that he saw as
　　　　  being under attack from Yijing's work? What if he knew monks who
　　　　  themselves were missing the odd finger, again hardly unlikely in the
　　　　  Tang, when even elite exegetes such as Fazang (643-712) burned off
　　　　  their fingers?(83)
　　　　  Burning the body was always on somewhat shaky ground doctrinally
　　　　  speaking, and Yijing's polemic attacked the practice from many
　　　　  angles. But, what could better answer Yijing's charge that the
　　　　  Buddha never said that monks could burn their bodies than the
　　　　  creation of a text in which the Buddha says "a monk may burn his
　　　　  body"? Also, consider where in the text of the Shouleng'yan jing the
　　　　  passage occurs--in the middle of the Buddha's discussion of Vinaya.
　　　　  Is this not the first place a Vinaya master would turn when
　　　　  presented with a newly "translated-sutra?
　　　　  Moreover, there is additional evidence that other parts of the
　　　　  Shouleng'yan jing were composed as a direct response to statements
　　　　  made in Yijing's work. I can hardly claim to have made a close
　　　　  comparative study of the two texts, but there are a number of lines
　　　　  that immediately leap off the page. Here, for example, is a
　　　　  quotation from Yijing: "As to fine and rough silk, these are allowed
　　　　  by the Buddha. What is the use of laying down rules for the strict
　　　　  prohibition of silk? ... Such a rule may be classed with the
　　　　  forcible prohibitions that have never been laid down (by the
　　　　  Buddha)."(84) And, "If one attempts to protect every being there