Meditation On Stealing By Lillian

THE REALMS OF CYCLIC EXISTENCE
Cyclic existence is composed of three realms, the desire realm, the form realm, and the formless realm. The desire realm has six divisions, the hell realm, the hungry ghost realm, the animal realm, the human realm, the demi-god realm, and the god realm. Above the desire realm, are the four levels of the form realm, where there are 17 classes of gods born amongst the four levels according to which of the four stages of meditative absorption they have previously achieved. Above the highest levels of the form realm are the four levels of the formless level, here all the gods have no form and exist only mentally with the highest level of happiness within existence, and don't experience suffering for thousands of millions of years.

SHOULD WE ENTER THE GOD REALMS?
Beings that abide in the formless realm do so in a blissful state of existence for thousands of millions of years. However in the meantime in the human realm, Buddhism could have disappeared and upon eventual return, the opportunity will have passed to experience the teachings to achieve liberation from samsara. Additionally, because in the formless realms the blissful experience is so deep, beings that reside there believe they are liberated when they are actually deluded with wrong-view. Ultimately all positive karma is used up just in order to be happy, with a strong likelihood of developing deeply engrained wrong views, a false belief in being liberated, and therefore ending up going on to the hell realms. As a result, it would be a mistake to go to the god realms, as we would remain in samsara with unhappiness following on from the bliss. Instead, why not pray to return to the human realms to continue what we have been doing in benefitting sentient beings.

HOW LONG DO BEINGS ABIDE IN REALMS?
At the end of an eon, all beings disperse from their realms and then the realms themselves disintegrate. Beginning with the hell realms, those that have exhausted the karma to be born there are reborn into a higher realm, those who still have such karma remaining are reborn into a hell realm in another universe. Beings then disperse from the spirit realm, then the animal realms in a similar fashion. After the three lower realms the human realm is emptied, some humans who have attained a blissful state free of any suffering through meditative practice will be reborn at the first level of the form realm. Here the key is the development of skill and compassion, not just meditative absorption. Some beings develop the concentration of one of the six classes of gods in the desire realm and are reborn into the god of the desire realm. The gods of the six classes of the desire realm attain the blissful meditative stabilisation of the first concentration, they gain a strong desire to be reborn in the form realm taking rebirth in the first level. In this way, the desire realm is completely emptied of living beings. The gods in the first level of the form realm then attain the meditative absorption of the second concentration consequently taking rebirth in the second level of the form realm, this empties the first level of the form realm.

BLACK KARMA
The ten actions we should avoid. Namely, killing, stealing, sexual misconduct, lying, divisive speech, harsh speech, idle gossip, covetousness, malice, and wrong views. The first three are non-virtues of the body, the next four are non-virtues of the speech, and the last three are non-virtues of the mind. A non-virtuous action does not create the cause for rebirth in a lower realm unless it is complete, for a non-virtuous action to be complete it must have four factors that create propelling karma. The four factors are object, intention, action, and completion. Intention is divided into discrimination, motive, and delusion. Completed propelling karma creates the cause for rebirth, if incomplete it provides the conditions experienced in the rebirth.