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By now the village monk s mind was trapped by its own jealous scheming.
He thought,  If that other monk eats this fantastic meal, even if I grabbed
him by the throat and kicked him out, he still would never leave! I must
secretly get rid of this alms food. But if I give it to a stranger, it will become
known and talked about. If I throw it away in a pond, the butter will float.
on the surface and be discovered. If I throw it away on the ground, crows
will come from miles around to feast on it, and that too would be noticed. So
how can I get rid of it?
Then he saw a field that had just been burned by farmers to enrich the soil. It
was covered with hot glowing coals. So he threw the rich man s generous
gift on the coals. The alms food burned up without a trace. And with it went
his peace of mind!
For, when he got back to the monastery, he found the visitor gone. He
thought,  This must have been a perfectly wise monk. He must have known
I was jealous afraid of losing my favored position. He must have known I
resented him and tried to trick him into leaving. I wasted alms food meant
for him. And all for the sake of keeping my own belly full! I m afraid
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something terrible will happen to me! What have I done? So, afraid of
losing his easy daily food, he had thrown away his peace of mind.
For the rest of his life the rich man continued to support him. But his mind
was filled with torment and suffering. He felt doomed like a walking
starving zombie, or a living hungry ghost.
When he died, his torment continued. For he was reborn in a hell world,
where he suffered for hundreds of thousands of years.
Finally, there too he died, as all beings must. But the results of his past
actions were only partly completed. So he was reborn as a demon, 500
times! In those 500 lives, there was only one day when he got enough to eat,
and that was a meal of afterbirth dropped by a deer in the forest!
Then he was reborn as a starving stray dog another 500 times! For the sake
of a full monk s belly in a past life, all these 500 lives were also filled with
hunger, and quarrelling over food. Only a single time did he get enough to
eat, and that was a meal of vomit he found in a gutter!
Finally most of the results of his actions were finished. Only then was he so
very fortunate enough to be reborn as a human being. He was born into the
poorest of the poor beggar families of the city of Kasi, in northern India. He
was given the name, Mittavinda.
From the moment of his birth, this poor family became even more poor and
miserable. After a few years, the pain of hunger became so great, that his
parents beat him and chased Mittavinda away for good. They shouted,  Be
gone forever! You are nothing but a curse!
Poor Mittavinda! So very long ago he had not known how lucky he was.
He was contented as a humble village monk. But he allowed the poison of
jealousy to enter his mind  the fear of losing his easy daily food. This led
to the self-torture of resentment against a perfect monk, and to trickery in
denying him one wholesome gift of alms food. And it took a thousand and
one lives for the loss of his comfort and daily food to be completed. What he
had feared, his own actions had brought to pass!
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Chapter 2. Greed
Little did poor Mittavinda know that his lives of constant hunger were about
to come to an end. After wandering about, he eventually ended up in
Benares.
At that time the Enlightenment Being was living the life of a world famous
teacher in Benares. He had 500 students. As an act of charity, the people of
the city supported these poor students with food. They also paid the
teacher s fees for teaching them.
Mittavinda was permitted to join them. He began studying under the great
teacher. And at last, he began eating regularly.
But he paid no attention to the teachings of the wise master. He was
disobedient and violent. During 500 lives as a hungry dog, quarrelling had
become a habit. So he constantly got into fist fights with the other students.
It became so bad that many of the students quit. The income of the world
famous teacher dwindled down to almost nothing. Because of all his
fighting, Mittavinda was finally forced to run away from Benares.
He found his way to a small remote village. He lived there as a hard
working laborer, married a very poor woman. and had two children.
It became known that he had studied under the world famous teacher of
Benares. So the poor villagers selected him to give advice when questions
arose. They provided a place for him to live near the entrance to the village.
And they began following his advice.
But things did not go well. The village was fined seven times by the king. [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]