Chapter One : Prefatory 14 On the twenty-first of August (the twenty-sixth day of the seventh lunar month), 4 W.E., the utmost sincerity of the nine members, which was unconcerned about life or death, produced the miracle of the seal of blood from bare fingers.
When he saw that their bare thumb prints on the paper had turned red as blood, the Founding Master remarked,
“Your minds have already moved the divine spirits of heaven and earth and the proceedings of the hidden authorities have rendered a verdict. Our success is derived from this. From now on, your bodies have been given over to the world of the ten directions and, therefore, whenever in the future you are carrying out your work, despite all hardships and mortal dangers, do not allow your conviction of today to change. Nor will you feel any temptation when faced with attachments to family or sensory conditions involving the five desires, if only you remind yourselves of today’s event. Exert yourselves then only on your practice and your work with an unattached, single mind.” Then the Founding Master conferred on them dharma names and honorific dharma cognomens and said, “Your past names were secular names and individual, private appellations. The people who had been given those names have already died. Now, I have called you back to life by bestowing on you these new public names for use throughout the world. Receive and keep your name in honor and deliver numerous sentient beings.”
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