This Sutra has changed the lives of many who
have read it, for it explains the direct results of causes.
It is also called the Golden Precepts by Lord
Buddha and is reproduced here in its entirety:
"Once upon a gathering attended by 1,250
followers, the venerable Ananda, after circling thrice with folded hands around
the Buddha and bowing with respect asked:
"In the present dark age where the
majority of our people are indulgent in unrighteousness, disrespectful to the
Lord’s teaching, undutiful to their parents, immoral, miserable and sordid,
among them some are deaf, some blind, some mute, some idiotic, some handicapped
in other aspects, and most people inured to killing, how could we understand
the cryptic and fundamental principle or causes that have brought about this
reality and what consequences each individual is to suffer eventually for his deeds.
My Lord, would you kindly explain these to
us?’.
The World-honoured One then answered,
"Listen carefully, I will now expound the
Law of Karma. Because of Karmic effects inherited from previous lives, some
people are poor, some rich, some happy and some miserable.
These are four rules inseparable in obtaining
happiness and prosperity for your next life.
They are:
1. To be dutiful to parents.
2. To be respectful to Buddha, to Buddha’s
teaching, and to Buddhist monks.
3. To abstain from killing and setting free
sentient beings.
4. To abstain from eating meat and be
charitable.
Then the Buddha proceeded on the
Karmic Sutra:
"Destiny is aggregate karmic effects from
the past. To believe in and practice this Sutra will bring you eternal
prosperity and happiness”.
Learn the Law of Karma expounded as follows:
To be able to hold office in the Government is
a reward for your building Buddha’s statues in previous lives. For building
Buddha’s statues is likened to molding yourself, and to protect the Tathagata
is protecting yourself.
To be a public officer cannot be taken for
granted, for without practicing Buddhism it will not befall you.
Having helped in the construction of bridges
and roads in your past life is conducive to your present enjoyment of various
transportation facilities which prevent you from getting foot-worn.
To donate clothing to monks will ensure you to
be well provided with clothing in future or in your next life.
To be free from want in food is the result of
your providing food to the poor in your previous life.
To be miserly and unwilling to help the needy
gives rise to future starvation and cloth less.
To have ample housing is a reward for donating
food to monasteries in your past life.
To build temples and public shelters will give
you future prosperity and happiness.
To be pretty and handsome is the reward for
your respecting and offering flowers to Buddha’s altar in the past.
To abstain from eating meat and to pray
constantly to Buddha wil assure you to be born a very intelligent child in your
next incarnation.
To have a good wife and son is reward for your
disseminating Buddha’s teaching in your past life.
Furnishing Buddhist temples with hangings and
tapestries will enable you to have a good marriage in your next rebirth.
To have good parents is a reward for your
respecting and helping those who were lonely and desolate in your past life.
Being a bird hunter in your previous life has
resulted in your being an orphan now.
To have plenty of children is attributable to
your setting free birds in your previous life.
To destroy flowers habitually in your previous
life has caused you to be heirless now.
Your longevity is due to your setting free
sentient beings in your past life.
Being short-lived is the result of your
committing too many killings in your previous life.
To steal the wife of another man will cause
you to have no spouse in your next reincarnation.
To be a widow now is due to your disrespecting
your husband in your previous life.
Being ungrateful in your previous life has
caused you to be a serf at present.
To covet another man’s wife will cause you to
have no spouse in your next reincarnation.
To distort truths habitually will cause you to
suffer blindness in your next life.
To have wry mouth is due to your intentionally
blowing out candles before Buddha’s altar in your past life.
To vituperate (abuse) your parents will cause
you to be reborn a deaf mute in your next incarnation.
Being a hunchback is punishment for jeering at
the Buddha’s followers in your previous life.
To have committed evil with your hands in your
past life is the cause for you having disabled hands now.
Your being lame is imputable to your being a
robber in your previous life.
To be reborn a horse or an ox is the result of
your denying your debts in your previous life.
To be reborn a pig or a dog is the punishment
for your deceiving and hurting others in your previous life.
Offering flesh to monks in your past life has
given rise to your constant illness now.
To be healthy is a reward for your offering
drugs and medications to save the sick and wounded
in your past life.
Relentlessly perpetrating evil in your
previous life is the cause for your present imprisonment.
Plugging snake-pit and mouse holds habitually
will cause you to starve to death in your next incarnation.
To intentionally poison a river or
water-source will cause you to die of poison in your next life.
Being forlorn and friendless is the punishment
for being unfaithful and deceitful to others in your past life.
Disrespecting the Buddha’s teaching will bring
you constant starvation in your next rebirth.
To spew blood is the punishment for eating
meat while praying to Buddha.
To have attended Buddhist instruction with
levity in your previous life is the cause for your
present deafness.
To be afflicted with ulcers is the punishment
for offering flesh before the Buddha’s altar in your past life.
To have bad bodily odour is the punishment for
selling incense with dishonesty in your previous life.
To hunt animals with rope and net will
predestine your death by hanging in your next incarnation.
Being unduly envious and jealous in your past
life is the cause for being so lonely or being reflect of spouse at present.
To be struck by lightning or burn by fire will
be the punishment for dishonest trade dealings.
Being wounded by beasts or snakes tells you
that those creatures were your enemies in your previous life.
Whatever you do will come back to you, so
accept whatever justice and retribution befalls you.
Be not mistaken that karma is fallacious. You
will live to bear its consequences, either in this lifetime or in your future
life.
Should you doubt the virtue of practicing
Buddhism, could you not see the happiness of Buddha’s followers?
Past karma determines your present destiny.
Present karmas are to mold your next life.
Whoever slanders this Sutra will not be reborn
again a human being.
Whoever accepts this Sutra will witness the
truth.
Whoever writes this Sutra will prosper in
successful lives.
Whoever carries this Sutra will be free from
mishaps.
Whoever preaches this Sutra will become a very
intelligent person in successive lives.
Whoever recites this Sutra will be
well-respected by people in his next incarnation.
Whoever distributes this Sutra free to all
will become a leader to humanity in his next life.
If karma did not produce effect, what prompted
Wu-Lin, a dutiful son, to rescue his mother under grave danger?
Whoever is faithful to this Sutra will not
fail to witness the eternal paradise.
The Law of Karma works forever, and the fruit
of good deed will come in due course."
Having spoken the above Sutra to Ananda and
the followers, the World-honored One added
"There are innumerable examples of Karmic
Law, but I have only mentioned in generalization."
Then Ananda said,
"Until the end of the present Dark Age,
most human beings would have through successive lives accumulated countless
misdeeds because of their ignorance of the karmic consequences, but thanks to
our Lord and the Sutra he has so kindly given to us, whoever writes
and reads, prints and distributes this Sutra,
upon praying to the Buddha, will be blessed with
eternal happiness and be admitted to see
Amitabha Buddha, Avalokiteshvara Bodhisattva and all
the other Buddhas in the heavenly
paradise."
After Ananda spoke, all Buddha’s disciples and
followers felt ecstatic and enlightened and, after
bowing respectfully and vowing to abide by his
Sutra, took their journey home.
It is a blessed sutra of the Buddha.
Understand and Practice to bring about goodness in you and other sentient
beings.
༈ བདག་ཅག་གི་སྟོན་པ་ཐུགས་རྗེ་ཅན་ཤཱཀྱ་ཐུབ་པའི་ནི།
སྙིང་རྗེ་ཆེན་པོས་རྩོད་ལྡན་སྙིགས་མའི་ཞིང༌། །
བཟུང་ནས་སྨོན་ལམ་ཆེན་པོ་ལྔ་བརྒྱ་བཏབ། །
པད་དཀར་ལྟར་བསྔགས་མཚན་ཐོས་ཕྱིར་མི་ལྡོག །
སྟོན་པ་ཐུགས་རྗེ་ཅན་ལ་ཕྱག་འཚལ་ལོ། །
བླ་མ་སྟོན་པ་བཅོམ་ལྡན་འདས་དེ་བཞིན་གཤེགས་པ་དགྲ་བཅོམ་པ་ཡང་དག་པར་རྫོགས་པའི་སངས་རྒྱས་དཔལ་རྒྱལ་བ་ཤཱཀྱ་ཐུབ་པ་ལ་ཕྱག་འཚལ་ལོ། །
མཆོད་དོ་སྐྱབས་སུ་མཆིའོ། །ཞེས་དང༌།
བྱིན་གྱིས་བརླབ་ཏུ་གསོལ། །
ཏདྱ་ཐཱ། ཨོཾ་མུ་ནེ་མུ་ནེ་མ་ཧཱ་མུ་ན་ཡེ་སྭཱ་ཧཱ།
