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Hsüan Chuang's rendering Kwan-tzǔ-tsai expresses the same idea, but the more usual Chinese translation Kuan-yin or Kuan-shih-yin, the deity who looks upon voices or the region of voices, seems to imply a verbal misunderstanding. For the use of Yin or voice makes us suspect that the translator identified the last part of Avalokiteśvara not with Îśvara lord but with svara sound.
This is substantially the same as Hsüan Chuang's statement except that I-Ching takes a more favourable view of the position of the Sarvâstivâda, either because it was his own school or because its position had really improved. It would seem that in the estimation of both pilgrims the Maha-and Hinayana are not schools but modes in which any school can be studied.
It was this dragon who had devoured Hsüan Chuang's horse, and Kuan Yin now bade him change himself into a horse of the same colour to carry the priest to his destination. He had the honour of bearing on his back the sacred books that Buddha gave to T'ai Tsung's deputy, and the first Buddhist temple built at the capital bore the name of Pai-ma Miao, 'Temple of the White Horse. Perils by the Way
This was the sixth quinquennial distribution which Harsha had held and the last, for he died in 648. He at first favoured the Hinayana but subsequently went over to the Mahayana, being moved in part by the exhortations of Hsüan Chuang. Yet the substance of Hsüan Chuang's account is that though Buddhism was prospering in the Far East it was decaying in India.
Hsüan Chuang's queer trio of converts at first caused great amusement among the crowds who thronged to see them, but when they learned of Sun's superhuman achievements, and his brave defence of the Master, their amusement was changed into wondering admiration. But the greatest honours were conferred upon the travellers at a meeting of the Immortals presided over by Mi-lo Fo, the Coming Buddha.
But in spite of such survivals, even in the sixth century Buddhism could not compete in southern India with either Jainism or Hinduism and there are no traces of its existence in the Deccan after 1150. For the Konkan, Maharashtra and Gujarat, Hsüan Chuang's statistics are fairly satisfactory.
In Hsüan Chuang's time it was only in Udyana that Buddhism could be said to be the religion of the people and the torrent of Mohammedan invasion which swept continuously through these countries during the middle ages overwhelmed all earlier religions, and even Hinduism had to yield.
Still Hsüan Chuang's long catalogue of deserted monasteries has an unmistakable significance. The decay was most pronounced in the north-west and south. In Gandhara there were only a few Buddhists: more than a thousand monasteries stood untenanted and the Buddha's sacred bowl had vanished. In Takshaśîla the monasteries were numerous but desolate: in Kashmir the people followed a mixed faith.
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