..續本文上一頁 Pay attention to this when you observe people. Don”t just judge by appearances and say, "That person looks virtuous; he seems to be a Good and Wise Advisor." You don”t have any real way to determine that. You must really get to know him thoroughly before you can make such a statement. In this Dharma-ending Age, we all have the same problem, which is that we like to seek what is lofty and distant. Instead of using our eyes to see, we let our ears do the "seeing" for us. When we hear someone say something is good, we rush over. When we get there, we have no idea of whether it”s really good or not, and without realizing it, we get duped. People who confusedly put their faith in wealth and sex and in geomancy are really pathetic!

　　今天從報紙上轉載大陸福建某地，有六個小孩子集體跳海自殺去成仙。這爲什麼呢？就因爲邪說把人迷住了，說人做壞事就要做鬼，做好事就成神仙。什麼叫好事呢？就是不怕死。在鄉下地方，小孩子天真純樸，聽了什麼也就容易入腦。說好人不怕死，死了會成仙，所以這六個小孩就要集體自殺成仙去，「以前有八仙，大概是集體自殺的，我們現在也要集體自殺成六仙，免去六道輪回。」所以他們一起自殺想成仙。

　　In today”s newspaper, there was an article about six children in the Fukien province of China who committed suicide together by jumping into the sea, hoping to become immortals. Why did they do that

　　 They had been misled into believing that people who do evil become ghosts, and people who do good turn into immortals. And what did "doing good" mean

　　 It meant not being afraid to die. Children in rural areas are quite naive and will believe whatever they hear. Since someone told those six children that good people are not afraid to die and will become immortals after death, they decided to kill themselves as a group and become immortals. They thought, "The Eight Immortals of the past probably committed suicide together. Now we can commit suicide together and become the Six Immortals and escape the cycle of rebirth in the six paths." Then they killed themselves, hoping to become immortals.

　　他們成不成仙呢？我可以證明沒有。爲什麼不成仙？因爲他們太迷了。成仙的人都很聰明的，沒有這麼愚癡，不懂真理，是非不辨的。怎麼會一起死去就成仙呢？成仙若是這麼容易，那麼大家不如快點死了，都去成仙。這真是無有是處，這種鄉愚太可憐了，盲從迷信邪說，令小孩子都失去了方向，這是很可憐的一件事。

　　Well, did they become immortals

　　 I can guarantee that they didn”t. Why

　　 They were too confused. People who become immortals are very intelligent. They aren”t as foolish as these children, who had no understanding of true principles and couldn”t tell right from wrong. How could they all die together and become immortals

　　 If becoming immortal were that easy, everyone should just hurry up and die and become immortal. But that”s impossible. How pitiful those foolish villagers are, blindly following this superstitious and deviant theory and leading their children astray. This is very sad.

　　話又說回來，爲什麼小孩子甯可死也不怕，而說要去成仙呢？這也可以說是環境壓迫而成，他們覺得人活著還不如死，做人如行屍走肉沒什麼意思，于是找個大解脫，一起去死。小孩子在他們的筆記簿上，寫「死」字寫了一千多個，天天死死死，一天到晚念死。所以這些童男童女無知，受迷信之蠱惑，而失去真正的目標和方向。

　　But why were those children so eager and unafraid to die, saying they were going to become immortals

　　 You could say their environment forced them to feel that life wasn”t worth living, that it would be better to die than to be living corpses. So seeking liberation, they all went to their deaths together. The children had written the word "death" over a thousand times in their notebooks. Every day, it was "death, death, death." They thought of death from morning to night. In their ignorance, those boys and girls were seduced by super-stition and lost their true goal and direction.

　　所以我們信佛的人，不應該迷信，要破除迷信。什麼是迷信？就是糊裏胡塗地亂信，別人說什麼就信，信迷了。「迷信」還不打緊，最怕是「信迷」，信那迷亂顛倒的外道。有人自作聰明，真的他不信，假的他反而去信，這就是「迷中之迷」，不認識真理，拿真當假，把假當真。好像這六個小孩，本來「找死成仙」是一種虛假騙人的方法，而他們卻相信。若是教他們要修行才能成仙，恐怕他們就不相信了。所以世界上可憐的人很多，可憐的事也很多，一言難盡！

　　Buddhists should not believe in superstition. You must break through superstition. What is superstition

　　 It is being reckless and confused in your belief. You simply believe anything people say, and you end up all muddled. Being confused in your belief is still not that serious. It”s only to be feared that you believe in confusion, that you believe in the confused, upside-down teachings of externalist ways. Some people try to be clever; they don”t believe in what is true but instead believe in what is false. This is a case of being confused within confusion. They don”t recognize true principles. They take the true to be false, and the false to be true. For example, in the case of the six children, the theory that "death leads to immortality" is actually just a false claim meant to cheat people, but they believed it. If someone had told them they have to cultivate before they can become immortals, they might not have believed that. There are many pathetic people and many woeful situations in the world; we could never finish speaking of them!

　　一九八二年十一月廿八日晚間開示

　　A talk given on November 28, 1982

　　Science and the Heaven

《參禅要先打地基 In Investigating Chan, First Lay the Foundation》全文閱讀結束。