From commentary
on Earth-Store Bodhisattva Sutra by Ven Master Hsuan Hua (a
contemporary realised Chan Patriarch)
http://www.cttbusa.org/esscommentary/earthstore3.htm
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Beings who shed the Buddha’s blood, slander the
Triple Jewel, and do not venerate Sutras, will fall into the
Relentless H ell where for thousands of billions of eons they will
seek escape in vain.
Commentary:
Beings who shed the Buddha’s blood. .
. Suppose innocent living beings do commit some offense
such as shed the Buddha’s blood. Now that Shakyamuni Buddha entered
nirvana, how can we make the Buddha bleed? We do not live in a time
when the Buddha is in the world and have never seen the Buddha, how
can we make the Buddha bleed? When the Buddha was in the world,
shedding his blood means injuring the Buddha’s physical body. After
his nirvana, it means destroying images of the Buddha, such as
removing an ear or a finger. Burning paper images of the Buddha,
for instance, is also equivalent to shedding the Buddha’s blood. In
principle, these offenses cannot be vindicated through repenting
and reforming, but there are exceptions such as when intoxicated or
overtaken by madness or mental breakdown. However, you cannot claim
to be mentally ill or drunk but commit these offenses
intentionally. It is when unintended that these karmic offenses are
lighter.
The Buddha had such great spiritual powers, who could
have shed his blood? The Buddha had certified to the fruit, who
could have hurt his physical body? Sometimes even the Buddha gets
injured unexpectedly. The Buddha’s cousin, Devadatta, opposed
everything the Buddha did and invariably tried to ruin him. If the
Buddha said something was proper, Devadatta would contradict him.
He did everything he possibly could to undermine the Buddha.
Once when the Buddha was speaking, Devadatta bribed a
poor woman to take part in a plot against the Buddha. As is the
case with many impoverished persons, her resolve was weak and she
would do anything for money. Devadatta had her tie a pillow around
her waist under her clothes and in this condition go to the
Buddha’s Dharma assembly and accuse him of fathering her unborn
child. Devadatta promised her a large sum of money for making the
Buddha no longer credible to his disciples.
When this woman followed suit and told the Buddha’s
disciples that she is pregnant with the Buddha’s child, the Buddha
used his spiritual powers to make the pillow fall to the ground,
proving on the spot that she was dishonest. That was how Devadatta
used various means to damage the Buddha.
Another time the Buddha was walking by Vulture Peak
when Devadatta, hoping to crush the Buddha, used his spiritual
powers to cause an avalanche. A Vajra knight and guardian spirit of
Vulture Peak, named Bei La, used his Vajra pestle to smash one of
the large boulders, which was about to hit the Buddha. One of the
fragments, however, struck the Buddha’s little toe and cracked a
bone. At that very moment a fiery chariot emerged to carry
Devadatta alive off to the hells. The retribution incurred by those
who burn and destroy images of the Buddha, dismantle temples or
ruin stupas is similar.
Slander the Triple Jewel. Buddhists
must remember not to commit this type of offense, that is, to speak
evil of the Buddha, the Dharma, and the Sangha. Among the
Bodhisattva precepts is one that prohibits people from speaking of
the offenses of the Fourfold Assembly, the bhiksus, bhiksunis,
upasakas, and upasikas. Not only does it warn people to refrain
from speaking of others’ faults, it also cautions against
participating when others speak of them. Just ignore the
conversation. If you participate in such a conversation, you also
violate the precept. The best thing to do in a situation like this
is to simply keep your mouth shut, remain silent.
Among other reasons for not speaking of the faults of
the Fourfold Assembly is that the views of an ordinary person are
often wrong. Ordinary people cannot fathom the realms of sages.
Bodhisattvas of the First Ground, for example, do not know the
states of those of the Second Ground, and so on up the line.
Bodhisattvas on the Tenth Ground do not know the states of the
Bodhisattvas on the Ground of Equal Enlightenment. Arhats of the
First Fruition do not know the states of Second Fruition Arhats.
Before you acquire true wisdom, you may not say harmful things
about the Fourfold Assembly, which is one form of slandering the
Triple Jewel. Even though people may very clearly be in the wrong,
you should not speak of it. Just do things correctly yourself,
rather than acting like a camera that goes about photographing
faults and never examining itself.
At this point some stories come to mind. During the
reign of Emperor Wu of the Liang Dynasty, there was a Dhyana Master
named Zhi Gong who ate two pigeons every day. The cook assumed that
the birds must be delicious, and one day tasted a wing on the sly.
Then he brought the remainder of the dish to Dhyana Master Zhi
Gong. After he finished eating, Dhyana Master Zhi Gong called for
the cook.
“Why did you eat some of my pigeons?”
“I didn’t take any pigeon,” answered the cook.
“Oh? Then what about this?” said Dhyana Master Zhi
Gong. He opened his mouth and two live pigeons emerged. One of the
birds flew off, but the other had a wing missing.
“If you didn’t, where’s the wing of this bird?” asked
Dhyana Master Zhi Gong.
Although in both cases the men ate pigeons, Dhyana
Master Zhi Gong swallowed the chopped up and cooked pigeon, then
spit it out alive; the cook, on the other hand, could not do it.
Dhyana Master Zhi Gong’s state was one of “eating and yet not
eating.”
At Ling Ying Monastery at West Lake, Hangzhou, there
lived Dhyana Master Ji Gong, another famous monk who always ate dog
meat and drank wine. He was invariably inebriated, and everyone
said, “There goes another tippling monk.” In his drunkenness,
however, Ji Gong taught and transformed living beings.
Once a Buddha image was not yet gilded with gold, so he
told the abbot, “I will gild this Buddha image. No one else needs
to do it.” The abbot of his temple agreed and then waited. After
some time the image was still not finished, so the abbot questioned
Dhyana Master Ji Gong about the matter. The Dhyana Master agreed to
do the work that very evening. When night came, however, he merely
kept on with his drinking.
When everyone was asleep though, he went to the image
and began to spew forth pure gold, with which he covered the
images. The abbot heard Dhyana Master Ji Gong spitting and abruptly
ordered, “How could you spit at the Buddha image?” Dhyana Master Ji
Gong immediately quit and left.
The next morning the abbot inspected the image. He
found that it was covered with gold except for a small spot on the
crown of the head. Although a master goldsmith completed the work,
his ordinary gold could not match that supplied by Dhyana Master Ji
Gong. The states of arhats are inconceivable.
So, you see, you should not speak of the faults of the
Fourfold Assembly. It is not so serious if you criticize ordinary
people, but should you criticize a sage, the penalty you might
incur will be very great, enough to cause you to fall into the
hells.
People slander the Triple Jewel because they do not
have faith. Another cause is mixing with bad company—people who do
not understand and therefore slander the Buddhadharma. Associating
with such people may cause one to be influenced by their bad
habits.
Some people berate and slander the Triple Jewel and use
flattery for ill gain. Such persons’ minds are crooked; they engage
in flattery to get what they want. They are stupid, yet puffed up
with their own intelligence, like the five thousand bhikshus who
left the assembly during the speaking of the Lotus Sutra.
Because they had a tiny bit of cleverness, they looked down on
others and slandered the good Dharma, thus blinding the selective
Dharma eye of living beings.
What is the retribution for such persons? In the future
they will be deformed and crippled, without arms, hands, ears, or
legs. They may not be able to walk or have some speech impediment.
Mutes are people who slandered the Triple Jewel. After they commit
this offense they fall into the hells, where they spend two million
years of hellish retribution, after which they are born into the
realms of the animals, possibly as a horse, cow, sheep, chicken or
dog. After two million years among the animals, they may be reborn
as humans, but they will be disabled. Either they will be without
eyes therefore blind, without ears therefore deaf, or perhaps
without tongues or even with tongues, but yet they cannot speak. In
general, they will be disabled and ugly. They undergo this kind of
suffering and fall into the Relentless Hells after death. Such is
the retribution of slandering the Triple Jewel in lives past.
And do not venerate sutras. . . Sutras
must be treated with respect, for, as it says in the Diamond
Sutra, “Wherever this sutra is, there is the Buddha.” Sutras
are the Dharma-body of the Buddha, toward which we must be very
respectful. Places where sutras are set must be organized and
clean, and without acts of defilement. They should always be stored
above other books. Also make sure that Buddhist sutras are on the
side where we lay our head in a room and not on the side where we
lay our feet. Our beds are unclean, thus sutras must not be placed
there. If you do not show the same respect for sutras that you show
the Buddha, you are slandering and harming the Triple Jewel. The
retribution for not respecting sutras is the same: one falls into
the Relentless Hall where for thousands of billions of eons
they will seek escape in vain. It would be impossible to
exit the hells despite such a long duration.
Remember this section of the sutra especially, it is
very important. Buddhists must be respectful of the Triple Jewel
and sutras, and must not shed the Buddha’s blood.