Grateful for the empowerment of the Buddha! I departed riding a white lotus flower.
“Namo Amitabha! I, Ayù, press my palms and pay homage to you, Magistrate. Today I wish to ask what karmic retribution awaits those who waste food.”
The Magistrate said, “Wasting food leads to descent into hell to undergo karmic punishment. Whenever anyone eats even a single mouthful of food, they ought to consume it with gratitude and remorse. One should be thankful to heaven and earth that nurture all produce, to farmers for their toil, to one’s parents for upbringing, and to the food blessings accumulated in one’s past lives. Human survival relies on external conditions: food, air, water and sunlight. Without these supporting factors, fine provisions would not exist in the human world. First and foremost, we must give thanks to heaven and earth. Without sunlight, air and fertile soil provided by nature, where would grains and crops come from? Once natural prerequisites are in place, grains demand farmers’ arduous labour: sowing, irrigation, harvesting and processing. Seeds are planted in spring and gathered in autumn, spanning spring, summer and autumn. As the ancient verse goes:
‘Beneath the midday sun the farmer hoes the field;
His sweat drips down to moisten the soil beneath the grain.
Who knows the food laid out upon the plate?
Each kernel comes from bitter toil and pain!’
“Regardless of scorching sun and pouring rain, farmers painstakingly and carefully grow our food little by little. What arduous toil this is! Therefore, we must be grateful for farmers’ hard work and never waste a single grain of food.
“Every human being comes into this world through the union of the father’s sperm and the mother’s blood. When we were young, all of us relied on them to clothe and feed us. Therefore, we ought to be grateful to our parents for raising us. Furthermore, we must cherish the blessing rewards we have gradually accumulated through practising giving, observing precepts and doing good deeds in our past lifetimes. Those with insufficient blessing rewards will be reborn in harsh, remote regions, such as Ethiopia, the Democratic Republic of the Congo, remote sparsely populated underdeveloped areas within China, and other impoverished nations. In such places, food is severely scarce. Countless adults and children starve to death or suffer from malnutrition with gaunt faces. Many wait for assistance, yet some pass away before relief arrives.
“How much one eats and wears in one’s life, one’s height, build, social station, misfortunes encountered, wealth possessed, and the exact time of one’s death—all are predetermined upon being born into the human realm. Hence, every mouthful of food we consume draws upon the blessing rewards destined for us in this lifetime. With each meal we enjoy, our stock of predestined blessing rewards diminishes by one portion. Ordinary mortals cannot break free from the fixed karma in their destiny. Only two kinds of people can alter this fate: those of supreme goodness and those of extreme evil.