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Thoughts on Karma
I live in a remote part of outback Australia and have been trying to teach myself the Dharma from books.
On the whole I think I've interpreted what I've been reading quite well and I've certainly experianced a wonderful change in myself and how I interact with those around me.
But at the moment I'm struggling with some thoughts I have about karma.
If I understand it correctly Karma is quite simply a matter of cause and effect, action and reaction. Even if that means the deed or action happened in a past life and you have the reaction of that in this life. I also like to think of karma as life lessons and I try each day not to add to any bad karmic debt I may have accumulated.
But what I am having trouble understanding is when you hear of babies and children being killed or tortured and you think to yourself, " how on earth is this karma?".." Yes they may have done something wrong in a past life but surely this level of suffering at such young ages is..is..I dont know what it is. I just think that when your too young to do evil acts in this life surely karma can take a back seat till they are older.
It's like if a child came to you and said " why is this happening to me" what are you supposed to say " sorry kid I guess you must of done something really bad in a past life and this is the result". I really dont think I could say that. I'd probably just cry and hug them and not know what to say.
I'm going to stop just going on and on and ask everyone here what their thoughts are on the subject if that's ok.
On the whole I think I've interpreted what I've been reading quite well and I've certainly experianced a wonderful change in myself and how I interact with those around me.
But at the moment I'm struggling with some thoughts I have about karma.
If I understand it correctly Karma is quite simply a matter of cause and effect, action and reaction. Even if that means the deed or action happened in a past life and you have the reaction of that in this life. I also like to think of karma as life lessons and I try each day not to add to any bad karmic debt I may have accumulated.
But what I am having trouble understanding is when you hear of babies and children being killed or tortured and you think to yourself, " how on earth is this karma?".." Yes they may have done something wrong in a past life but surely this level of suffering at such young ages is..is..I dont know what it is. I just think that when your too young to do evil acts in this life surely karma can take a back seat till they are older.
It's like if a child came to you and said " why is this happening to me" what are you supposed to say " sorry kid I guess you must of done something really bad in a past life and this is the result". I really dont think I could say that. I'd probably just cry and hug them and not know what to say.
I'm going to stop just going on and on and ask everyone here what their thoughts are on the subject if that's ok.
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Comments
Nobody can answer your question.
Not that we don't want to, but in actual fact, the Buddha himself advised that the complex, intricate and mysterious workings of how exactly Karma "operates" is impossible. We simply cannot begin to understand it due to the knock-on effect, social, ethical and cultural premises, and every other possible permutation you can think of which may - or may not - be a contributing factor.
Just to outline, these are the Four Unconjecturables the Buddha advised us to really not dwell on.
so don't worry. you're not alone.
But to try to address your question more sympathetically, the thing to remember is that life is a mystery. we have no control over the past, and we cannot predict the future.
nobody knows precisely how Karma has contrived to bring people to this situation. All anyone can do - through volitional action, compassion and equanimity - is to alleviate suffering.
If we are in the midst of suffering, be compassionate for ourselves and make the very best of the situation we are in.
If we see suffering we can somehow help to relieve, then do so.
I don't think you are supposed to have that attitude towards anybody, doesn't matter if they are old, young, sick, health, rich, poor...The 'whatever man, deal with your own s****' attitude is not very Buddhist. :P
I'm sure there's a sutta reference... I shall try dig one out.
EDIT: AN 3.110 countains this;
"If one says that in whatever way a person performs a kammic action, in that very same way he will experience the result — in that case there will be no (possibility for a) religious life and no opportunity would appear for the complete ending of suffering.
"But if one says that a person who performs a kammic action (with a result) that is variably experienceable, will reap its results accordingly — in that case there will be (a possibility for) a religious life and an opportunity for making a complete end of suffering."
In other words saying, karma is not an equal and oposite - tit for tat, kinda thing.
I'm sorry to say that I can't find an on-line translation. More can be found here.
Nios.
Hugs to all.
I don't know what you would say to them, but you would definitely not say that. You could think something like that if you needed to make sense of the situation but it would not be skillful.
To build on what aMatt said, due to a developing neocortex, kids to not have abstract thought until well into puberty. (Jean Piaget called it "formal operations.") So, yes, you'd respond to their emotion and not to reason.
Also, karmic causes are due to the momentum of the action or event just prior, nothing else. So if I raise my voice in a conflict, this momentum can cause the interlocutor to raise their voice. This momentum can cause me to get defensive and attack. The interlocutor might take a deep breath and take a softer tone which might cause me to take a softer tone.
This is my understanding of karma anyhow. I could be mistaken.
Your reaction to negative karmas befalling an innocent young child ... that of crying and hugging them ... this is a very caring response on your part, very compassionate, very Buddhist. And yes, that is exactly how to handle it when it occurs to others.
We are taught in Tibetan Buddhism that we have lived countless lives, and have also done "something really bad" in countless of these past lives. We are ALL of us innocent, and ALL of us not-innocent, regardless of our age.
Karma "ripens" when the conditions are right ... although I don't know what situations create "right conditions". It does not ripen at the discretion of some higher power, so no matter how unfair it seems when it hits a young one, it is no more unfair than gravity.
Pema Chodron teaches that karma is the very set of IMPRINTS that we create. Every second, by every action and thought we do, we either reinforce an existing imprint or start a new one. This teaching reminds me of the neural pathways we create in our brain by what we think and do ... karma, I would think. These imprints create our reality ... both internal AND external. And, according to the teachings, these imprints are what pass on from one lifetime to the next.
I remember my teacher telling us that one of the possible karmas for killing is being reborn into the "hell realm", and another is being reborn into a human body but dieing young ... I ponder that one, these little innocents not being able to grow into maturity. I have a strange reaction to it that I can't quite put my finger on, and I don't know if I want to accept this. But this is what one school of Buddhism teaches.
It isnt really that I want to know all the in's and outs about karma but knowing as little as I do can sometimes lead to making assumtions about it that are incorrect.
I already have made a very unskilled remark to my husband the other day that lead to him being very upset to the point of tears.
He had emotionally hurt two people very dear to him through his own ego and greed and was suffering greatly for it for a long time.
He came to me and said " surely I have suffered enough for the things I've done wrong". I said " I dont know, I think maybe it's up to you how long you suffer, I dont even know if this is just karma and if your suffering is the price you pay for what you've done or the karma will happen in your next life and at the moment your just feeling guiltly and sorry for yourself".
To watch his face crumple at the thought that he might have to go through this again in the next life was heartbreaking.
What I should have done was to say simply " I dont know" and hug him and tell him I love him I loved him.
Maybe if I knew more or had read more or simply understood better what I'd been reading I wouldnt have made him sadder than he already was.
Then I read the news a few days later about a child who suffered so horribly from an abusive parent, and the thoughts on karma came to mind. Hense my question in the forum.
I think I need to meditate more read more and emptly my head of so many of the questions I have to make room for wisdom to fill it .
I will simply put how it is with me:
While I see the sense in hypothesising that kamma is something that can affect us from one life to another, I can also see how simple it is to become ensnared in the complex web such cogitation weaves. We can actually hinder our own progress and bring ourselves into a negative state of thinking, by worrying about it so much, that we fail to seize this moment skilfully or constructively. And that in itself creates kamma.....
I personally prefer to completely put that aside for a moment, and consider the wise words of HH the DL: (I'm not actually sure they were his originally, as I have seen them written elsewhere also, but I first read them in a book of his....)
"If you wish to know what went on in your previous life, look at your body, now.
If you wish to know, what you will become in a future life, look at your mind now."
The very fact that we are born in the human realm, is an indication to me that we got something right.
So the best we can do is to do the best we can.
Here and Now, and think, speak and act wisely and in accordance with what we know for ourselves, is absolutely, indisputably right, of the Buddha's teachings.
I think sometimes, it's more wise to lay such mental machinations aside, if they cause us vexation and hindrance.
There is powerful progress in the new discoveries we make within Buddhism, within ourselves and within the life we are living.
There is equal powerful progress in the admission that we don't know.
Because therein lies a revelation in itself.
It's perfectly ok to not know.
If we think we've got it wrong, we probably have.
If we think we've got it right, we probably have.
The skill is in being more right than wrong.
That's all, really.
Just to add,
I think the above is extremely skilful.
You did nothing wrong in responding to your husband in that way. It was an appropriate and correct response in my view, and gave him further food for thought.
The only question, was the timing.
The hug and love might well have been more appropriate at that moment, because perhaps it's what he needed more, but certainly, your words were neither unfounded nor incorrect. Just ill-timed.
It's a bit like Richard Gere's attempts to bring harmony to the hearts of New Yorkers after 9/11.
He spoke about forgiveness, compassion and understanding.
It didn't half put a lot of people's backs up.
He was absolutely right, of course.
But his timing sucked!
Yours was not a volitional action - you did nothing to deliberately make him feel bad, that wasn't your intention - the kammic consequence of your words does not carry the same kammic weight as if you'd said "oh stop wallowing - pay more attention to those you've hurt, rather than to your own selfish hurt pride and ego!"
you acted out of a compassion and wisdom you had at that moment.
So, in turn, I really wouldn't beat yourself up about it.
I think you already know a good deal more than you think you do.
There's already plenty of wisdom in that there head of yours.
Kamma's great. You can always start again, today!
What you wrote in post # 13 made my heart glow and I’m so appreciative that your words not only helped me with understanding but had the added unexpected bonus of relieving the sadness I felt at what I perceived as a failure on my part to help my husband.
For example, say a man decides to start a war (I know, very simple and silly but bear with me). In the moment, he thinks this is a great idea for whatever reasons. What he doesn't foresee is that his great-great-great grand daughter will be murdered because of the war he started and the prejudices between people that it stirred. That is not to say that she is him reincarnated, but it is a part of him, a direct result of his existence, being prematurely and tragically extinguished as a result of his decisions.
I like to think the kind things we do in life are truly benefiting the future, not necessarily our own children, but whoever the ripples touch.
Do you mean that there's no such thing as karma from the more distant past? That all karmic effects follow immediately on the heels of their cause?
While I agree that such "instant karma" is indeed a reality, I also believe karma can hark back to yesterday, last week, last year, a decade ago or more.
The wonderful thing about karma, for me, is that in every moment, you have an opportunity to shift your own karma out of its old groove, and in the direction you want it to go. Practicing virtue, learning to be aware of your thoughts, and shifting your actions from random to deliberate, are all ways of karma-shifting.
If I set up a row of 1,000 dominoes and push the first one over is it wrong to say only the 999th domino had an effect on the 1,000th?
What an interesting question! Very "Zen".
While I probably wouldn't call it "wrong" to say that, I might call it inaccurate--since although the 999th domino is the only one to actually touch the thousandth, it also has the momentum of the first 998 behind it.
Which I guess is another way of saying our lives are the result of a lengthy chain of causal events--a principle known as "dependent origination" in fancy-schmancy Buddhist language, if I'm not mistaken.
I might think to myself when I suffer that since I am buddhist I believe I am trapped in samsara. That is the reason for the spiritual practice to liberate beings from samsara. Karma is the force that traps us in samsara. It is responsible for birth, sickness, old age, and death (is that correct?).
Secondly I know that I can escape samsara by the example of the buddha. Although I am suffering I believe that I can practice with it. Every situation is workable and I do not need to have any particular condition to be liberated.
If someone were suffering and a buddhist I might say to them to remember the practice that they feel closest to at times of suffering. That might be meditation or reliance on the buddha or a guru. It might be just resting in the nature of mind. It might be thinking of loved ones and wishing to make all beings happy. Or saying Ptat! and letting go of all the mental chatter.
how about trying to convince them,
whatever happened has happened and we can not undone it now
but
from this time onwards we 'never do any harm to ourselves or others'
well sorry, the link goes to a talk on community and friendship, but scroll down the right and find 'the law on karma'
http://www.youtube.com/user/BuddhistSocietyWA#p/u/28/VTuxmFYQJjs
To me Karma is a sort of a tendency. It's the tendency that if you have a positive outlook and treat people well, most of the time that'll bring you happiness. If you are negative and treat people badly, on the other hand, most of the time that'll breed mysery for you. But no guarantees in either case. That comes from observation. And it's not a law-- it's a tendency. If there's a natural disaster or a war there isn't some supernatural mechanism to pick out the good guys with positive outlooks to be spared.
When karma becomes dogma you immediately run into tricky contradictions. Those are more or less the same quality as the dilemma of a Christian who asks how a loving God allows for all the injustices in the world. And then there's just no emotionally or intellectually adequate answer.
In the Suttas, the Buddha defines kamma as intentional actions of body, speech and mind (<a href="http://www.accesstoinsight.org/tipitaka/an/an06/an06.063.than.html">AN 6.63</a>) that have the potential to produce certain results, which, in turn, have the potential to produce pleasant, painful or neutral feelings (<a href="http://www.accesstoinsight.org/tipitaka/an/an04/an04.235.than.html">AN 4.235</a>). The word itself simply means 'action.'
Pragmatically speaking, actions are deemed 'unskillful' (<i>akusala</i>) if they lead to to self-affliction, to the affliction of others or to both. Actions that don't lead to self-affliction, to the affliction of others or to both are deemed 'skillful' (<i>kusala</i>) (<a href="http://www.accesstoinsight.org/tipitaka/mn/mn.061.than.html">MN 61</a>). Therefore, the distinction between skillful and unskillful actions is based upon how their results are experienced—not only by ourselves, but by others as well. (This emphasis on the consequential aspect of actions is similar to Jeremy Bentham's teleological utilitarianism, with John Stuart Mill's idea of higher and lower happiness being similar to the Buddha's distinction between long-term and short-term welfare and happiness.)
Psychologically speaking, however, the quality of the intentions behind the actions is what ultimately determines whether they're unskillful or skillful. (This aspect is closer to Kant's deontological categorical imperative when combined with the Buddhist principle of <i>ahimsa</i> or harmlessness.) Intentional actions rooted in greed, hatred or delusion produce painful mental feelings "like those of the beings in hell," while intentional actions rooted in non-greed, non-hatred and non-delusion produce the opposite ("like those of the Beautiful Black Devas"). Then there are acts rooted in both that bring mixed results "like those of human beings, some devas, and some beings in the lower realms" (<a href="http://www.accesstoinsight.org/tipitaka/an/an04/an04.235.than.html">AN 4.235</a>). By bringing kamma to an end, however, the mind is said to become free and undisturbed.
Intention (<i>cetana</i>) is a product of the aggregate of mental formations (<i>sankharakhandha</i>). The cause by which kamma comes into play is sensory contact (<i>phassa</i>). Furthermore, according to Nyanatiloka's <a href="http://www.buddhanet.net/budsas/ebud/bud-dict/dic3_v.htm">Manual of Buddhist Terms and Doctrines</a>, <i>vipaka</i>, 'fruit' or 'result,' is "any ... mental phenomenon (e.g. bodily agreeable or painful feeling, sense-consciousness, etc.), which is the result of wholesome or unwholesome volitional action (karma, q.v.) through body, speech or mind, done either in this or some previous life."
Essentially, intentional actions of body, speech and mind produce results that are said to have the potential to ripen during this lifetime, in the next birth or in later births. This can be taken literally (i.e., ripening in the form of a pleasant or unpleasant rebirth in an external realm of existence), or metaphorically (i.e., ripening in the form of various pleasant or unpleasant mental states). In the words of <a href="http://sdhammika.blogspot.com/2008/06/kamma-and-natural-disasters-iii.html">S. Dhammika</a>:
<blockquote>According to the Buddha, every intentional action modifies our consciousness, thus building our character and thereby influencing our behaviour, our experience and consequently our destiny. Positive intentional actions (motivated by generosity, love and wisdom) tend towards consequences that are experienced as positive while intentional negative actions (motivated by greed, hatred and delusion) tend towards consequences that are experienced as negative.</blockquote>
Therefore, I think that in certain contexts, it would be appropriate to think of kamma as 'habit energy' in the sense that the potential effects of an action can be to condition and even strengthen certain physical and psychological reactions. This is especially true in regard to psychological reactions considering that vipaka is limited specifically to 'mental phenomena.'
As for the common misconception of kamma that everything we do or experience in the present is solely conditioned by past actions (i.e., the straight line theory of causality), that's actually how the Jain doctrine of kamma is portrayed in the Pali Canon. The Buddha, on the other hand, took the position that our experience of the present is conditioned by both past <i>and</i> present actions (i.e., the non-linear theory of causality). (It seems to me that the difference between Nigantha Nataputta's doctrine of kamma and the Buddha's doctrine of kamma is not unlike the difference between Democritus' atomism and Epicurus' atomism.)
Since the Buddhist conception of causality is non-linear, we don't have to exhaust all our negative kamma, which is essentially the doctrine of the Jains (see <a href="http://www.accesstoinsight.org/tipitaka/mn/mn.101.than.html">MN 101</a>), we simply have to eliminate the <i>production</i> of kamma in the present. And that's a good thing. Theoretically, if we assume for the moment that all of the teachings on <a href="http://leavesinthehand.blogspot.com/2010/06/rebirth_12.html">rebirth</a> are literally true, then it'd be statistically impossible to exhaust all of our 'negative kamma' due to the fact that a beginning point to <i>samsara</i> (literally 'wandering on') isn't evident (<a href="http://www.accesstoinsight.org/tipitaka/sn/sn15/sn15.003.than.html">SN 15.3</a>).
The Buddha's teachings, on the other hand, state that to gain release from samsara, one must put an end to all types of kamma, not just the negative. That's why the noble eightfold path is called "the path of practice leading to the cessation of kamma" (<a href="http://www.accesstoinsight.org/tipitaka/sn/sn35/sn35.145.than.html">SN 35.145</a>). They're skillful actions that, when used appropriately, have the potential to ultimately lead to the elimination of the skillful/unskillful dichotomy altogether, leaving only moral perfection behind.
I see karma as the act of balancing out the universe. All existence wants to be in balance and karma is that balancing act. It may take some time for the balance to occur, but it does happen. We have an effect on this balance, but only to a degree. In the end, balance always wins. Karma is the balancing act of existence.