About Ghost part 5……,,,
III. Where Do Ghosts Live and What Are Their Pleasures and Pains
Human beings live on the earth in the human realm. Where do ghosts live? In human life there is pleasure and pain. What gives ghosts pleasure and pain?
The Abhidharmamahavibhasa-sastra says that wealthy ghosts live in mountain valleys and gorges, on the coasts of the world's oceans, in the air, in forests or in temples where people worship them. They are like people who live in penthouses in cities or in luxurious resorts in the picturesque countryside. Poor ghosts live in remote areas near graveyards, or in piles of grass and wood, or in latrines, or in deserted areas. Poor ghosts do not have homes for themselves, but usually wander around like human beggars, completely exposed to the natural elements of wind and rain. They are mired in anguish.
Some ghosts suffer a great deal and some of them actually have quite a lot of fun. Suffering ghosts experience terrible hunger and unbearable thirst. They never have anything to eat and even if they see a river, they cannot drink from it. If ever they do lift water from a river to drink, it will instantly turn into flames in their throats. Even the most delicious food offerings are useless in relieving their perpetual hunger. If you want to help these beings, you may offer them a simple meal of fruits and vegetables in a Buddhist ceremony. Through the merits and blessings of the Buddhist sutras and mantras, the burning fire in their throats may cease, thereby allowing them to eat. Definitely do not offer them sacrifices, otherwise, you will only increase their evil karma and suffering.
The Ksitigarbha Sutra says that, of the merits in chanting sutras and making offerings for the ghosts, six out of seven parts will benefit human beings while only one in seven parts will benefit the deceased. From this we can see how important it is to use our time here while we are healthy to do as much good as we can. If we wait until we are dead and our bodies are stretched out and stiff, then it will be too late to do anything for ourselves, and other people will not be able to do us much good either.
Happy ghosts live pleasant lives full of good food and beautiful clothes. They have vehicles to take them wherever they want to go and they generally pass their time pleasantly. Happy ghosts have it pretty easy because when they were alive, they were generous towards others.
They became ghosts, though, because they often regretted their generosity or felt stingy in their hearts.
Even though the life of a happy ghost is more pleasant than the life of a human being, it is still much better to be a human being. These ghosts are very timid and only dare to come out late at night. They are afraid of light and never appear in the day. If they happen to come across a human being, they run and hide in dark places because they are afraid to touch people. Once we understand how afraid of us ghosts are, we will not feel the need to fear them so much.
Sometimes human beings unintentionally disturb ghosts. In Taiwan, there is a folk custom of "marrying" a dead daughter (so she will have a place on someone's ancestral shrine).
There is a story about a couple who tried very hard to find someone to "marry" their daughter who had died before she was married in life. The daughter had not married in life because she did not want to, and their forcing her to do so after death only angered her and caused her more misery.
"Father, Mother," she said. "when I was alive you tried to force me to marry to carry on the family and now that I am dead and have become a ghost, you still want to force your will on me!"
Since the ghost thought this young man was good-for-nothing in wishing to "marry" a ghost, she intentionally caused her "husband" a lot of trouble. On the "wedding night," she came and hit her "husband" on the head, boxed his ears and struck him in the face. She continued to push and hit him all night long. The "bridegroom" never once caught sight of his "bride," but when the morning came, his face was swollen from being punched so often.
The next day he took her name away from his family shrine and returned it to her parents.
Why do people do such ignorant things? How strange that a man would consider sleeping with a ghost and putting her name in his family shrine. What good could that ever bring? In Taiwan, some people also have the custom of burning paper representations of automobiles, houses, American dollars, television sets, refrigerators and other things so that these items will go to the ghost realm where their departed loved ones can enjoy them. (The smoke is thought to carry them to the ghost realm.)
The truth is, ghosts have five types of magical powers, and they can move around by just thinking of where they want to go. They do not need cars. If they did use cars, it would take them longer than if they had gone by their own powers. If everybody burned a paper car for their loved ones, pretty soon hell would be overloaded with automobiles. There would be traffic accidents and no one would ever get anywhere. In this human realm, home appliances are either 110 volts or 220 volts. If they do not have the right outlets in hell, our appliances will be useless there. American dollars are used almost all over the world, but do you think they will be accepted in hell, too?
Ghosts have their own ways of living and we do not need to be too concerned with them. A loved one who has passed away may have gone to heaven or been reborn as a human being.
You can not be sure they have become ghosts and that their lives are full of sorrow and need. If we are going to honor our ancestors, we do not need to burn paper money for them because we will only end up with a heap of useless ash. It would be much better for everyone to donate money in the names of our ancestors. We can build schools, establish scholarship funds and do other good things in their names. In this way our ancestors can make a useful contribution to the human realm.
In Chinese literature, there is a wonderful and vivid story about ghosts. Once there was a ghost who had just left his human body. As a new ghost, he discovered that he was so inexperienced he could not find anything to eat. He was getting really hungry when he met an old ghost. The old ghost said to him, "Young fellow, why are you so skinny and why is your face so pale and gaunt?"
"I have been a ghost for quite a few days now," the new ghost replied, "but I have not yet succeeded in finding anything to eat. That is why I look so bad. My friend, you have been a ghost for a much longer time than I have. Please tell me how to get some food!"
"That is so easy," the old ghost said. "What I usually do is to play some ghost tricks and do something supernatural. That is what gets me fed!"
"So that is how you do it," the new ghost said. "Now I understand."
The new ghost was delighted with his new understanding and immediately ran to the east side of town. He entered a poor person's house where someone was grinding flour. As soon as he had the chance, the ghost stepped up to the grinding wheel and started to move it himself.
When the person in the house saw that the wheel was moving all by itself, he called out in surprise, "Wow! The wheel is moving all by itself and no one is pushing it! There must be a ghost here! It must be our compassionate Buddha who sent him here to help us because we are so poor and have to work hard all the time!"
The new ghost kept pushing the grinding wheel all night long. He was made very tired by the work and his eyes began to glaze over, but when dawn came he still had not gotten anything to eat. He ran straight back to the old ghost.
"Hey, you! You told me to play some ghost tricks to make my life better," he complained angrily.
"I followed your advise completely. I worked all night, yet I did not get one thing to eat!"
"Oh, you fool," the old ghost said. "The home you went to believes in Buddhism. Buddhists are not afraid of ghosts. Why should they give you anything to eat?"
"So that is how it is. I see. I will try another place tonight," the new ghost said. That night he slipped through the shadows and went to a different house on the west side of town where some people were pounding rice. He picked up the pounding stick and began pounding the rice for them. When the people saw what was happening, they were very surprised.
"Amazing! Look at that! Last night the Buddha sent a ghost to someone's home to help him grind flour, and tonight Lao Tzu has sent a ghost to help us pound rice."
The new ghost worked as hard as he could until the sky began to lighten and he heard roosters crowing.
His back and arms were terribly sore and he felt tired all through his body, but still he had not been given a single thing to eat. He raced back to the old ghost, more than a little bit angry this time.
"Now, try to explain this to me. Why did they not give me anything to eat? I do not understand!"
"My young friend, those people were Taoists. Not only do they not fear ghosts, sometimes they even try to catch them!"
"Then what should I do? Do I have to go hungry day in and day out? I can hardly bear it!"
"Here is what you do," the old ghost said. "Find a house without any Buddhist statues or signs of Taoist gods. In that place, anything will be possible."
The new ghost looked all over the town until at last he found a house which had no gods and no images of the Buddha in it. Inside there was a room full of people enjoying a feast of fish, meat, vegetables and wine. When the new ghost saw their sumptuous meal, he was so tempted that he began to drool. He had to promptly think of what to do to get them to feed him. He saw a skinny little dog crouched by one of the legs of the table. The dog was wagging its tail in the hope that someone would throw him a bone. The ghost grabbed the dog and started to race around the room so it looked to the people as if the dog were flying.
"Look at that!" someone exclaimed. "How can that be? How can the dog be flying around like that? Did someone cast a spell on him?"
The whole room fell into a commotion as the dog flew around and around. Somebody suggested that they call on Jesus to help them. Another person said, "No, Jesus can help people change, but he cannot do anything when it comes to ghosts."
Someone else said, "Let us read Confucius's words out loud. Maybe he can help us!"
Another person answered, "No! Have you forgotten that Confucius refused to talk about ghosts? He told us to keep away from them! He will not be able to help us, either!"
Things went on like this with people arguing back and forth for quite some time. At last they decided to call on a spirit medium to exercise his magical power.
"This ghost is bewitched. Let us kill the dog and prepare for him a table of food complete with three types of meat and wine. That will appease him!"
The people quickly did as instructed and prepared a bounteous feast for the ghost, who enjoyed every last bite of it. "That was great!" he said when he was finished. "That was really good!" The food was so good, in fact, the new ghost never wanted to leave that house again.
Every night after that he performed some new trick to get the people to make him more food.
So, this is truly the way to "invite a ghost into your house."
In life, we have to be careful to always treat others with kindness and to keep ourselves well within the limits of good behavior. Definitely do not ever invite a ghost into your home.
Sometimes people fall in bad company, with robbers or murderers. If you ask that kind of person to help you even once, you will have a world of trouble on your hands. You may even lose your life for it. In Taiwan, there are some really foolish customs wherein people worship ghosts, rocks, trees, and practically everything. If you follow these customs and invite all these spirits and ghosts into your home and honor them as special guests, you will be inviting disasters onto yourself. We should be careful to give our respect only to people who deserve it, to people who are honorable in their own lives. To ensure our well-being and safety, we should keep our distance from people who worship spirits and practice magic.
cont…….
Source
http://tibetanbuddhistencyclopedia.com/en/index.php/A_discussion_on_Ghosts
Categories: Buddhist TermsGhosts
6 August 2023
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