Prevod

Long ago, in the province of Shinano, there was a place called Tsukuma Hot Springs, whose healing waters drew bathers from far and wide. One night, someone living nearby had a dream in which a voice said, “Tomorrow at noon, Kannon will come to bathe in the hot spring.” “In what guise will Kannon appear?” the dreamer asked. The voice replied, “A man of about thirty, with a black beard, will come wearing a woven hat, carrying a dark-jointed quiver and a leather-wrapped bow. He will be dressed in a dark blue hunting robe and deerskin chaps of summer hide, and will ride a dapple-gray horse. You must recognize him as Kannon.” Then the dreamer awoke. Filled with wonder, at daybreak he went about telling everyone, and as word spread, people flocked to the hot spring in countless numbers. They changed the water, swept the grounds, hung a sacred rope about the place, and offered flowers and incense. Then they gathered to await Kannon’s arrival. Noon passed, and it was approaching the hour of the Sheep when a man appeared who matched the dream in every detail. From his face to his clothing and his horse, nothing differed from what the dreamer had seen. All at once, the people rose and bowed with their foreheads to the ground. The man was utterly astonished and could make no sense of it. He asked the people what was happening, but they only bowed to him again and again, and not one would explain. Among them was a monk who pressed his palms together, raised them to his forehead, and bowed in fervent worship. The man went up to him and asked in a broad country accent, “What is all this? Why do you bow to me like that?” When the monk told him what had been revealed in the dream, the man said, “The other day I fell from my horse while hunting and broke my right arm. I have come here to soak it in the hot water.” But wherever he went, the people followed at his heels, bowing and crying out in adoration. At last, quite at a loss, he thought, “Then I must indeed be Kannon. I shall become a monk here and now.” He cut up and cast aside his bow, quiver, sword, and dagger, and took the tonsure. At the sight, everyone wept, deeply moved. Then someone who knew him came forward and said, “Why, that is the Master of Horse from the province of Kōzuke!” Hearing this, they gave him the name Batō Kannon—Horse-Headed Kannon. After becoming a monk, he went up to Yokawa, became a disciple of the senior prelate Kachō, and lived there. Later, it is said, he went away to the province of Tosa.