Catch 22: Buddhist Monk Wins The Lottery, Instantly Gives It Away
- A mysterious Thai monk (47), won $500,000 and gave it mostly to fellow villagers.
- He bought three lottery tickets just so he could help out a troubled lottery vendor.
Divine Intervention Or Just Pure Luck?
According to the Thai newspaper Thairath, a Buddhist monk from the city of Nakhon Phanom won a whopping $500,000 lottery win and instantly gave the money away to the poor villagers. It appears that Catch 22 works for lottery tickets as well, so the best way to hit the lottery is not wanting to hit the lottery at all.
Half a million dollars is a lot of money everywhere in the world, especially in Thailand. But the best part of this story is yet to come. You probably wonder why would a person who doesn’t want to be rich anyway, purchase a lottery ticket in the first place?
It turns out that the mysterious monk, age 47, bought three lottery tickets in order to help a lottery vendor who was going through a rough time. On March 1st, he won 18M Thai bath, approximately some $500,000, and he started to give the money away to those who needed it.
He donated roughly $45,000 in the first week alone, giving it to his temple, schools, and civic organizations. The monk stated that this is the “Money that belonged to the angels”, so he decided to give 500 baht ($15) to each local, in a city where the average monthly salary revolves around $420.
Due to the demand, the monk was forced to reduce the handout to 200 baht, some $6 per citizen. As one might guess, the situation quickly escalated and the police had to intervene and control the crowd.
Philosophically and morally, Buddhism does not prevent monks to gamble, but strict Buddhism preaches that monks are not allowed to gain possessions and hold cash. Over the years, Thai media reported on incidents involving monk gamblers, which was a bit of a scandal every time it happened.
