Longshu Pure Land Text" cloud: plant a grain of millet in spring, and harvest 10,000 seeds in autumn; Life is good and evil, and the retribution is still like this.
The first is to talk about karma without loss, and the third thing that is more terrifying is that it not only does not lose, but also grows greatly. In other words, in the spring, you sow a small seed, but when you harvest in the fall, it is 10,000 fruits, and the retribution is great! It's the same with when we do good and evil, you can't say, "Eh, it only took me 10 minutes to do evil, and when I got the retribution, I should only have 10 minutes of suffering." "That's not what it means.
In the past, there was a Zen master who had obstacles in his meditation, and his mind was originally very corresponding to the three views of emptiness, falsehood, and middleness. But suddenly, a mountain appeared in his heart and the realm of his magic weapon, and a mountain made of salt blocked him. He is a cultivator, so he will reflect on himself: Oh, it turns out that when he was just a monk, he used to steal a little salt from the temple kitchen. As we can imagine, he didn't take a lot of salt, so how could it become a mountain in the end?
In this place, you should pay attention to one concept: after you have created karma, of course, this "karma" is "the impermanence of all actions", and when you create it, it will be born and die in an instant, and you may have created it for five or ten minutes, and this karma has disappeared and has been completed. But after that, there is a function in your heart, which is the seed of sinful karma in you, and the seed is in your heart. In "Consciousness Only", it is said: Seeds are born and destroyed in an instant; What does it mean to be "born and die"? It's that it's constantly changing. Our minds are active and fluid, and only the mind of a Buddha is unchanging. The mind of the Buddha was the same yesterday as it is today. The so-called "change" means that it has two situations, it is either increasing or decreasing, and it cannot be stopped and not moving; Change is an increase and a decrease. If you don't repent, it means that you agree with the existence of this karma, and you rejoice.
Why does the precept say, "If you have sinned against it, you can't put it on until the next day, but you have to confess it on the same day?" Because you don't repent, you have to know that "you don't repent" means that you have a kind of "happy agreement" with this sinful karma. As long as you agree with joy, this karma will continue to grow as day by day. That's why it only took us ten minutes to make a sin today, but it will take millions of years to go to hell for retribution in the next life. Because of your rejoicing, the seed will continue to multiply, and multiply....
So: after we discover the karma of sin, "immediate repentance" is very important, because it grows greatly!
This means that today, before we officially enter the Buddha hall to practice confession, we must observe the principle of cause and effect, and observe that "karma determines the effect" - karma does have the function of causing retribution. The second is that "karma is not lost", the karma you have created, there can be no luck, you can't escape! It's in your heart and definitely won't go away.
Thirdly, not only will it not disappear, but it will "grow greater" as each day passes, so what we do today is to avoid our sinful karma, which will only do us more harm. So we have created sin karma today, and the only way for us to save it is to face it and destroy it. This is a mental preparation that we should make before we practice confession.
Pure Mage: Repentance.