If the spirits in ghost realm don't behave themselves, if they
go rebirth will they become animals or something
else?
If no one dedicates merits to them, usually hell beings will get
reborn as ghosts, and then as animals before they can become human
again. You may ask why they cannot just as well jump from hell to
the human realm. Well, besides the reason that their
unwholesome karma needs to first be exhausted, it is also because
it is very difficult for hell beings, ghosts and animals to
accumulate merit. The conditions are not conducive for them
to do good deeds in such realms; and it is also not possible to
practice the Buddhadharma in realms other than the human and deva
realms.
Some extracts from the Shurangama Sutra:
"And then, Ananda, after
the living beings who have slandered and destroyed rules and
deportment, violated the Bodhisattva precepts, slandered the
Buddha’s Nirvana, and created various other kinds of karma, pass
through many kalpas of being burned in the inferno, they finally
finish paying for their offenses and are reborn as ghosts.
7:161
”Ananda, such a person’s fall is due to his
totally emotional level of functioning. When his karmic fire has
burned out, he will rise up to be reborn as a ghost. This is
occasioned by his own karma of false thinking. If he awakens to
Bodhi, then in the wonderful perfect brightness there isn’t
anything at all. 7:173
”Moreover, Ananda, when his karma as a ghost is ended, the problem
of emotion as opposed to discursive thought is resolved. At that
point he must pay back in kind what he borrowed from others to
resolve those grievances. He is born into the body of an animal to
repay his debts from past lives. 7:175
”Ananda, these are all beings that have finished
paying back former debts and are born again in the human realm.
They are involved in a beginningless scheme of karma and being
upside-down in which their lives are spent killing one another and
being killed by one another. They do not get to meet the Thus Come
One or hear the Proper Dharma. They just abide in the wearisome
dust, passing through a repetitive cycle. Such people can truly be
called pitiful. 7:192
”Furthermore, Ananda, there are people who do not rely on proper
enlightenment to cultivate samadhi, but cultivate in some special
way that is based on their false thinking. Holding to the idea of
perpetuating their physical bodies, they roam in the mountains and
forests in places people do not go and become ten kinds of
immortals. 7:194
http://cttbusa.org/shurangama/shurangama30.asp
http://cttbusa.org/shurangama/shurangama31.asp
