Spoken by Supreme Master Ching Hai
Hsihu Center, Formosa • April 29, 1992
(Originally in Chinese)

In this world, politicians cannot give their people a peaceful life by means of some kinds of intelligent political projects or a very good plan. Morality should come first. When people have morality, the world will be peaceful, safe and happy. There is no need at all for any politics, no need for any argument, no need for any weapons, no need to control people, or no need to have any police or army. There is no need for anything. It is a pity that leaders of many countries in this world do not quite comprehend this.

If you go and say to certain politicians, “I have a way to help your country to become a happy and peaceful one.” They will definitely say to you, “What our country needs is food and money.” They do not consider morality. They do not think of “seek you first the Kingdom of God, and then everything else shall be added onto you”. I am not saying that there are none. It is just that there are only a few. Even if there is a good leader, it is also troublesome when the people below him are not good. Most of them merely bought their positions. Those who have money can get inside. (Master laughs.) Generally it is like that. Then, those who have talents cannot serve their country if they do not have much money; no one listens to them.

In ancient times, kings and governments looked for great enlightened masters, great spiritual practitioners who had morality and wisdom, to consult them about matters of ruling the nation. Some countries also do this nowadays! But there are very, very few. That is why the world is falling, and has many wars and disasters. It is because a leader can affect the whole nation. People listen to what he says. At least he has the chance to voice his thoughts. All the television or radio stations and newspapers broadcast his thinking. If his thinking is good and noble, of course the whole nation will be affected. It does not matter whether the people like it or not when they first hear it. Having listened to it, their mind must have recorded it. They record the good ones, and the bad ones also, so the influence is incredible!

If you go to take a look in hell, you will see that it is full of leaders of the world. It is horrible; just that they do not know this! It is because one person influences so many people, and in turn the whole world. If he leads people astray, of course he will incur an incredible amount of karma. So, if we are ordinary people, before we become very advanced in our spiritual practice, when we do not have wisdom or many talents, we still have a chance to be saved, a chance to attain eternal liberation. If we do not have any talents, morality, love and wisdom, and we climb up to a very high position and be one of those important persons, then we are finished! (Laughter) It is really very dangerous. Do you understand? Our karma will increase thousands of millions of times.

For us small people, how many people can we influence? The most we can influence is our children. We can only set a bad example for our children, or the wife or husband. Is that not so? And there are also friends and relatives, if they listen to what we say. Therefore, we do not have a big influence. If we were big people, of course our influence would be incredible. We would also attract the kind of negative and low level force that is similar to ours, making the whole world even more negative, more shaky, heading further toward that direction, and consequently increasing the negative force even more. The karma would become heavier. That is why hell is full of kings. It’s terrible, very terrible!

It is the same with the so-called spiritual practitioners. If they have not truly attained the Tao, do not truly understand, do not have the right method, and do not possess truth, virtue and beauty within, and then they go up onto a stage and influence people, leading them astray, then the karma they will have is incredible. That is why hell is full of those kinds of religious and political leaders. Many of them are having their “training” there. (Laughter) In some cases they have to wait for a very long time. They have to wait till those people who had been brain washed by them become enlightened and liberated before they can be saved. Can you imagine how long they have to wait? That is why it is said in the Buddhist scriptures that there is a “timeless hell”. Because too many people were hurt and misled, you have to wait till all of them become enlightened and liberated before your sins lessen. That takes a very long time!

It is just like, if at some time, you were poisoned a little bit, your mind became unclear. Then if someone hands you more poison, you will drink it also. You become more and more poisoned. So it is very difficult to wait for those people to be liberated. It takes a very, very long time. That is why people who mislead others have to wait even longer. It is best for us spiritual practitioners, not to be greedy, not to chase after positions! Do not hanker after the kind of position that has important responsibilities. If we do not have talents, abilities or wisdom, truly we will hurt ourselves. We will also cause damage to the world, and obstruct the evolution of the universe.

The best thing for us to do is to improve our virtues and wisdom. Then we can do whatever God wants us to do, because by that time we are ready. It is like when we are wealthy, we can put our money anywhere. We can be in any business. Is that not so? It is a concern only when we do not have any money. If we want to have our own business or to be a boss before we have any money, and sit there worrying that we will fail in business, that is creating trouble for ourselves. We cannot say that God does not save us. It is really unimaginable that when our own karma is already so heavy, we still want to shoulder the karma of a whole nation or a big group!

The so-called spiritual practitioners, because they do not realize this consequence, they dare to get up and talk nonsense, to accept people as their disciples and to teach people the wrong things. If they knew that there is hell awaiting them, they would not dare to make such a move, or would not dare to talk about anything. It is not good just to have many disciples. We should know what we are teaching them, and where we are leading them, because all does not end after we stay in this world for a hundred years. We still go on. Our lives continue, one after another. It is only a matter of where we will live, in heaven or in hell, in nirvana or in the world?