The Story of the Chicken Stars

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The Story of the Chicken Stars
Question and Answer for Life

By the Most Ven. Phrabhavanaviriyakhun
Edited from the Luang Phaw Answers the Questions program broadcasting on DMC

Questions: If someone had killed animals for cooking food for monk, the monk would got some sin as well, is it correct? Like the story of the Chicken Stars, Grand Pa and Grand Ma had cooked the chicken curry intentionally to offer the monk. Although the hen and its chicken were not willing to die, they were reborn as the Chicken Stars. This means that the hen and its chicken got the merit, is it correct? Would Grand Pa and Grand Ma get any merit?

Answers: Oh! Don’t be serious with the lullaby. However, about the killing for the monk’s food nowadays, let’s come to determine it. It is ok if you use these characters to be the examples.
For this question, I would like to split it to be two main points which are the aspect of cooks and the aspect of monks.

The first point about Grand Pa and Grand Ma who killed the hen and cooked it as food for the monk, what did they get, sin or merit?
The answer is they got the sin since they had thought to kill the hen. This sin was their Wrong View that they would get merit from doing like this. When they had killed the hen by themselves, they got more sin.

The second point is about the monk. Please remember that every monk can not eat any meat if he sees or hears that the host intentionally killed for him. Even if the monk did not see, hear or know about the killing but the monk questions that the host intentionally killed for him, he can not eat it as well. Suppose, a monk had pilgrimaged in the forest and found a house there, the monk set up his umbrella to stay near this house at night. In the next morning, the host offered the chicken curry to the monk and the monk realized at once that the host had killed a hen for him; the monk could not eat the chicken curry as well.

If the monk is worried that the host will be disappointed, the monk can receive it but can not eat it because it will break the monastic discipline.

I had pilgrimaged in the forest and a host offered the chicken curry in the next morning. I knew at once that there was not any market selling meat there. Therefore, the hen was killed to cook for me; I could not eat it as well. However, I received it to keep the host’s goodwill but did not eat at all.

Back to the story that the chicken jumped into the fire, died following their mother and reborn as the stars. You question that why the hen and chicken got merit but Grand Pa and Grand Ma did not. Oh! It is the lullaby. It is impossible to happen like that. It is not sensible.

There is another point I would like to tell everyone because I experienced this problem many times. Some hosts offer the raw shrimp or fish to the monk and tell that it is well-done by cooking with vinegar or lemon juice; the monk can not eat it as well. The monk can eat some well-done meat which is cooked with fire. This is a rule in the monastic discipline.

You can see that the Lord Buddha took care of the monks’ health very much because the raw meat has much of germ, bacteria, parasites, etc. Although the meat is medium, if you still see the blood, don’t eat it.

There are 10 kinds of meat that the monk can not eat which are
1.    the human’s meat
2.    the elephant’s meat
3.    the horse’s meat
4.    the dog’s meat
5.    the snake’s meat
6.    the lion’s meat
7.    the tiger’s meat
8.    the panther’ meat
9.    the bear’s meat
10.    the leopard’s meat

The monk can not eat these kinds of meat. It he does, he breaks the monastic discipline.

For the hosts, you had to determine which meat you can cook to offer the monk. Don’t make the monk’s precept to be broken because some monk can not recognize what kind of meat it is.