Ancients’ explanation about ‘yam kung’(陰功, means hidden merits) was that: doing good deeds but would not like others to know since it was regarded as something perfectly normal. It was exactly the same as ‘yam de’(陰德 secret virtue). ‘Yam (secret/hidden)’ means doing something without letting others know who the doer is whereas ‘kung (merits)’ is explained as ‘meritorious virtue’. However, in Cantonese, ‘mo yam kung law (having no hidden merits at all)!’ has an implication of poor, sympathetic, miserable or sad etc.
If someone is carelessly hurt himself/herself or encountered an accident, people will say to him/her, “mo yam kung law! You’re so badly injured!” In this case, ‘mo yam kung law’ means ‘you’re very poor indeed! I feel sympathetic for you’.

Being asked about the connotation of ‘mo yam kung law’, Rinpoche gave (us) a discourse simply, “Actually, there’s one more phrase before ‘mo yam kung law’, it’s ‘chin sai ng sau (did not cultivate in past lives)’. The whole sentence should be ‘chin sai ng sau, mo yam kung law (前世唔修，無陰功囉 one did not cultivate in one’s past lives, one does not have any hidden merits at all.)!’.

The blessings from ancestors for their descendants can be classified into two aspects, namely yam(陰) and yeung(陽); yeung represents the ones that are visible whereas yam denotes the invisible ones.
Above all, let’s talk about the yeung part first. They include the reputation and social standing, net worth and property, villas and houses, shares and cash, yachts and jets, luxury cars and brand-name watches as well as jewelleries and ornaments etc. that were left by forefathers. They’re all tangible material heritage which can be seen with the naked eyes of common people.
The yam part refers to the intangible blessings that were accumulated by ancestors who had done a lot of work for charity and also built up virtues. If the blessings accumulated are tremendous enough, not only can the virtue accumulator acquire many benefits in his/her present life that will in turn favour the reincarnation in his/her afterlife, but also can his/her descendants receive his/her protections. The situation is just like a bottle that’s fully filled with water (it means meritorious virtue). The water is so full that it overflows from its lip and pours downwards. The bottle stands for the virtue accumulator while the down-pouring of water is the benefiting of the ones underneath (it means the virtue accumulator’s children and grandchildren).

In general, one will only say ‘mo yam kung law’ to express one’s sympathy but not the ‘chin sai ng sau’ part as it’s remained for the person concerned or his/her elders to say so! If it’s said by others, it’ll sound as if they’re lecturing the person concerned instead. Thus when ‘mo yam kung law’ is said, the ‘retributions’ are already noted and one means to ask the person concerned if he/she has realized the ‘previous causes’ for them.

Though ‘mo yam kung law’ is always said by the Chinese, the emphasis is indeed the first phrase of the sentence! ‘Mo yam kung law’ is the effect (consequence) whereas the first phrase, ‘chin sai ng sau’ is the cause! ‘Chin sai’ refers to your previous lives which includes not only all karma made in the present lifetime by your father in this life (he’s passed away), but also your grandfather in this life (maybe) as well as other forefathers. In short, it’s that you yourself have not accumulated any meritorious virtue in either this life or the previous ones. Neither does your father nor your grandfather accumulate any meritorious virtue. Nor even did your ancestors!

If you say that you ‘have’, how much does the ‘have’ refer to?

Apart from practising cultivation until achievements are obtained, all of us should never forget to accumulate merits and virtues as well as carrying out good deeds!”