Mahāyāna Sūtra on the Manifestation of Consciousness (84)

Original text: 贤护。其为福胜。诸大天神。之所著者。即须好香花。烧众名香。香美饮食。清净安置。祭解供具。咸须华洁。如是此识。为福资者。便获尊贵。安乐之果。

Explanation: The Buddha said, Bhadrapāla, if this person's physical body is possessed by some heavenly deva, the deva will require fine fragrant flowers to be arranged, many precious incenses to be burned, and fragrant and delicious food and drink to be prepared. The surrounding environment must all be kept spotlessly clean, and the offering implements for worshipping the deva must all be placed there, all of them splendid and pure, because devas are fond of cleanliness, purity, and beauty. It is the same with the ālayavijñāna: when it is nourished by meritorious karma and contains the meritorious fruits of wholesome karma, the ālayavijñāna will cause the five-aggregate body to obtain the karmic retribution of honor, stability, and happiness.

Devas love incense, love purity, and love splendor, so the person who is possessed must frequently burn incense, and for the sake of pleasant fragrance, the food and drink must all be fragrant, delicious, and especially clean. Those people whom devas, upon ending their lives, take rebirth as in the human realm almost all have an obsession with cleanliness—that is because they have brought along the deva's habitual tendencies. Such a person washes his hands countless times a day, and his living environment is extremely fastidious. In fact, those bacteria cannot be washed away, but he does not know it; he just washes habitually. He washes his clothes constantly, wipes the table constantly, and will not tolerate a speck of dust. This is the obsession with cleanliness developed in the heavens, the habitual tendencies of a deva who loves cleanliness.

As for a person who has taken rebirth from being a pig or a dog, just look at what kind of environment pigs and dogs live in, and his home will be more or less like that. From this one can judge what kind of sentient being this person was in a past life and from which realm he took rebirth. From a person's habitual tendencies, one can also judge what kind of sentient being he was in his previous life. If his appearance is extremely, extremely thin, with a long face, one can roughly judge what kind of being this person was in a past life. At the time of death, by observing his appearance and the habitual tendencies and disposition of his whole life, one can also roughly judge which realm he will take rebirth in. If a person, even into old age, remains greedy and stingy, unwilling to give away the slightest thing to others, then one knows for certain that this person will surely go to the hungry ghost realm. Most people, after death, generally go to the ghost realm, because most sentient beings are stingy and greedy, resonating with the beings of the ghost realm, and so they become ghosts. Most sentient beings in the human realm have also taken rebirth from the three evil realms, because the habitual tendencies of most sentient beings resonate with the three evil realms.