The Prison Guard's Journey to Liberation

This is a record of an interview with Zeng Minglu, who sought Chao Du at the Hsiang Kuang Pure Land Buddhist Centre in Australia. He now resides in the Western Pure Land of Ultimate Bliss. This account reflects upon his life and his transition from a prison guard to a practitioner. Recorded by the chief writer, Shi Fa, on August 16, 2020.

Zeng Minglu speaks:

"Namo Amituofo. Words cannot express the depth of my gratitude to you all. I am truly, deeply thankful—thankful for the compassion of Namo Amituofo, thankful for Practitioner Su, and thankful to all the great Bodhisattvas at the Hsiang Kuang Pure Land Buddhist Centre. As I kneel before the Buddha today, reflecting on the causal conditions that allowed me to be reborn in the Western Pure Land of Ultimate Bliss, my heart is overwhelmed with emotion.

During the midday offering today, Practitioner Su waved his hand, and I, along with sixty other prison guards, were guided to be reborn in the Western Pure Land of Ultimate Bliss. We were not alone; countless other beings, an immeasurable and boundless number, were also guided alongside us. It was a truly unprecedented and magnificent event in history! Many of these beings were moved to tears, weeping openly. How could there be such a compassionate temple, willing to perform Chao Du for us—lost, suffering beings trapped in the cycle of samsara—and lead us to liberation and away from suffering? For such immense grace and virtue, I, representing the sixty prison guards, bow my head in deepest gratitude."

A Humble Life in the Countryside

"My life was one of poverty. Because my family was so poor when I was young, I had almost no opportunity to receive an education. From a very early age, I followed my father into the fields to farm. I spent my entire life in the countryside, never seeing the world beyond our village, living out a plain and simple existence.

I grew up in a traditional, simple farming family. For generations, we worked the land, growing sugarcane, rice, and various seasonal vegetables. We produced a great deal of sugarcane, which we processed into sugar. During local temple festivals, my mother would push a small cart to the temple entrance to sell it. With her clever hands, she would shape the sugar into various forms, even moulding it into little dolls. Often, she would only make a few coins in an entire day, but it was enough to help supplement our family's income.

Every harvest season was the busiest time for our family. My mother would prepare herbal tea to help my father and the workers cool down from the heat, and she would deliver meals and snacks to the fields. The workload in the fields was immense; if they did not replenish their energy at the right time, they risked heatstroke, which was incredibly dangerous. No matter how exhausting it was, my mother would run back and forth between our home and the fields, determined to take care of everyone."

The Turning Point: A Lesson in Compassion

"My mother was a traditional, virtuous woman who poured her heart and soul into caring for our family. I was not an easy child to raise; from the moment I was born, I was prone to crying and fussing, and I was constantly falling ill. There was always something happening to me. My mother spent so much effort looking after me that even when she went to the fields to help, she had to carry me on her back to feel at ease. My other siblings were easy to care for and could be left at home, but I was the one who caused my mother the most worry. Because of this, I was extremely close to her from a young age; wherever she went, I followed.

I grew up on the sweat and toil of my mother. In my eyes, she was a great and capable woman, and I always looked up to her as my role model. I remember one particular event vividly: the village was preparing for a grand festival, and we had to cast divination blocks to ask the local deity which family would be chosen to host the event that year. We were the ones selected. Being chosen meant we were responsible for managing every detail of the festival, which was no small task. We had to prepare a vast amount of supplies, and the costs were shared among all the families in the village.

My mother carried me on her back as she went from door to door to collect the funds. Some families were reluctant to participate and offered cold, biting remarks, while others were more willing to contribute. It took several days to collect the full amount. Then came the preparation of offerings and the entertainment for the deities—the most popular being the Taiwanese opera. My father would set out at the crack of dawn with the money to invite an opera troupe from the neighbouring village, often not returning until dusk. The final task, a traditional custom of the festival, was to slaughter a male and a female pig as an offering to the deities to pray for favourable weather and a good harvest. This was the most difficult part, as both my parents were compassionate people. They could not bear the thought of killing these two pigs for the ritual. My father tried to discuss the matter with the village head and the elders, but the answer remained the same: the pigs had to be slaughtered. My parents had no choice but to take the remaining festival funds, go to a pig farmer to select the animals, and have them slaughtered on the day of the festival. For days afterward, my parents were deeply depressed. When the festival finally ended, my father decided he would never participate in such events again. They resolved to set up a small Buddhist altar at home, stop worshipping local deities, and instead focus on chanting to the Buddha, praying for the health and safety of our family."

Prosperity Through the Dharma

"After that incident, our family underwent a profound transformation. My parents felt a deep sense of guilt toward those two pigs and would often chant the Buddha's name, hoping to save them. Following that event, our family began to follow a vegetarian diet; meat no longer appeared on our table, and we lived on simple, clean meals. Having witnessed the horror of killing, my parents felt the weight of karmic retribution and began to practice vegetarianism and chant the Buddha's name, bringing us children along with them. From that point on, our family changed for the better—a change that was visible to everyone in the village. My father's crops grew better than ever, and my mother no longer needed to sell sugar, as she could focus entirely on helping my father with the farming. We hired more and more workers, and during harvest and planting seasons, we were incredibly busy. All my siblings helped in the fields. I had four brothers and three sisters, and I was the youngest. By the time I was five and old enough to understand things, my eldest brother was already fifteen or sixteen. In those days, people married young; my eldest and second sisters married into neighbouring villages when they were just twelve or thirteen, and my brothers also married and had children. Our family grew increasingly prosperous. Since we started practicing vegetarianism and Buddhism, our family's fortunes turned around, and everyone in the village saw it. Few people in the village practiced Buddhism—most worshipped local deities—but seeing our transformation, many began to believe in the power of the Buddha's teachings. My mother loved to share our story, often taking her little grandchildren to visit neighbours to talk about the Dharma. She hadn't studied deep Buddhist philosophy; she simply shared the benefits we had experienced since becoming vegetarian and chanting the Buddha's name, encouraging others to do the same to help animals and their own families. Many who listened were moved to adopt a vegetarian diet and practice Buddhism, and they too saw positive changes in their lives. The number of vegetarian families in our village gradually increased."

"As my parents deepened their practice, their compassion grew. They could not bear to kill any living thing. Even when it came to farm work, my father stopped using pesticides to kill pests. Instead, he would personally guide the insects away to other places, sacrificing a portion of our farmland to give them a place to live. Even though he sacrificed part of his harvest to feed these pests, our annual yield was higher than ever before! This made my father incredibly happy, and he was eager to share this method with other farmers. Not everyone was willing to choose this path—some still preferred to kill the pests—but my father did his best to share his experience. For those willing to learn and change, he encouraged them to guide the pests to the land he had set aside, providing them with even more space to survive. My father had a truly kind heart and a vast mind-capacity, and all of us siblings learned from him. It was wonderful.

As time passed, I reached adulthood. Because my mother had taken such special care of me, our bond was particularly strong. Since I had no formal education, I followed in my father's footsteps and took up farming. At first, I worked alongside him, but later, I began to develop new agricultural methods to improve our farming development. Among all my siblings, I was the only one who continued the family trade; my older brothers had married and moved away from the village, leaving me as the only child remaining at home. Although I was over twenty, I had no desire to marry; I only wanted to take care of my parents and live a good, simple life."

"There were still few people in the village who practiced Buddhism, but having grown up beside my parents and experienced the many benefits of a vegetarian, Buddhist lifestyle, I developed a deep interest in the Dharma. When I was twenty-five, I proposed to my parents that we build a Buddhist temple in the village. Because our funds were limited, it started as nothing more than a small corrugated iron shed. Very few people came to pay their respects, but I was determined to see the temple flourish.

After my parents passed away, the family estate was divided, and I sold everything I had inherited, investing all the money into the temple. I had discussed this decision with my parents while they were alive; although they supported me, they were worried that I might go hungry. I told them that I was doing Buddha's work and that I believed the Buddha would bless me. Hearing this, they agreed. Now that they were gone, I finally put those funds into the construction of the temple. It became much more dignified, and the number of people coming to pay their respects gradually increased. Because I did not have a deep understanding of Buddhist scriptures, I travelled to nearby temples to seek the Dharma, inviting virtuous Venerables to come and teach, so that the devotees could hear the scriptures and gain more confidence in the Buddha's teachings.

Under my dedicated management, the temple gradually grew in scale, and more people came to worship. I invited a Venerable to stay and serve as the abbot. At first, he was hesitant, but after my sincere invitation, he agreed to stay. With the Venerable giving daily teachings, the temple began to attract many followers, and some even came to take refuge and become monastics. The temple finally began to flourish. After I handed the temple over to the Venerable, I felt immense joy. Originally, I lived inside the temple, but now that there was a monastic community, I returned to my own home, where I grew some vegetables in front of my door and lived my own life.

At that time, I never thought about becoming a monastic myself, because I only wanted everyone to live well and have the chance to know the Dharma. I was illiterate and could not explain complex doctrines, so I never thought I was qualified to become a monastic. Every day, I would go to the temple to help clean and bring some of the vegetables I had grown as an offering to the Venerables. I lived like that for several years; although the days were very plain, my heart was filled with joy."

Namo Amituofo."

Every Lunar New Year, my brothers and sisters would return from all corners to reunite. Each year, as I looked at my brothers, I would discover that they had changed significantly; some had even altered their appearances entirely. I knew this was the result of them being deeply influenced by the desires of the world. Although they never spoke of it, I knew that every time they returned, they were scouting the house to see what valuables remained that could be divided among them. Even though we were all raised by our parents with the same education and our original natures were all rooted in Goodness, the years they spent living in the outside world had caused them to accumulate many negative habits. Because I lived a life of poverty, they even began to reject me. But I did not mind; I was content living the life I loved. I could not change the transformation that had taken hold of my brothers, and I could only sigh in my heart, feeling a profound sense of regret at their decline.

The Path to the Dharma

At the age of forty, I made the firm decision to leave the home life and become a monk, receiving the Dharma name Shi Zhengyu. Every day at the temple, I listened to the Dharma and studied the profound principles, which filled my heart with a sense of immense fulfilment. I am deeply grateful to my master, for it was he who encouraged me to take this path. My master taught me that in the study of the Buddha’s teachings, there is no place for discriminations. He urged me to strengthen my faith—the very faith in the Buddha—and it was through his compassionate guidance that I finally found the resolve to commit my life to the Dharma.

Ten years into my monastic life, a crisis struck my family, though the news took a long time to reach my ears. When I first heard it, I was naturally shaken. The news was that my second elder brother, driven by greed and desire, had committed a serious crime and broken the law. Both he and his wife were arrested by the authorities, leaving behind a young son and daughter. I rushed back home and found that these two children had turned the house into a state of total chaos. Their habits had been poorly nurtured by their parents, and they were spoiled and unruly. I realised that I was ill-equipped to discipline them. After spending a few days with them, I had no choice but to use a mix of persuasion and gentle coaxing to bring them to the temple.

Transforming the Next Generation

At first, they screamed and threw tantrums, making it impossible for the temple to find peace. In the end, it was only through the clever and compassionate intervention of several Venerables that their disruptive behaviour was finally calmed. My master, a person of great Wisdom, continued to teach them patiently. Under his constant guidance, the children finally became willing to listen and obey, and they even began to embrace a vegetarian diet and chant Namo Amituofo. My brother and sister-in-law were imprisoned for a long time. I heard that they were eventually released, but they never came to seek us out. Having lived in the temple for so long, the children’s behaviour became disciplined and refined. As they grew older and wiser, they even made the vow to leave the home life and dedicate themselves to practice. Although I never heard from my brother or his wife again, being able to save my niece and nephew felt like a truly wonderful accomplishment.

Judgment and the Underworld

I passed away at the age of sixty-two. In my sleep, I heard someone calling my name. I opened my eyes and found myself sitting at the edge of my bed. At the time, I did not question it; I simply followed the voice that was calling me, moving forward until I arrived in the underworld. Only then did I realise that I had passed away. In the Hall of Yama, the King of the Underworld judged my life. He was very complimentary of my actions, which actually made me feel quite embarrassed. Yama told me that because I had built a temple, my merit was great, and I would be able to ascend to the heavens in the future. However, he said I was not yet ready to go to the Western Land of Ultimate Bliss. I asked him, 'How can one attain rebirth in the Western Land of Ultimate Bliss?' Yama replied, 'Only through true practice.' I felt a bit discouraged, as I did not yet understand what 'true practice' really meant. Throughout my life, I had only known how to do good deeds and listen to the Dharma, but I did not know what constituted true practice. Yama, sensing my thoughts, told me to go and invite the Dharma from Ksitigarbha Bodhisattva. He said that if I found it suitable, there was currently an official position in the underworld that I could take up. Yama agreed to let me stay in the underworld to practice, and I gladly accepted, for I believed in my heart that the Causal Conditions would eventually arise, and one day, I would be able to go to the Western Land of Ultimate Bliss.

A Long-Awaited Deliverance

While serving as a prison guard in the underworld, I practiced by the side of Ksitigarbha Bodhisattva. The days passed, and over a hundred years went by. I am so deeply grateful for the great vow of Practitioner Su, whose compassion has allowed me to finally wait for the opportunity to be reborn in the Western Land of Ultimate Bliss. When the sound of Practitioner Su’s Dharma talks and spreading of the Dharma echoed through the underworld, I knew immediately that this was the Causal Condition I had been waiting for. I am so grateful to the Buddha for his compassion, for not abandoning a single soul. I am thankful for this opportunity, and I cherish it deeply. Once I achieve success in my practice in the Western Land of Ultimate Bliss, I hope to have the ability to spread the Dharma and save sentient beings, just as Practitioner Su does with his great vow of compassion.

Grateful for this opportunity, I, Zeng Minglu, on behalf of sixty prison guards, bow in gratitude for the Buddha’s grace and the grace of Practitioner Su. We are deeply thankful for the Buddha’s compassion, and we cherish this chance immensely. Namo Amituofo.

This interview was recorded by the chief writer, Shi Fa Xi.