Explanations by Master Cheng-Yan
Subject: The Eight Difficulties Arise from Negative Karma (造罪惡業八難障法)
Date:November.25. 2015
“The truth of the law of karma is that action will certainly induce a response, and karmic retribution follows us like a shadow. Whether we create calamity or blessings, there will always be consequences. We create our suffering or happiness and face effects according to the cause.”
The workings of karma cannot be changed in the slightest. So, when it comes to all the actions we take, we must accept the consequences according to the karma that we create. The only way to change anything is for us to understand the law of karma and then promptly change [our behavior]. This is a true principle.
This is the truth of the law of karma. With any action, once we have created karma, a response will naturally manifest. This is certain. “Karmic retribution follows us like a shadow.” If we do good deeds, the response we will receive in the way other people feel and the way they react to us will be one of respect towards us. This is certain. If we do something unwholesome, people will criticize us in response. This is the workings of karmic retribution; it follows us like a shadow.
So, “We create our suffering or happiness and face effects according to the cause.” No matter what kind of karma, the working are the same. If we experience happiness and joy, it is because we formed positive conditions and created blessed causes in past lives. Thus we are able to happily come together. The same happens with the causes and conditions for suffering. As we interact with each other, sometimes a causal remark can weigh on people’s hearts; this is like a time-bomb. Who knows how long it will be buried in their mind with these karmic forces unceasingly replicating? Then, when causes and conditions mature, those karmic causes become karmic effects. This is why we should not take the law of karma lightly.
There is a story about this. The story is about a businessman traveling to the city to deal with some matters. He quickly hired a donkey to pull his cart, but when the donkey reached the 100km mark, he suddenly stopped. There were only two or three kilometers to go. The businessman was very anxious. “We are almost there; hurry up!” However, this donkey just stood there. No matter how the man urged him on, the donkey just simply refused to move.
The businessman had no choice but to come down from the cart. He half-ran and half-walked to take care of his business matters. After finishing his business, it was late, so he found an inn to rest. That night, he had a dream.
The donkey came to him and said, “I apologize for not taking you to your destination. Since I stole a pair of shoes from you in my previous life, I had to repay you by carrying you for 100km. Therefore, I took you exactly 100km so we would not owe each other anything. I have fully repaid the debt I owed you. I want to thank you and to apologize too for stealing your shoes in the past.”
Then this businessman woke up. After he awoke, he was very surprised. “That’s right, I am in the shoe business. Many years ago, my shop was indeed missing a pair of shoes. I was really angry. Who would steal this pair of shoes from me? Whoever stole this pair of shoes, I want him to walk at least 100km in repayment.”
He recalled what he had said. “This must be the workings of karma!” Ever since then, this businessman placed great importance on causes of effects.He donated all the money he made from this business trip, and from then on be constantly did good deeds.He constantly shared this story with other people, encouraging them to do good deeds and counseling them against doing bad deeds.Just from stealing a pair of shoes, we may have to become an ox, horse or donkey and labor in order to repay that debt.
Therefore, the principles of the law of karma must indeed be applied in our daily living.We must believe in them.With other people, we must say kind words and form good karmic affinities.When it comes to things we can do, we must not be afraid of hard work.
As long as our body can handle it, when other people are doing things, we should give them a hand.With each thing we help them with; we are forming good karmic affinities.When we help them, they feel grateful.When we say kind words to them, they have a good impression of us.All of these form positive karmic affinities.
Causes and conditions for blessings come from constantly helping people.Therefore, we must believe in the law of karma.
The previous sutra passage states, “If they themselves get sick, there is no one to save or cure them. Even if they take wondrous medicine, the severity of their illness only increases. When another person transgresses by revolting, raiding, plundering, stealing or robbing, they will also be affected by and suffer from others’ calamities.”
We already discussed this passage yesterday.
When a person is sick and we do not earnestly help them find a good doctor, or misguide them when they try to find a doctor, or because a delay in their treatment, those are the wrong things to do.Perhaps this person is clearly taking the right medicine but their condition remains the same.Day by day, their condition and their suffering grow worse.
Their doctor also says, “I have done everything humanly possible. Why isn’t this person getting better?”Not every doctor can work miracles.
Even Hua Tuo himself, the legendary physician, died from an illness, to say nothing of his patients.
In conclusion, the law of karma is a law of nature we are all subject to.“When another person transgresses by revolting, raiding, plundering, stealing or robbing,” we will also be affected by their acts of evil.
Some people say, “Clearly I had no part in this I just happened to pass by,” or “Clearly I only heard something; I did not do anything,” or “Clearly,”Sometimes in society, when people are arguing, even if it has nothing to do with us, we may end up being punched by someone.
This happens too.In this way, we “suffer from others’ calamities”.
The sutra passage continues, “Such transgressors will never see the Buddha, the king of all noble beings, who teaches and transforms through the Dharma.”
[These transgressors] may suffer in hell without interrupting.In the hungry ghost realm the kind of starvation they experience is like a fire that consumes them; that is the kind of suffering they face.They may also end up in the animal realm.
We have seen how [animals suffer], especially if, as an animal, they are born with physical deformities.These are the retributions for transgressions that they suffer in the Three Evil Realms.
What if they are born human?They may be disabled, impoverished or ill and so on.All of this is caused by the karma they created in their previous lifetimes.If they are born in the human realm, they are tormented by suffering; this is due to the karma causes they created led them to suffer these negative retributions.
If people face this kind of suffering as humans, they are hindered by their karmic obstructions.
Thus they “will never see the Buddha”.Even if the Buddha is in the world, they will not have the chance to see Him.Therefore, in life we must earnestly seize every moment.
When there are positive causes and conditions, we must form aspirations together.When we have the good karmic conditions to hear the Dharma, we need to earnestly put it into practice and cherish this precious opportunity.Otherwise, we “will never see the Buddha”.
These transgressors severed the roots of goodness, planted seeds of slandering the Great Vehicle and did not create blessed karmic conditions.
This negative karma caused their descent into hell, so they will see the Buddha.
They lack good karmic seeds, thus making it difficult to meet the king of noble beings, listen to the Dharma and be taught and transformed.
These transgressors have severed the roots of goodness and have cut off the seeds of wisdom-life.By slandering the Great Vehicle Dharma and not creating blessed causes and conditions, they cannot encounter the Buddha-Dharma nor obtain the principles.
Instead, they go astray and create negative causes and negative conditions.They replicate many of their afflictions and ignorant thoughts, so they create much negative karma.
“This negative karma caused their descent into hell.”Because of that, they cannot encounter “the king of all noble beings, who can “teach and transform them.” They cannot attain [the Dharma]. Even if they can, they will slander it. All of that generates negative karma, causing them to fall into hell. For this reason, they “will never see the Buddha.”
This happened in the past, and it happens now as well. We are lacking in good karmic seeds, so “meeting the king of noble beings would be very difficult. Seeing the Buddha face to face would be even more difficult. Even listening to the Buddha-Dharma, listening to true principles, would be very hard.
If all we have are negative causes, conditions and effects, naturally we will face negative retributions. This is a very natural principle.
The following passage states, “Such transgressors are constantly reborn in difficult places; mad and deaf, minds in disorder, they never get to listen to the Dharma. For countless kalpas, numerous as the Ganges’ sands, they are always born deaf and mute, and all their faculties are incomplete.”
All this is due to the negative karma we created in past lifetimes. If we committed an act of evil, a transgression, we will have to face the negative retributions. The human realms is like a big prison.Some people’s transgressions are more serious. That means they have to endure more serious karmic retributions. They face a lifetime of unbearable suffering. They often find themselves in extreme hardship. People like this are “mad and deaf, with minds in disorder” because they do not have principles guiding them in their lives.
People who are “mad and deaf” have mental and physical issues. They cannot control themselves, and they do not know what they are doing. When others talk, they cannot understand what is being said. They do not understand the principles. Even though they heard the sounds, they cannot understand the words. Since they cannot understand it, they are like people who cannot hear.
Those who commit transgressions and create karma receive retributions according to their karma and are constantly reborn in difficult places. They are like drunken people who cannot hear the True Dharma. Mad and deaf, with minds in disorder, they never get to listen to the Dharma.
They are like a person who is drunk. Once a person becomes drunk, he is completely unaware of his demeanor. For those who are constantly drunk, they are so drunk that their minds are disordered, and their physical appearances have been ruined. Unable to take the principles to heart, they cannot guard against wrongs and stop evil, uphold precepts or listen to the True Dharma. As a result, “Mad and deaf, with minds in disorder, they will never hear the Dharma”.
How long will they remain this way? For asankya kalpas, for infinite kalpas. These kalpas are as countless as the sands of the Ganges; this is an incalculable length of time.
Isn’t this the description found in the Earth Treasury Sutra? A grain of sand can be counted as a kalpa. A blade of grass can also be counted as a kalpa. A single leaf can also be counted a kalpa. It is not just the sands of the Ganges.
“Countless kalpas” is a very long period of time. During that long period of time, hearing the Buddha-Dharma and learning principles will be very difficult. Having not listened to them, they will “always [be] born deaf and mute”. This is an endless cycle. They are like people who are deaf and mute, like people who can neither hear nor speak. “All their faculties [are] incomplete”. Perhaps their minds are in disorder, or so on. this last for a very long period of time.
Then in this lifetime, they are unwilling to accept [the Dharma], or may not have the chance to accept it, or even if they accept it, they may be unable to take it to heart. Perhaps, when they listen to principles, they are limited in what they understand from what they hear. They cannot go beyond that. When we seriously listen, when we constantly listen, we must hear one thing and understand ten things.
Take Christopher Yang for example, he is only in his early teens. Yesterday, after I left the Great Hall, he told me he had some questions. I asked, “What is your question?” He replied, “Master, when you told the story about how the Brahmin maiden saved her mother, you said her mother was able to go to heaven because of the Brahmin maiden’s merits and virtues. How can the other people who are suffering there also go to heaven with the help of the Brahmin maiden’s merits and virtues? Don’t they have to face the consequences of their own transgressions? He said he felt doubtful of this. He said, “In the past, these people must have created an affinity with the Brahmin maiden. It is because of this karmic affinity that they were able to go to heaven at that time”.
I said, “That is right. Your explanation is correct. There had to be a karmic affinity between them. [She was] Earth Treasury Bodhisattva and had, in a past lifetime a very long time ago, vowed to deliver all sentient beings from hell. Over many lifetimes she formed karmic affinities with many people”. At that time, because of her affinities with her mother, she vowed to deliver her form hell. To do that, she created blessings and made offerings to the Three Treasures. Because of these blessings she created, the beings who had the karmic conditions to be in the same [hell] as her mother were also delivered, such were their causes and conditions.
This is why we must earnestly listen to teachings so that after hearing one thing, we are able to understand many principles and delve deeply into them. So, we need [the right] causes and conditions to listen to the Dharma. If we can take it to heart, we should then be able to exercise our wisdom.
If we have [negative] karma, we will face all kinds of obstacles. If we have wisdom, we can hear one thing and understand ten. We will not face the slightest hindrance, we can reach understanding without any obstacles. This is what we must cultivate at all times.
“Born deaf and mute” refer to people who constantly listen to the Dharma but cannot take it to heart. They refuse to listen, or they listen and err in their understanding. Thus they do many things to slander the Dharma. So, we need to constantly develop our wisdom.
Otherwise, we face the Eight Difficulties. These Eight Difficulties are results of the karma we crated that put us in all kinds of difficult places with many kinds of difficulties that prevent us from listening to the Dharma. Thus, we are not able to listen to the Dharma. “Since [we] cannot see the Buddha, it is difficult to listen to the Dharma.” Furthermore, our faculties may not be sound, or they may be incomplete at birth. We may also have other kinds of physical deformities. People who have created negative karma will face these kinds of retributions.
What are the Eight Difficulties? The first is the difficulty of hell. Suffering retributions in hell is very painful. The second is the difficult of the hungry ghost realm, how can we listen to the Dharma? Suffering extreme starvation, how can we listen to the Dharma? The next is the difficulty of the animal realm. Animals live difficult lives; how can they listen to the Dharma?
The above mentioned are the Three Evil Realms. “Since their karma is too severe, they cannot see or hear the Buddha-Dharma.”
The Eight Difficulties: The difficulty of hell, of the hungry ghost realm, of the animal realm, of Uttarakuru, of the heaven of no thoughts, of being blind, deaf and dumb, of worldly intelligence and of the periods before and after a Buddha. Next is the fourth difficulty. Next is the fourth difficulty, which is being born in Uttarakuru. It is place of wonderful pleasures, but we cannot hear the Dharma there. The fifth is the difficulty of the heaven of no thought. The heaven of no thought is a place where non-Buddhist practitioners live in that place, people cannot hear the Right Dharma. This is the difficulty faced In the heaven of no thought .
The sixth is the difficulty of being deaf, dumb and blind. If we are blind, we cannot read the sutras. If we are deaf, we cannot hear the teachings. Even if we can hear, [If we are mute, we would not be able to ask questions]. These are difficulties caused by our faculties that make it hard to listen to the Dharma.
The seventh difficulty is the difficulty of worldly intelligence. Being self-conceited, we believe we clearly understand all things in the world. So, we only listen to the Dharma in order to be able to debate with others We do not take the Dharma to heart at all.
The eighth is the difficulty of the periods before and after the Buddha. We may live in the period before a Buddha appears Then when the Buddha is here, we are not. Only after the Buddha has entered Parinirvana do we come to the world again.
Thus it is difficult to live in the same period as the Buddha. Not only is meeting the Buddha difficult, encountering the Dharma fully formed in the world is very difficult as well.
The difficulty of being deaf, dumb and blind: Those who are deaf, dumb and blind cannot see or hear the Buddha-Dharma. The difficulty of worldly intelligence: They rely on their limited intelligence and cannot humbly engage in spiritual practice, even to the point of slandering the Buddha-Dharma.
The difficulty of the periods before and after a Buddha: People born in a period before a Buddha appears or after He has entered Parinirvana cannot see the Buddha and cannot listen to the Buddha-Dharma.
These are the eight types of difficulties; being able hear the Buddha-Dharma is not that easy. In conclusion, as Buddhist practitioners, we must have deep faith. In life, we must be able to experience and realize the teachings. After listening to the Dharma, we must take it to heart. Therefore, we must always be mindful.
(Source: Da Ai TV – Wisdom at Dawn program – Explanation by Master Chen-Yen)
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