丹墀双铁树开花

庚午九十一岁。所有一切就绪。春戒期。请文质和尚为羯磨。讲梵网经时。方丈室前丹墀中。两株铁树盛开花朵。据传此树。乃闽王与圣箭祖师各手植一株。甚难生长。千年始开华一次。以彰其瑞。公有偈志。优昙钵罗非凡品云云。

宣化偈曰：

菩萨演法众护持。放光现瑞正及时。
空中传报龙天赞。铁树开华世稀奇。

Witnessing a pair of cycad trees blooming in the courtyard

At ninety-one years of age in 1930, the Master continued to transmit the precepts in the spring as he had done every year. He requested the Venerable Master Wen Chih to be the Karmadana, While he was lecturing the Brahmajala (Brahma Net) Sutra, two feathery palm trees in the courtyard in front of the Abbot's quarters bloomed with many lush blossoms. Tradition states that both the king of the state of Min and Patriarch Sheng Chien (Sagely Arrow) had each planted one of the trees. Their growth had been very slow, for it normally takes that kind of tree one thousand years to bloom. Because of the auspiciousness of the event, the Master wrote a verse, one line of which says:

Udumbara flowers are not at all a common sight.

The gatha says:
The Bodhisattva proclaims the Dharma; the masses protect and maintain it.
An auspicious appearance emitting light - the time for it was ripe.
The news was communicated in the sky; the dragons and gods praised it.
The cycad trees bloomed with flowers - strange and rare indeed!