Tomorrow is Vesak Day, a day to commemorate Buddha's birth, enlightenment and parinibbana. It's a public holiday in Singapore. Due to circuit breaker or partial lockdown, all temples will still be closed. I will spend the day at home tomorrow listening to Ajahn Keng dharma talk, watching videos relating to Buddha and chanting meditation. It is also important to observe the 5 precepts. For Mahayana Buddhists, it is the day to eat vegetarian food. There are also 8 precepts for lay Buddhist but I find it tough as one of the precept is to refrain from eating after 12pm, which means you only take one meal a day. Maybe I take 8 precepts when I'm ready to lose weight by taking 1 meal instead of 3 meals a day. Hmm, now I'm wondering how the monks can survive on 1 meal and without gastric.
I enjoy listening to two venerable Buddhist monks namely Singaporean Ajahn Keng and Taiwanese Master Sheng Yen who passed on in 2009.
Sadly there are some people who pretend to be Buddhist monks who beg for money in the street. For your information, real monks don't go to the street to beg for money. However for Theravada monks, they will go for alms round in the morning for food. Based on Buddhist monk precepts, they only eat one meal a day before 12 pm. A real monk will not look for fame and wealth as they know that these material possessions are impermanent and don't bring lasting happiness.
Happy Vesak Day to all my Buddhist friends and Happy holiday to my non-Buddhist readers and friends.
Last year I was delighted to attend Dhamma talk by Ajahn Keng in June.
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