'What's the problem?': Monk gets aggressive towards grieving family at wake
Aren’t monks supposed to be peaceful?
Apparently, not all of them.
One monk who was engaged to perform religious rites at a wake was caught on video arguing with and behaving aggressively towards the grieving family.
A video clip on Facebook (April 29) showed the monk, dressed in a grey robe, yelling at another person in dialect: "What's the problem? It's your wife, right? Why can't she help?"
As the monk got more aggressive, a few people in the background can be heard urging them not to fight.
"Gangster monk, fight and throw fist and chair at the deceased family before ritual [sic]. Woman also beat," Chu Pi Ka wrote in the post.
Chu also alleged that a friend of the monk came out from a nearby lorry with a four-foot-long stick and attempted to "cause harm to more people".
According to Shin Min Daily News, the incident happened at the void deck of an HDB block in Delta Avenue.
The monk had asked the deceased's family if they could move a speaker into their house. The family refused and the situation escalated.
When Shin Min contacted the deceased's family, they declined to comment on the incident, saying it was all in the past.
A representative from the casket company handling the funeral said the family had hired the monk as he was a family friend.
The dispute happened shortly before the casket was scheduled to depart for the crematorium, the representative said.
"We were frantically trying to arrange for another monk to come and conduct the rites, so that we could help the deceased's family," the casket company added.
A representative from the Singapore Buddhist Federation apologised to the deceased's family, and added that the monk's behaviour was “unbecoming”.
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