Description

6th Kup/Gup Green Belt

8 pages of data. Content sample:

The name given to him at birth was Sol Sedang. He took the pen name Won-Hyo (meaning “dawn”) from his nickname, “Sedak” (also meaning “dawn”).

Won-Hyo grew up surrounded by civil war. The Koguryo, Silla and Baekje kingdoms were at war and it was not until 677 that the Silla dynasty unified Korea.
Legends suggest that Won-Hyo took part in these bloody civil wars and saw many of his friends killed. It was this that drove him to turn his back on violence and become a monk. Most sources agree that he became a monk at the age of 20.

It is said that “One evening as Won-Hyo was crossing the desert, he
stopped at a small patch of green where there were a few t rees and some
water. He went to sleep. Toward midnight he awoke, very thirsty. It was
pitch-dark. He groped along on all fours, searching for water. At last his
hand touched a cup on the ground. He picked it up and drank. Then he
bowed deeply, in grat itude to Buddha for the gift of water.
The next morning Won-Hyo woke up and saw beside him what he had
taken for a cup. It was a shattered skull, blood-caked and with shreds of
flesh still stuck to the cheek-bones. Strange insects crawled or floated on
the surface of the filthy rainwater inside it .