Purple Lotus Publisher > Journal > Volumn NO. 16

Debt of Love
A discourse given at the Purple Lotus Temple on January 7, 2001

Translated by Janny Chow

A dharma sister from Texas recently made a special trip to see me for a consultation. Her problem concerned her eldest daughter who, until recently, had always been very obedient, a good student, and well liked by everyone. The daughter had always been very close to her mother, and there had been nothing the two could not discuss. Three months ago, however, her daughter met a young man and the two started dating frequently. Her grades began to suffer, and her mother tried to reason with her, "You are only seventeen. It is too early to date. Why don't you concentrate on your studies now and wait until after high school to fall in love?" Her words fell on deaf ears, however, and the mother and daughter started arguing over the boyfriend. The girl became irascible and demanded that her mother not interfere with her personal life. Their bickering even escalated into physical fighting.

Over a brief period of two months, her daughter became pale and irritable, lost over twenty pounds, and seemed to lose the vibrancy of youth. The close relationship the two had enjoyed evaporated, and overnight, it was as if the darling daughter had turned into a rebellious stranger.

One night, the daughter suddenly left home and ran over to her boyfriend's house. The parents of the boyfriend, instead of persuading her to go home, actually kept her in their house and would not let her contact her family! It was as if she had been placed under house arrest. Unable to see her daughter, this dharma sister became heartbroken. She cried all day and was unable to eat or sleep well. She became so distraught she could not even take care of her family or business. Though she continually called the boy's family, begging them to let her daughter come home, they refused. The tough tone in their voices worried her and caused her so much anxiety that she even contemplated suicide.

I said to her, "Under the law, your daughter is still a minor. You should call the police and press kidnapping charges. This is a serious crime."

The dharma sister replied, "We know that. But my husband is a simple person and our store is just a small business. He is afraid the boyfriend will come and make trouble at our store or even hurt our daughter." She continued, "I even sought guidance from the deities before coming here. I suspect the family may even have placed voodoo spells on my daughter to keep her under their control. They threatened they would make us pay if we called the police."

She took out a picture for me to see. The boyfriend looked tall and robust, and her daughter looked bright and beautiful. Yet seventeen is a young and tender age, and if the girl were my daughter, I too would have hoped for her to finish school before getting married. Besides, they had only known each other for three months, and to be seduced and kept under house arrest this way did seem abnormal.

I asked the dharma sister to join her palms and we prayed together to the bodhisattva to give us guidance. What were the karmic reasons behind these emotional upheavals of joy and sorrow?

The bodhisattva enabled scenes to flash before my eyes. Indeed, karmic events of the past had led to today's drama. In my meditative trance I saw a man, whose wife had run away with a lover, going from temple to temple seeking help from the gods. Kneeling before the gods, he cried sadly and vowed, "I will find her, whether it be in this life or the next. I will make her come back to me and never let her leave!"

In fact I, too, had played a role in the unfolding of these events. I also saw this man come to ask me for help. He had been very sincere and continuously kowtowed while kneeling. "Please help me and make my wife come back. I am willing to do anything to have her back." I was also sitting down then, and the situation was like the present one where the dharma sister was begging me to help bring her daughter back.

The scenes flashing before me made me feel sorry for myself. I should be crying more miserably than her! What could I do? Often, I find myself playing a role in the dramas that come before me during consultations. I have at times even come across children and spouses from my previous lifetimes! What am I to do? Buddhas and bodhisattvas, please help me!

To return to the consultation at hand, the husband from the previous life turned out to be the boyfriend in this life. The eloped wife from the previous life is the girlfriend, the dharma sister's daughter. In a twisted way, the husband from the past life has regained his wife. The mother of the girlfriend, the dharma sister who had come to consult me, had been the lover who had robbed the man of his wife in the previous life.

Why then did the parents of the boyfriend help keep this girl under house arrest? In their previous lifetimes, one parent had been a child of the couple and the other had been the husband's elder sister. So, in this lifetime, they naturally sided with their "father" and "younger brother" to stop the girl from again being taken away by the lover/dharma sister.

With such karmic causes behind this present drama, what help could I give? It is not that I am without compassion, but one cannot employ transcendental powers to arbitrarily break the laws of karma. Yet the dharma sister wailed so loudly that I could not bear to see her suffer.

Breaking the hold of karma requires three things: First, the person involved must sincerely repent, vow to perform good deeds, and chant sutras and mantras dedicating the merits to the other party. Secondly, there must be blessings from the buddhas. Thirdly, one should transmute and release the self into emptiness. With the presence of these three elements, one can transform one's fate and create one's destiny.

The dharma sister said, "I do sincerely repent and will do meritorious deeds to remedy my past transgressions. Master, please help me and save my daughter."

I told her, "Go and consult the divination blocks. If the buddhas and bodhisattvas say yes, I will conduct a fire puja on your behalf to help resolve enmities between the parties. Fire pujas are very powerful. Not only do they effect purification, enhancement, magnetization, subjugation, and bardo deliverances, but they can also solve problems ranging from personal matters at one end to national or natural disasters at the other. However, in order for the fire pujas to be efficacious, the deities must agree to help you first. This is why you need to go to the shrine and sincerely pray for help. If you receive three consecutive affirmative answers from the divination blocks, I will do my best to help you."

Karmic entwinements are not confined to just one lifetime. They may involve several lifetimes and one must find the crux of the matter before the disaster can be resolved. One cannot simply resort to transcendental powers and ignore divine laws. If I am not careful, I too will become entwined in the affairs and be faced with the karmic consequences.

When I first started my consultations, I had believed that, due to human ignorance, mistakes were unavoidable. I would have such compassion for those who came to me, that I would try to solve every problem and take over each person's karmic hindrances. At times I shouldered the consequences for half or even entire years. It was very difficult. And despite my efforts, I realized that the people helped often did not understand the hardships incurred. When their scars healed, they forgot about the pain and rapidly fell back into the world of roaring dust. This has often brought me much grief. It is not easy to help sentient beings cross to the other shore!

This dharma sister went to the shrine to repent, generate vows, and pray sincerely to the buddhas. She did manage to get three consecutive affirmative readings from the divination blocks. Buddhism recognizes causes and condition. When a sincere and devoted heart of repentance gives rise to a new cause, the compassionate buddhas and bodhisattvas intervene to help.

She was visibly happy when she told me the results of the blocks, "The bodhisattvas said yes! Master, please conduct the fire puja for me."

Amid the blazing flames of the fire puja, I entered into a Tantrayana prayer, invoking the three basic roots of Tantrayana. I prayed to the root guru for lineage empowerment; I prayed to the root personal deity for accomplishment empowerment; and I prayed to the root dharma protector to bring the task at hand to completion. In a meditative trance, I enacted a dance of mudras, focusing on invocation, offering, and the emitting of lights for purification and enhancement. I summoned the young man and woman in the photograph to come and enter into the fire altar. I used the great energy from the cosmic true condition to burn away all karmic entwinements between them.

A verse on karma surfaced in my mind: "To know what one has done in the past, one only need look at what is happening to one in the present. To learn what the future bears, one only needs to look at what one is creating now." With a switch of focus, I entered into the consciousness of the former personality of the boyfriend. I tried to change his way of looking at things, and I sent a message to this man who was full of hatred and vengeance. "Please extinguish your fire of anger and listen to my advice. This lover has most likely robbed you of your wife because of karmic reasons from a previous life. Search the memories of your former life and you will find that everything is karma. Do not hate and seek vengeance anymore. Let the light from the universe reveal your wisdom and remove the hatred from your heart. Dissolve this enmity that is spiraling over multiple lifetimes and live together in peace and harmony now. Cherish and love each other, and walk together towards the luminous, other shore."

I also discovered that, indeed, voodoo spells had been cast on the young girl. That was why she had lost her mind in such a short time. I quickly removed those ugly little ghosts from her body.

I then saw a little girl embracing her mother, crying, "Mommy, do not leave me! Don't go away!" A man then manifested and spoke to the girl, "She has already been sold to me and will remarry me. Hurry and come with me!" The little girl grabbed onto her mother and tried to put up a fight, "No, no! I want my mommy, I want my mommy!" Suddenly an old man appeared and, with a slap, he hit the girl and pulled her away. The old man was the little girl's grandfather. Ever since the death of his son, the old man had believed the daughter-in-law to be bad luck and detested her. He decided to sell her to another man. The little girl was furious at her grandfather, but there was nothing she could do. In her heart, she made this wish, "When I grow up, I am going to look for my mommy and find her." The wish was not fulfilled in that lifetime and carried over to the next life. This turned into the scenario of a lover stealing another man's wife. In reality, he had been searching for a mother's love. When he found her, he immediately took her away with him. He had not been able to protect her in the previous life, and now he had to take care of her, protect her, and love her. The lover from this past life is the dharma sister in this present life.

After seeing these karmic entwinements, I felt very tired. When will sentient beings awaken? Here was another dramatic enactment of love and hatred, roles reversing. Today, one plays the role of a rich man; tomorrow, the role of a poor man. Today, one plays the role of someone beautiful; tomorrow, the role of someone ugly. Today, you hate me; tomorrow I hate you. All these role reversals, over and over again! What is the point if this is what life is about!

In truth, karma, as a divine secret, is not something to be revealed casually. But I am very open in my consultations. My only wish is that the person involved open his or her heart and bring closure to a segment of karma without hanging onto any more hatred and grievance. I said to the dharma sister, "If I withheld this information, you would never know the cause behind it, and you would continue to blame the boyfriend for harming your daughter. This resentment and hatred would continue spiraling and might even escalate and involve more people until the situation grows considerably out of hand.

"Although you wish your daughter to come back to you, you must be penitent and harbor no hatred. Accept what is happening in this life as a result of actions in a former life. It has only been three months, and you already find it unbearable. Fortunately, in the past you had done good deeds and accumulated enough merits to have some of the retribution partially reduced. That is why you had the opportunity to sponsor a fire puja. Otherwise, such an opportunity may not even have presented itself. People sometimes complain that their homework did not help. Do they truly understand the gravity of their transgressions? Some people have murdered others in previous lives. They cannot expect huge results after investing only a little energy in homework."

I also told the dharma sister that after the return of her daughter, if the boyfriend indeed liked the girl, she should agree to allow them to date formally. This way, the young man will not try to take her away or prevent her from seeing her mother. Subconsciously, he is afraid to lose her again if they become separated. That is why, in this lifetime, he wanted to take her away as soon as he could. It was a natural response. It should be fine for them to date as long as the girl finishes high school and goes on to college.

After all, they still have unfinished business with each other from former lives. For example, if it is meant for them to be husband and wife for twenty years, and the marriage for some reason ends after ten, then the remaining ten years will still have to be made up. To bring a karmic tie to an early closure, the affinity must be replaced or remedied by alternative means.

The husband from the previous life still harbors resentment for the runaway wife. The boyfriend's desire to possess the girl is not based purely on love. Finding her again is tantamount to exacting vengeance and inflicting physical and mental suffering upon her. It is foreseeable that in the future, based on karmic causes from previous lives, he will gradually begin mistreating her. Since one of the parents of this young man was the girl's offspring in the past life, resentment from being abandoned by the runaway mother is causing the house arrest and desire to keep her from leaving.

That is why I often remind everyone: Do not think that providing the best for your child automatically allows him or her to have a rosy life. Children have their own karma to face. When the time comes, all you have provided may be of little help. This dharma sister's story is a living example. What then am I supposed to do here? The interveners are directors and scriptwriters trying to rewrite the endings. In the original script, the main actress is supposed to die. But, because the soap opera is so popular, we now want her to live again. This is what it is all about. The actors are crazy and the audiences are idiots. I wonder what that makes us, the scriptwriters, out to be?

I asked the dharma sister if she would be willing to do the repentance practice, remedy her mistakes, and dedicate meritorious deeds for the dissolution of her karmic entwinement? "Yes," she replied.

She may have felt that she had no other choice, but the intent to carry out the remedies had to be sincere and come from an open, honest heart. Much of human suffering, originating from ignorance, involves vicious cycles of exacting vengeance upon one another. During consultations, we pray to the buddhas and bodhisattvas to intervene and bless us so that negative entwinements can be dissolved. The aim is to provide understanding so people will embark on spiritual practice themselves. When they eventually succeed in cultivation and are liberated from their emotional afflictions, they will no longer be trapped in vicious cycles of transmigration.