..續本文上一頁ncentration. All kinds of hardships — the five Hindrances — will come flowing into the heart, and no peace will appear. This causes you to suffer and to miss out on the good results that you should have achieved.

　　At the same time, you cause hardships to others — i.e., the monk sitting up here giving you a Dhamma talk. He wastes his time, talking for hours until his rear end hurts. Instead of lying around his hut at his leisure, he has to sit here jabbering away with no results to show for it at all.

　　So keep this story in mind as a lesson in teaching yourself to be intent in doing what”s good. Don”t be the sort of person who — like the servant in the story — is disloyal to his monk.

　　There”s another story to illustrate the good things that come from being loyal to your monk, which I”ll tell to you now.

　　Once there was a moneylender couple who had a large mansion in the city of Varanasi. Both husband and wife were avid merit-makers. Every year during the Rains retreat they would invite a monk to have his meal in their home each day for the entire three months.

　　Now the moneylender couple had a slave couple working in their household. The duty of the slave woman was to pound the rice and separate it into various grades. The highest grade rice was for giving the monk as alms. The second grade rice was for the moneylender couple to eat. The third grade rice was for the servants in the household, and the fourth grade — the lowest grade rice mixed with bran — was for the slave couple to eat themselves. As for the slave woman”s husband, his primary duty was to cut firewood in the forest and make the fire for cooking the rice. His secondary duty was to wait at the mansion gate each morning to welcome the monk who would come for the meal, and to carry his bowl and shoulder bag up to the house for him. And if I remember rightly, the monk who was invited for the meal that year was a Private Buddha. At any rate, when the monk had finished his meal, the slave would carry his bowl and bag from the front door of the house back out to the mansion gate. As he performed this duty every day, the slave came to develop a strong affection for the monk. And the monk felt compassion for the slave. If he had any fruits or other delicacies left from his meal, he would always share them with the slave. This made the slave feel an even greater loyalty toward the monk — to the point where the moneylender couple allowed him to enter the house as the monk”s attendant.

　　One day the slave got to follow the monk all the way into the dining room. Before reaching the dining room, he passed the bedroom, the parlor, and the moneylenders” private dining room. He got to see all the many beautiful and expensive things decorating the moneylender couple”s home. On the way out, after the meal, he happened to see the moneylenders” favorite dog — a male — eating food from a dish near the door to the dining room. He couldn”t help noticing that the dog”s food was fine rice with curries, and that the dish was made of silver. He thought to himself, "Look at all the merit this dog has. It gets to live in the house and doesn”t have to run around looking for food on the ground outside like other dogs. When the time comes, someone fixes food for it to eat, and the food looks so delicious. The rice is a higher grade than what my wife and I get to eat. And its dish is a fine one made of silver. If only I could be reborn as a moneylender”s dog, just think of how happy I”d be!"

　　After he had accompanied the monk to the mansion gate, he went back to his shack and told his wife about all the things he had seen in the moneylenders” house, and especially about the dog eating high grade rice and curries from a silver dish. Then he added, "Neither you nor I have any real happiness or ease in …

《Loyalty to Your Meditation》全文未完，請進入下頁繼續閱讀…