The story of grasp all, lose all.

There were a couple of grandfather and grandmother who make a living by being the farmers. One day, while grandfather was doing the farming, he clashed with the jar that was stuck in the rice field. Grandfather then stopped doing the farming and started digging to find the jar. He found that there were plenty of gold and jewels within the jar. Grandfather was so surprised. He thought that “Wow, these are all the precious treasures. What should I do with them? I should not tell anybody.”

After that grandfather put the jar back to the same hole and then ploughed it up and over and acted like nothing happened. At night, grandfather was not able to sleep. Grandfather slept uneasily until grandmother could notice. Grandmother thought that “Well, my husband has never been like this before. There must be something wrong.”

Therefore, in the morning after grandfather went out for doing the farming, grandmother followed him and hided behind the tree to see grandfather. Then, grandfather dug out to bring the jar, brought out treasures to count with greed. Grandfather thought about the plan to keep secret with him, make money from selling the treasures and then keep the money with him alone. Grandfather also planned to kill grandmother. At the same time, grandmother had a plan to kill grandfather as well. Both of them had planned to kill each others

In early morning of the next day, grandfather went out for doing the farming as usual. In the late morning, when grandfather finished doing the farming, he went to sit under the tree. Grandmother brought the food carrier to grandfather. Grand father started to eating and called grandmother came to join. However, grandmother didn’t eat the food. Grandmother denied to eat and said she would go home as she was busy.

So grandfather followed grandmother until grandmother was careless, he hit grandmother at her nape of the neck with hoe. Grandmother fell down. Then grandfather dragged his wife’s body to bury, ploughed up and over and acted like nothing happened.

After that, grandfather was back to continue eating the food. But just for a while, grandfather’s mouth soaked up with the spit and with symptom struggle, and died instantaneously. It’s because   grandmother put some poison in the food. It’s just only the greed for treasure that makes grandfather and grandmother die miserably.

This is what we call “grasp all, lose all”. If we have too much greed, we have to run after to catch our desires endlessly. So… be careful. Even though we make merit, we should not desire too much for the merit. Whatever we do should base on the moderate practice.

By V.Vachiramedhi Bhikkhu