减食过午赈灾

戊寅九十九岁。仍传戒。讲经。赴港作大悲法会。秋回南华。乙卯一百岁春戒期。各处兵难。新戒益多。十方来聚。公提倡每日礼忏二小时。以息灾劫而超度抗日战争。阵亡将士。大众吃午。减省晚食。余粮献与政府赈灾。众赞成。

宣化偈曰：

慈善为怀赈灾民。须达长者给孤贫。
老人方外念赤子。减食节衣救群伦。

Eliminating the evening meal to relieve disaster victims

The Master was ninety-nine in 1938, and continued his annual transmission of the Precepts and lecturing of Sutras. In Hong Kong, he led a Great Compassion Dharma Assembly and then returned to Nan Hua in the fall. In 1939, the Master's one-hundredth year, there was widespread hostilities during the spring Precept Period. The new preceptees were many in number, arriving from all parts of the country. The Master recommended that everyone bow in repentance for two hours each day in order to end the disastrous plundering of the country, and also to cross over the many soldiers who had died in the war against the Japanese. He further suggested that the people in the monastery not eat after noon and turn over the food saved from their not eating dinner to the government to be used for relief. Everyone approved the Master's proposals.

The gatha says:
He cherished compassion and benevolence and aided the endangered people,
Just like the Elder Sudatta who provided for orphans and the poor.
The grand old man of Buddhism, ever thinking of the masses,
Urged the reduction of food and clothing to save his fellow beings.