Selected Lectures on the Sūtra of the Meeting of Father and Son

Original text: 佛言大王。如是如是。愚痴异生。寡闻无智。于可意触。而生爱乐。心生染着。造如是业。身业三种。语业四种。意业三种。造作彼业。刹那迁谢。是业灭已。不依东方。南西北方。四维上下。中间而住。至命终时。见先所作。心想中现。如彼睡觉。忆梦中事。最后识灭。自业现前。

After the karmic activity created by sentient beings has ceased, where does it go? It does not abide in the east, south, west, or north, the four intermediate directions, above, below, or in between. There is no place where karma ceases or exists. If there were a place where karmic activity could be stored, that would be terrible—wherever such karma was stored, sooner or later it would erupt; whoever the karma follows would suffer misfortune. Karma has no place of storage; it comes without a trace and goes without a shadow. Although karmic activity has no place of storage, when life comes to an end, all the karma created in this lifetime flashes rapidly through the mind; the mind consciousness can perceive it all, can discriminate it all clearly, the mind knows it all completely, missing nothing. At that moment one knows where one is going, and therefore one deeply hopes that one's relatives can help one attain liberation from one's karmic obstructions, but by then one can no longer speak or express oneself; in the neutrino-body (antarā-bhava) one wants to tell one's loved ones, but the two realms of yin and yang are separated, communication is impossible—people of two different worlds cannot understand each other's language.

After consciousness ceases, this life is over, and the dream of this human life comes to a close. Thinking about it now, real life truly seems just like a dream. After the six consciousnesses cease, one transmigrates according to karma; because the manas desires a body of the five aggregates (pañca-skandha), the Ālayavijñāna cooperates and manifests the neutrino-body (antarā-bhava). Those of extreme goodness or extreme evil have no neutrino-body (antarā-bhava): the extremely evil person falls into hell without a neutrino-body (antarā-bhava)—as soon as he breathes his last on this side, the hell body manifests; for the extremely good person, after death the heavenly body manifests, and he is directly reborn in heaven to enjoy blessings. Once the hell body emerges, even if one regrets having created evil karma and wishes to repent and remedy it, there is no opportunity; in the neutrino-body (antarā-bhava) one can still repent, and relatives may perhaps still do something to remedy it, but without a neutrino-body (antarā-bhava) there is no way—the karmic seeds are settled. Unless someone is highly awakened and repents while in hell with the hell body—if his power is sufficient and his mental strength very strong, he can also emerge from hell; if his blessings are greater, after death Kṣitigarbha Bodhisattva may be waiting for him at the gates of hell, teaching him to repent or teaching him verses from the Buddha-dharma; if he can recite along with them, he can dissolve his hell karma and leave hell. If one has received the bodhisattva precepts, and after falling into hell one knows which precept one violated, a single moment of repentance in the mind can also dissolve the karma and enable one to leave hell.

Therefore, in our usual cultivation, we should accumulate more merit and cultivate more wisdom; then when receiving evil retribution, there will be many opportunities for liberation. What is to be feared is lacking merit and blessings, not knowing how to apply the Dharma, and not understanding how to repent of one's karmic actions. By listening more to sutras and hearing more Dharma, one can gain more wisdom for liberation.