SPIRITUAL COMMUNITY OF THE TRUE FOLLOWERS OF THE PATH SHOWN BY THE BLESSED NOBLE AWAKENED ONE -TATHAGATA
Thus abstaining from the taking of life leads to longevity, abstaining from stealing to prosperity, abstaining from sexual misconduct to popularity, abstaining from false speech to a good reputation, and abstaining from intoxicants to mindfulness and wisdom.
According to THE BLESSED NOBLE AWAKENED ONE -TATHAGATA’S teaching the mode of rebirth we take in our next existence is determined by our kamma, the willed actions we have performed in this present existence. The general principle governing the working of the rebirth process is that unwholesome kamma leads to an unfavorable rebirth, wholesome kamma to a favorable rebirth. More specifically, if the kamma built up by breaking the five precepts becomes the determining cause of the mode of rebirth it will conduce to rebirth in one of the four planes of misery β the hells, the realm of tormented spirits, the animal world, or the world of the asuras. If, as a result of some wholesome kamma, a person who regularly breaks the five precepts should take rebirth as a human being, then when his unwholesome kamma matures it will produce pain and suffering in his human state. The forms this suffering takes correspond to the transgressions. Killing leads to a premature death, stealing to loss of wealth, sexual misconduct to enmity, false speech to being deceived and slandered by others, and the use of intoxicants to loss of intelligence.
The observance of the five precepts, on the other hand, brings about the accumulation of wholesome kamma tending to rebirth in the planes of happiness, i.e., in the human or heavenly worlds. This kamma again, coming to maturity in the course of the life, produces favorable results consonant in nature with the precepts. Thus abstaining from the taking of life leads to longevity, abstaining from stealing to prosperity, abstaining from sexual misconduct to popularity, abstaining from false speech to a good reputation, and abstaining from intoxicants to mindfulness and wisdom.