Mulian Rescues His Mother | Wikipedia audio article
Channel: wikipedia tts
Date: 2018-11-25

This is an audio version of the Wikipedia Article:
Mulian Rescues His Mother

Listening is a more natural way of learning, when compared to reading. Written language only began at around 3200 BC, but spoken language has existed long ago.

Learning by listening is a great way to:
- increases imagination and understanding
- improves your listening skills
- improves your own spoken accent
- learn while on the move
- reduce eye strain

Now learn the vast amount of general knowledge available on Wikipedia through audio (audio article). You could even learn subconsciously by playing the audio while you are sleeping! If you are planning to listen a lot, you could try using a bone conduction headphone, or a standard speaker instead of an earphone.

You can find other Wikipedia audio articles too at:
https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCuKfABj2eGyjH3ntPxp4YeQ

You can upload your own Wikipedia articles through:
https://github.com/nodef/wikipedia-tts



"The only true wisdom is in knowing you know nothing."
- Socrates



SUMMARY
=======
Mulian Rescues His Mother or Mulian Saves His Mother From Hell is a popular Chinese Buddhist tale first attested in a Dunhuang manuscript dating to the early 9th century CE.   It is an elaboration of the canonical Yulanpen Sutra which was translated from Indic sources by Dharmarakṣa sometime between 265–311 CE. Maudgalyayana (Pali: Moggallāna), whose abbreviated Chinese transliteration is Mulian, seeks the help of the Buddha to rescue his mother, who has been reborn in the preta world (in canonical sutra) or in the Avici Hell (in elaborated tale), the karmic retribution for her transgressions. Mulian cannot rescue her by his individual effort, however, but is instructed by the Buddha to offer food and gifts to monks and monasteries on the fifteenth day of the seventh lunar month, which established the Ghost Festival (Chinese: 鬼 節; pinyin: guǐjié). While Mulian's devotion to his mother reassured East Asians that Buddhism did not undermine the Confucian value of filial piety and helped to make Buddhism into a Chinese religion, it also reflected strong undercurrents of filial piety that existed throughout Indian Buddhism as evidenced through its canonical texts and epigraphical remains.The story developed many variations and appeared in many forms. Tang dynasty texts discovered early in the twentieth century at Dunhuang in Gansu revealed rich stories in the form of chuanqi ('transmissions of the strange') or bianwen ('transformation tales'). Mulian and his mother appeared onstage in operas, especially folk-opera, and have been the subject of films and television series. The story became a standard part of Buddhist funeral services, especially in the countryside, until the end of the twentieth century. The legend spread quickly to other parts of East Asia, and was one of the earliest to be written down in the literature of Korea, Vietnam, and Japan.Another canonical version similar to the Yulanpen Sutra, has Sāriputta as the chief protagonist and is recorded in the Theravāda Petavatthu. It is the basis of the custom of offering foods to the hungry ghosts and the Ghost Festival in the cultures of Cambodia, Sri Lanka, Thailand and Laos.