To What Degree Should We Help Others So That Blessings Never Run Dry?

During a teaching at the start of the year at a temple nestled in a valley, Master Thích Chân Quang told the story of an elderly man in Củ Chi. Every early morning, the man would cook rice and bring it to poor laborers struggling to make a living. He was not wealthy, but he lived kindly each day. When he was near death, he knew the exact day and hour of his passing, called his children and grandchildren to gather, and departed with ease. This small story opens a profound dharma talk about helping others, a topic that seems simple yet holds layers of important meaning in Buddhism.

Helping Others Is the Easiest Way to Make Merit

Buddhists believe in cause and effect (karmic law) and karma. Knowing that we reap what we sow, we try to avoid wrongdoing and do good deeds. But doing good is not always easy: building temples or making Buddha statues are special undertakings with few opportunities. Helping others, however, is something we encounter constantly in daily life. Master Chân Quang emphasized:

"Special acts of merit only come along once in a while... But when it comes to helping people, that is something constant in everyday life. So helping people regularly in daily life is the easiest way for us to make merit."

Simply by offering a little kindness each day and helping someone, we are accumulating blessings from merit for ourselves. What matters is not missing any opportunity, for all around us are people, are sentient beings, and the chances to love and to help are countless.

Blessings Come From Two Sources: The Devas and Those We Help

When we help others, we receive two things. First, the celestial beings above love and protect us. Second, the person we helped becomes indebted to us and will repay us in future lives. The Master explained clearly:

"A person who is kind is immediately loved and cherished by the divine beings. This is truly so."

And the one who is helped will repay that kindness not just once, but possibly across many lifetimes. The Master told of a married couple: the wife had been abused by her stepfather as a child, then misfortunes came one after another, even being violated by a band of robbers before her husband's eyes. Through the guidance of an eminent monk, they came to understand that in a past life the wife had been a robber, while the husband was the boy whom that robber had once helped. Out of gratitude, that boy became her husband in a later life, protecting her in order to repay the debt. Though he had to witness so much suffering, he still loved and sheltered her. The story shows that every act of help carries cause and effect (karmic law), and the one who receives kindness must repay it.

Helping Good People and Helping Bad People: Balancing Compassion and Wisdom

Cause and effect (karmic law) is fair: help many and your merit is great, help few and your merit is small. Helping a good person brings great merit, because that good person will go on to help many others, and we share in a portion of that merit. Helping a bad person brings the opposite.

"Help many people and your merit is great, help few and your merit is small. Help a good person and your merit is large, help a somewhat good person and your merit is a little smaller. But if you mistakenly help a bad person, you lose merit at once."

Yet if we only help good people and abandon bad ones, we lose our compassion. This is a difficult question the Master poses: when controlled by evil people and forced to commit wrongdoing, how should a Buddhist disciple respond? The Master suggests remembering that we are disciples of the Buddha. The balance between compassion and wisdom is what we need to cultivate. Help anyone, but with clear awareness, never letting our goodness be exploited.

Three Levels of Helping: Kindness, Wholeheartedness, and Helping to the Very End

Master Chân Quang shares that helping has three levels. The first level is kindness: helping someone through a hardship and then moving on, never knowing what becomes of them. The second level is wholeheartedness: learning about their circumstances and helping in a way that prevents them from suffering again. The third level is helping to the very end: helping a person practice, attain the path, and find liberation.

"Helping has three levels. The first level is kindness... the second level is wholeheartedness... the third level is helping to the very end."

Imagine this: when you meet someone who has run out of rice, giving them a little money to buy rice is kindness. But wholeheartedness means asking carefully: why has your family run out of rice? Is your husband out of work? Is your mother ill? Then we find ways to help more comprehensively: taking the husband for medical treatment, buying a motorbike so he can work as a driver, paying for vocational training. And helping to the very end means helping that person practice and attain enlightenment. When we help in this way, the blessings from merit are boundless.

Helping Others to the Very End: Blessings That Never Run Dry

When we help someone practice and attain the path, our blessings from merit never run out. Because that person will continue to benefit sentient beings, and we always have a share in it. The Master affirmed:

"When we can help someone reach the point of practicing and attaining the path, then our glory is endless and never ceases."

The Master told of Phật Ấn Liễu Nguyên, a Zen master who had realized the path yet made a vow to follow his friend Tô Đông Pha through many lifetimes in order to guide him to attainment. Whether Tô Đông Pha served as an official or weathered countless ups and downs, the master stayed close by his side, guiding him. In the end, Tô Đông Pha attained the fruit of an Anagami. This shows the boundless power of helping someone to the very end.

Practicing the Aspiration to Help

Having heard this dharma talk, the Master wants every Buddhist to hold in their heart a vow: whenever we help someone, strive to help them until they realize the path. Even if we cannot accomplish it right away, that aspiration will guide us along the bodhisattva path.

"Today, before the Buddha, I make the aspiration to help others on all three levels... Above all, may the Buddha grant me the aspiration to help sentient beings to the very end, helping them until they attain the fruit of liberation."

Let us begin with the smallest acts: a word of comfort, a meal, a little money to help someone through hardship. But at the same time, let us nurture the greatest aspiration of all: to help others escape birth and death. That is the complete meaning of helping.