The Precept of Not Eating After Noon

Original text of the Ekottara Āgama Sūtra, Volume Sixteen, Gaochuang Chapter: 如阿罗汉。尽形寿不坏斋法。恒以时食。少食知足。不着于味。我今亦如是。尽形寿不坏斋法。恒以时食。少食知足。不着于味。从今日至明旦。

Explanation: Like an arhat, for the entire span of one's life one does not break the precept of fasting, always eating at the proper time, eating little and being content, not attaching to flavors. I shall now also be like this: for my entire life I will not break the precept of fasting, always eating at the proper time, eating little and being content, not craving the sense object of flavor, from today until tomorrow morning.

This is the eight precepts observed for one day and one night; those with the conditions may undertake and hold them for seven days and seven nights, or may hold them every day, and the merit is immeasurable. During the Buddha's time, arhats and all the monastics ate one meal a day at midday, abstaining from food after midday (vikālabhojanā veramaṇī) for their entire lives. They devoted themselves fully to cultivation, had no worldly affairs, spent much time in sitting meditation, their minds were pure, and keeping to one meal at midday was easy to maintain. Some Buddhist lay practitioners can manage to abstain from food after midday. In the Dharma-ending age, keeping the precept of abstaining from food after midday is somewhat difficult; unless retired lay practitioners without jobs can keep it, it is very difficult for those who have work. As for monastics in monasteries, if the monastery's affairs are numerous, they cannot settle down, have little meditative concentration (samādhi), and their minds are not pure, so it is also not easy for them to keep the precept of abstaining from food after midday. The Buddha established this precept so that practitioners' minds would be pure, making it easy to cultivate the Path and enter the Path. If one eats too much, first, it increases attachment, and second, the stomach is always busy digesting food, so the mind is not pure and one cannot concentrate on cultivating the Path and contemplating questions. Especially when eating at night, the stomach is busy digesting food and the mind is not calm, meditative concentration cannot arise, and tranquil contemplation cannot be accomplished. Therefore, eating little is beneficial for cultivation.

Some people use the precepts to constrain the Buddha, making the Buddha keep the precept of abstaining from food after midday; not only do they not make offerings to the Buddha at night, they do not make offerings to the Buddha in the afternoon either. Why do these people treat the Buddhas and Bodhisattvas this way? Because ordinary sentient beings do not understand the realm of Buddhas and Bodhisattvas, do not understand the essential meaning of the precepts, and regard the Buddhas and Bodhisattvas as ordinary beings like themselves—moreover as ordinary human beings—so they think the Buddhas and Bodhisattvas should, like human sentient beings, keep the precept of abstaining from food after midday.

When the Buddha established this precept back then, it was so that practitioners' minds would be pure, undisturbed by food and drink, able to cultivate continuously and apply effort uninterruptedly, without the states of distraction and torpor arising to affect cultivation. But this precept does not suit the Buddha and the great Bodhisattvas; even when the Buddhas and Bodhisattvas dwell in the human world in human bodies, they should not be limited by this precept, because first, the Buddha does not cultivate, and second, the Buddha possesses immeasurable attainment of the Path and can transform and dissolve food and drink—He may not eat, or may eat immeasurable amounts, and neither affects His body and mind. Yet the Buddha in the human world at that time also abstained from food after midday, as a demonstration and model for sentient beings; but before the devas, the Buddha was not limited by the precept of abstaining from food after midday, and accepted the various offerings of the devas anytime and anywhere.

When the Buddhas and Bodhisattvas are not in the human world, in the Buddha-lands where they abide, sunlight is not the dividing line between day and night, and one minute in other Buddha-lands equals many human days in the Saha world; so how should human morning and evening times correspond to the times of other Buddha-lands? In the desire realm, the heavens from Trāyastriṃśa upward have no sun; there is natural radiance manifesting, with no need for sunlight, so from Trāyastriṃśa upward there is no dark night, no nighttime; other Buddha-lands likewise have no dark nights, and the Buddha's worlds even more so have no such thing as night. The human precept of abstaining from food after midday, in a different spacetime, has no meaning whatsoever; therefore, when making offerings to the Buddha, there is no need to consider human times such as day and night.

Furthermore, the Buddhas and Bodhisattvas have immeasurable wisdom to discern whether to eat or not, how much to eat, and when to eat; how could the wisdom of ordinary beings presume to conjecture and limit the actions of the Buddhas and Bodhisattvas? Therefore, there is no time restriction on making offerings to the Buddha; in the Buddha's realm there is no time, no distinction between morning and evening. The Buddha accepts offerings in order to let sentient beings accumulate merit; He Himself needs nothing, and even if He needed something, He would transform it Himself, accomplishing it in an instant. The Buddha is also not limited by precepts; with the Buddha's immeasurable wisdom, virtue, and abilities, He long ago no longer needed any precepts as constraints. Human sentient beings should not demand that the devas, divine beings, and the Buddhas and Bodhisattvas be the same as humans in their dispositions and habits.

The human mind is confined within the scope of human life and cannot understand the realms of beings beyond the human scope, nor the realms of the Buddhas and Bodhisattvas. We who study Buddhism should try our best to break through humanity's narrow thinking and realms, as well as various habits. Humans walk on two legs, while the devas fly through the sky; we should not use the rules of human walking to regulate the behavior of the flying devas, much less take the rules of ordinary human beings to limit and regulate the mental activities of the Buddhas and Bodhisattvas. Compared with the Buddhas and Bodhisattvas, humans are like infants and toddlers, unable to understand and imagine the mental activities and realms of the Buddhas and Bodhisattvas; that is why all kinds of misunderstandings and incomprehensions arise. We should try our best to open our minds and broaden our horizons, try our best to break through the narrow, unreasonable, and immature thinking of ordinary beings, and try our best to draw close to the mental realms and codes of conduct of higher forms of life.