A story of re birth:..
(My thanks to Fred whose birthday bought back memories of our time together in Fang)
Everything we say,
think and do,
effects our future.
An old man came to the Temple with two ladies.
One was aged about sixty five, the other fifteen.
It was assumed the elder woman was his wife and the child his daughter.
The man then began to discuss with the head Monk his plans to build a meditation hall.
He said he needed to build this hall within one day of his death.
He said that his death was not far off and he had been told this by his first wife.
When he said this,
he pointed to the young girl.
"One moment,"
said the Monk,
"How can this girl be your first wife and the old woman your second?"
And so the old man began to tell the following Dharma:
"This young girl was my first real love and we married when she was fifteen.
I was a wealthy merchant and we were very happy.
I loved her dearly and she was most beautiful and I cared for her every need.
There was however a problem.
She liked to steal things.
We would go out to friends houses and she would steal from them.
I did not know of course as the saying "love is blind" is true.
She would also go into our rice fields and when the harvest was ready and the bundles of rice were placed neatly, she would send our workers next door to steal their rice."
After a moment of silence, he was too upset to continue and the girl
spoke.
"I was happy with him for some twelve years, but one day when walking to the fields, I had a feeling I was about to die.
I was wearing two heavy gold chains my husband had given to me as a wedding present.
I decided to bury them under the foot of a large tree beside the workers hut by the rice field.
And so I died and went to hell.
In hell they told me I had been so bad I had to spend one hundred years before I could be reborn.
My husband of course did not know I had gone to hell.
He missed me so badly he gave a large donation to the Temple in my name.
The head of the hell realm told me that because of his merit I had been given twenty years off my time in hell.
My husband then built a school in my name and again I received a twenty year deduction.
This happened twice more and the head of hell said I had to only serve twenty years for my wrong doing,
not one hundred.
My husbands merit had earned me eighty years off my sentence.
When I finished the twenty years,
I was told I was to be reborn in a town near my husbands home.
When I turned fifteen I was to marry him again and look after him in his old age.
I was told that he was to build a meditation hall in one day after his death.
And so I was reborn.
When I turned twelve,
I started to remember the past and I would go and stare at my husband.
He had now remarried and it made his second wife uncomfortable to have a beautiful young girl stare at her husband.
They thought me mad.
It became worse when I started to tell the people at the village and my school, that I am here to marry an old man who is already married.
On my fifteenth birthday,
I went to see my husband and told him of the gold chains.
Of course I looked and sounded familiar to him and when he finally decided to dig, I was happy to say not only found the chains, but said he would re marry me.
So now we are here to offer and gain merit by building the hall."
The merchant passed away a few years later, and a day after he passed, the meditation hall was built.
The girl died within the week and both were sent straight to heaven.
She to be ordained and to continue to help those afflicted and he to become an Arhat .
(perfect person or saint)
This story was told to me by my Dharma Master,
as was told to him,
as the truth,
by his Master who met the merchant and his two wives at his Temple.
Nathan
Sent from my iPhone and
http://www.dharmamaster.com
With love
