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Karma and Social Responsibility
compassionate_warrior
Veteran
If we accept the teaching that people's present-life circumstances are due to past life karma, does that absolve us of responsibility to practice compassion and work to bring about social change? If people are born into serfdom, slavery, or poverty, do we shrug it off as their karma, and allow the continued exploitation of the underclass?
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it's pointless to try to speculate how or why they are suffering, hazard a guess, or make a wild stab at understanding. The fact is, they don't want any form of support referring to a hypothetical previous cause...they want relief now, for what's happening now.
It's the analogy of being struck by the arrow.
Don't waste time wondering how or why it got there, who made it, and who shot it - just pull the damn thing out!
I wonder if Mahayana or Vajrayana practitioners might have a different view, since that's where the belief about karma affecting current rebirth circumstances is held.
What do you think the Kamma Sutta is referring to by "old kamma"-- in simple terms.
It's a very short sutta of just a few lines, so there's little excuse to not read it.
"If you want to see what you were in a past life, look at your body now.
If you want to know what you will be in a future life - look at your mind, now."
Previous Kamma has 'made' you what you are today. What your mind fabricates and enacts, determines your 'new' Kamma and what lies in store.
NEXT!!
Do you?
At this point, I stop speculating.
Because it really doesn't matter.
Say for example, in a previous life, you were a despotic tyrant, murdering, raping, pillaging and destroying everything that stood in opposition to your might..... and then again, another time, you were a sweet young girl, helping everyone in her village, born into humility, but showing kindness and generosity to all who came into contact with you, human, bird or beast....
Now, you obviously remember neither life at all....so, would it make any difference to you now, while you were standing by your broken down vehicle, waiting for the truck driver to come and fix it or tow it away for repairs?
I really don't think so.
Your priority would be to fix on your state of mind and attitude now, and address the issue presented to you in as skilful a way as you can.
To as certain extent, past karma does determine who you were born to, where, when , how, what defects, circumstances, etc. etc. But not all. Sakya Pandita is one of the best persons to look up for to research this topic. There is a game created by Sakya Pandita which is online. I can't remember the URL, but I'll let you know when I remember.
However, as Fed says they are not important. What is important is to understand that you and all other sentient beings are suffering now. What you do now has an exponentially greater effect than what you did in the past.
Just as I show compassion to my neighbor who has been mean to others and to me, I can not (and must not try to) force him to practice compassion.
Compassion only grows by nurturing. Social changes will come only when enough of us nurture those changes.
- Edmund Burke
Thanks, dorje. That's the point I tried to make a few months ago, when I had some discussions going about why abuses were happening by teachers, and what we could do to educate students and prevent these situations from arising, but others didn't see it that way, somehow. Some felt the students were at fault for not being able to find good teachers, due to past karma, and quoted a respected teacher who had said as much. I wish you'd been around back then. :-/ I think wherever there's suffering, if we're in a position to address it, we should, even if (or especially if) it's in our own backyard. We have a responsibility.