Yuan Zheng Tang – Perfect Enlightenment (No: 13) 
Quarterly/January 1996, (pages 52-55) 

IS MONEY GOOD OR BAD?

by Living Buddha Sheng-yen Lu

All religious teach us not to be greedy for money. Money is wicked. It is the cause of many degrading acts. It is the roots of all evils. The utility of money therefore condemned. These views must be changed.

Many believers take the meaning literally and consider it to be the truth. Therefore they donate all their wealth to the preachers. As a result, the preachers become very wealthy; and all the believers are in financial difficulties.

Master Lu never condemns the usefulness of money. On the contrary he affirms it as way of life. We have to be practical. Without money Rainbow Villa will not be completed. We use money to pay for the building materials, the images of Buddhas and Bodhisattvas and the brick wall. The vibration of money can be felt everywhere – pillars of the monastery, gardens, halls and the sacred shrine.

We have to use material wealth to build Rainbow Villa – a spiritual retreat centre. To quote from Master Lu: “If we seek money for money’s sake, then money is materialistic. If we use it for spiritual end, then the value of money cannot be measured.”

The materialistic and spiritual aspects of money are not mutually exclusive. In my spiritual level, I see there is not difference between materialism and spiritualism. Money can be considered the work of Bodhisattvas; and the reverse is true.

All of us know that money is at best transient in nature. It is an object we did not bring with us when we were born, nor can we bring it with us to our grave.

Although we must uphold the usefulness of money in this world, we should not worship it, seek fervently and take it by any means. Instead, we should lead an honest life, using money to improve our spiritual cultivation.

If we know how to transform money, that is to combine its materialistic and spiritual aspects into one, then our inner self and outside world can be in unison in no time.

I always put money in the right prospective. I make full use of it. I use money to change people’s mind and draw them closer to the Buddhas. We should not distance money, let alone cut it off from Buddhism. At all time, money can help a person find his own Buddha nature.

If a cultivator says: “I like to cultivate and I dislike money,” He must very wise and his thought cannot be faulted. If he is too smart, he would appear to be a piece of wood and he is more suitable to cultivate alone. At best, his spiritual achievement will be an Arhat or desireless deity.

I dislike money too but I use money as my ‘zhi liang’ (capital and ration for spiritual cultivation), to lead a spiritual life, to help others financially, to build cultivation centers, to do good deeds and to do the four immeasurable. (Return the money to all the sentient beings). I believe money can improve the well being of all sentient beings.

To quote from Grand Master Lu: “If you are rich, do all the wholesome deeds; if you are poor, purify all your unwholesome mind.”

These questions which always rankers in my mind are:

Is my wife and my children whom I can’t even leave for a few seconds really mine? 
Are my property and my wealth, which I am most unwilling to part really mine? 
Is the friendship from my buddies really mine? 
Is my business that I boast about really mine? 
Is my high social status really mine?

My answers are: Once the impermanence catches up with me, my body will decompose. I am not even the owner of my body. The truth is: “ I will have nothing!”

It follows that we should not be sentimentally attached to our fame and status. We should spend all our money in propagating the Buddha Dharma.

Businessmen are noted for their capability in accumulating wealth. They get very excited over their fortune. Eventually they will be intoxicated by money and indulge themselves in the game of wealth gathering. To them, money is omnipotent; it is the best thing in the world! It is the sunshine of their lives. Money makes the world go round. Once they take the wrong turn; money will lose its usefulness.

I do not deplore money; instead I confirm its usefulness. I let money come alive and use its’ power to bring human beings closer to the Buddhas and Bodhisattvas. This is my humble opinion towards money. To quote a poem from Han San Zhi:

An old lady from the East, 
She became rich for the past five years, 
Although she was poorer than me before, 
Its time for her to settle her core, 
As I looked down on her first, 
She now had the last laugh, 
Amid the laughter of us, 
The tide of fortune keeps turning.

The six Parimita sutra taught us: “It is better to be poor and uphold the path until death, than be born with a silver spoon and know nothing about the truth.”

Ni Qian Zi sutra talked about: “Greedy people will find ways to accumulate wealth. Failing which, they feel disgusted with their lives. Through their ignorance, they harbour evil thoughts and harm others. Their grouses and hatred will cause their descend to the evil realms.” Therefore, wise men will always be satisfied with what they have.

Bai Yuan Jing (Hundred Causation sutra) mentioned that:

Human beings suffer mentally and physically when they look for money. Once they are rich, they suffer too as they have to painstakingly protect their belongings. They are laden with anxiety if the wealth they accumulated is lost. Human beings do not have happiness in any of these three scenarios.

I wrote a poem on the subject of money:

All the imposing manners, 
All the prosperity, 
All the women and songs derive from money. 
All the magnificent buildings, 
All the franchise shops, 
All kinds of jubilation are at the dispose of money. 
In this samsara world, 
Most of us are mesmerized by the power of money, 
How many of us are sober enough, 
And capable of reconciling this messy accounts?

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