Lecturer: Master Zheng-Yan
Subject: Giving Joyful is Spiritual Wealth (歡喜布施心靈富)
I am always telling everyone how to cultivate good thoughts. If someone’s mind is greedy or miserly, that person will certainly be poor. No matter how materially rich they are, for the greedy and stingy, it is never enough. Such people are never satisfied.
Dissatisfaction is the worst poverty. If someone’s mind is impoverished, they are ill. We want to cure them. But worldly medicine cannot cure them. Only the Buddha-Dharma can. It requires someone with the affinity to help them.
Those with impoverished minds are the most pitiful. If we have the affinity to hear the Dharma, we will gain respect for the Three Treasures. If we hear the Dharma and it enters our heart, we can change our behavior and learn to give joyfully. Happiness arises in us when we give to others. If this happens, poverty can be transformed into wealth.
One of our commissioners once shared a story. “There was an old man. When he was young, he did not really think things through.” He owned property, a house and land. He was successful and married with children. He lived a life he should have been satisfied with. But he was not. He felt the need to work even harder. To grow his business, he needed to socialize and network. His friends would invite him out to drink. Thus, they began to have a tight hold on him. They drew him into playing underground lotteries. At first, they would let him taste the joy of winning. He felt gambling was easier and more fun than just doing business. So, he began to lose himself in these lotteries, and then he lost money.
His friends said to him, “This isn’t as good as going to a casino.” Those around him took a lot of pleasure in making money through gambling, so he started gambling too. He had a very happy family. He was hardworking, and he cherished his wife and kids. But slowly, he started drinking and playing the lotteries more and more. He became lost in casino games and gambling. He was not doing any business. He would come home drunk and beat his wife. His land and his business kept dwindling.
Eventually, his wife left him and took the kids with her. By the time we met him. He was living in a house surrounded by weeds. It was hard to say how long he had been that way. The weeds were higher than the house. But he was still in good health. He really liked to make friends. Although poor, old and alone, he would still often come out of his house to chat with people, then return to his garbage dump of a home.
Come out of his house to chat with people, then return to his garbage dump of a home. His neighbors reported this case to our commissioners. These commissioners went to see him. They would talk with this old man. “Why don’t you let us come clean up your house a bit?” He was unwilling. One Faith Corps member became friends with him. He would bring food and other things to the old man. This member would visit him once in the morning and again at night.
One day he said to him, “Grandpa, I come over all the time; I really want to go inside and sit down. But it is so dirty outside, can’t I help you clean it up a bit? What do you say? I will cut the grass.”
“Okay, okay,” the old man said, “but I just don’t have the manpower.”
“Don’t worry, we have a lot of people. They are all Tzu Cheng Faith Corps. Not long ago they came to see you, but you wouldn’t let anyone close to you. They were very concerned about you, just like I am. How about I invite everyone to come help clean? Is that okay?”
“If they are like you, it’s okay.”
So, he organized a group, with some commissioners and Faith Corps members, a dozen or so people. They cut the grass around the house and cleared away all the garbage. From the window they could see the inside was very dirty, also.
So, they took it one step further. “Grandpa, let’s find a day when we can clean up the inside, too.”
The old man saw so many people treating him like their grandfather. They did not judge him for being old and alone. So he felt that he could make friends with these people. So, when they offered to clean his house, he said, “Okay, when can you come?”
“We can come next Saturday.”
“Okay, come next Saturday.”
Then next week, when they opened the door, the inside was very dirty and smelly. The old man said, “I’m sorry for over ten years, whenever I thought about cleaning. I got intimidated, so I just left it.”
“Don’t worry, it doesn’t matter. We are here to clean it up for you.”
Once they got into it, rats, cockroaches, and even snakes came out. Everyone was very frightened. But they still had loving hearts and minds, so in one day, ten to twenty people worked together and cleaned the entire house. They even helped him whitewash the walls and clean up all the garbage. After it was all cleaned, it looked brand new. The old man really appreciated it, and from that moment on, he started communicating with Tzu Chi volunteers.
One of the volunteers said, “Grandpa, every day you hang around the temple talking to people, but it really isn’t much use. I want to invite you to do some volunteer work.”
“I am so old. How could I do any work?”
“There are people older than you who volunteer. These elders are still working to save people.”
“But I am so old, how can I save people?”
“Follow me, and just do it. Just do what I do.”
So, she brought him to see some of these elders.
“What are these people doing? The things here look like the things in my house.”
At first, he just stood on the side and watched. He stood with his hands behind his back watching, and observing, until he could not help himself. He stretched out both hands and said, “I can do this. I can do that, too.”
They were sorting recyclables. Everyone began to talk to him. They told him, “Did you know all these items have gold in them? Everything here can be recycled and used for other things.”
They would tell him this, and he felt it was all very sensible. “I can do all of this. I can participate, too.”
He started walking to and from the center, which took him about forty minutes each way. On the way, he would see plastic items. “This is what I just recycled.” He would pick things up as he walked.
He would see aluminum cans, too. “This is what I was just sorting.”
He’d pick it up and put it in his plastic bag. As he walked home he would pick things up along his way.
The next day, he would bring these things with him still picking more things up as he went.
Everyone praised him. That made him very happy, so he formed very good affinities with those people. At the same time, someone told him, “We are always able to make you happy, to say nice things to you. Grandpa do you know where we learned this?”
“I don’t know, you are all very excellent people.”
“This is what our Master teaches us. Every day the Master has a show. Come on, let’s watch it.”
They brought the television out. “We can watch as we recycle.” They listened to “Life Wisdom.”
He began to watch and work at the same time “That house is even dirtier than mine was.”
He heard me say that Tzu Chi volunteers go clean houses. Although I did not mention his house, he thought of what his house was like before and how it compared to others’ houses.
Afterwards he said, “Next time you clean someone’s house, call me. I can do it.”
They worked with him one step at a time. A few years passed and he was still in good health. He still worked as a recycling volunteer.
One year, during the year-end blessing, he came to meet me. A commissioner brought him over and told me his story. He listened, then said, “I am really embarrassed when I think about how confused I was then.”
He talked about how he used to have a good life.
I asked him, “Do your children ever visit?”
“No, never I don’t even know where they live, and they don’t know where I live. Maybe in the future,” he said, “the township office can do something about this.”
Our volunteers told him, “No need, Grandpa. If you want us to, we can go inquire for you. Do you have your residence information from before?”
Volunteers investigated and found his children. The children were not willing to see him, but Tzu Chi volunteers kept visiting the family. They began to have good relations with the mother.
She said, “We will see” I have heard the story up to this point. “We will see.” Will they be able to re-establish a relationship? After the family considers, if they know that the man has changed, that his temper has changed, that he does not smoke or drink anymore, that his habits have changed after all these years, if they know all of this, maybe they can be reunited.
Talking about this story reminds us that if we have the affinity to hear the Dharma, it can give rise to joyous giving. If we take pleasure in giving, poverty turns into wealth. So, we need to always be mindful. Poverty and wealth do not depend on the tangible. They come from intangible happiness, from making good connections with people and having an abundant feeling of love. Then one has abundant spiritual wealth.
The difference between poverty and wealth is not found in material things, but in our thoughts.
If our minds are greedy or stingy, no matter how wealthy we are, it is never enough. Dissatisfaction is the worst poverty. If we have the affinity to hear the Dharma, it can give rise to joyous giving. This can transform the poor into wealthy people.
The next passage in the text continues on, “In this way, we even seek profit from profit. We seek more and more and are never sated or content. We could speak endlessly of these limitless transgressions.”
We previously talked about seizing things illegally or taking things form spirits, animals and beings of the Four Forms of Birth. Sometimes we may use spirits to cheat people. There are many different instances. Just like what was just said, there are many cases of seeking profit from profit, adding interest to interest. We also talked before about trade and business, trading cheap, shoddy goods for expensive ones or selling under weight and buying over weight. There are many kinds of greed. There is no way to name them all. Thus, “we seek more and more,” so we take things improperly. Whether it is doing business without standards, not using proper measurements or not practicing fair business conduct, this is all very wrong. The worst is actually robbing, stealing, cheating, or deceiving others. These are all evil.
We seek more and more. Because a greedy mind knows no limits, these activities are carried out endlessly and we create these many transgressions. We could “speak endlessly of these limitless transgressions.” There is really no way to name them all.
Although we talk every day of acts that are both obvious and subtle, there are still so many to discuss. We have listened to the Sutras for so long, listened to all the wrongdoings listed in the repentance text. We should be vigilant of our behavior. We need to reflect on ourselves to be vigilant. Then we can begin to correct ourselves and turn greediness into joyful giving. We have already been repenting,
We have already been repenting, section by section. So, “Today we pray.”
Today, we should pray with the most sincere mind. “To the Buddhas and sages of the Ten Directions” To the Buddhas, Dharma and Sangha, “we repent completely. We willingly repent all transgressions of theft.”
This is because what we have been discussing is all about the karma of theft. If it is not robbery, it is hijacking, or perhaps it is stealing. This is all theft. Some even dig tunnels or cut through walls to transport stolen goods, or to steal and rob. There are so many variations of these acts, and all are the transgressions of theft. Some even use deceptive cups, scales and rulers. This kind of business leads to ill-gotten gains.
Shorting someone for even an ounce is still theft. So, merits will arise because we have repented. Repentance leads to purity. After we repent, slowly, our seeds of love, seeds of giving and creating merits, all these good seeds, enter into the ground or our minds. This is “the merits that arise.” As long as the Buddha-Dharma enters your mind good thoughts will slowly arise. This is “the merits that arise.”
So, “life after life, we will obtain the wish-fulfilling jewel.” In the future, if we do not want to create debt, and want to create good affinities instead, life after life, then starting right now, if we have unexhausted retributions, we need to repay our debts right away then create good affinities with others. Then we accumulate merits for the future.
It is like that old man we just mentioned. Now that his house is clean inside and out, he has started to do good deeds. I believe he is already 70 or 80 years old. If he speaks good words and does good deeds now, he will already have good affinities in his next lifetime. Then everything will happen as he wishes.
Everyone, we must believe in the law of cause and effect as Buddhists, we need to take care of our minds. We absolutely cannot have greedy, stingy thoughts. If the mind is never satisfied, we will live in mental poverty. This is the most pitiable life. If causes and conditions let us hear the Dharma,
we need to reverently practice the teachings. Naturally, giving will joyfully arise in our minds. We will take great pleasure in giving, and accordingly turn poverty into wealth. Everyone, in listening to the Dharma, the most important thing is transforming our minds. So, we should always be mindful.
(Source: Da Ai TV 靜思晨語 法譬如水)