Karma

What is Karma?

For the Eurocentrics, the Greek notion of fate dominated. The MOIRAI (Moirai) were personifications of the inescapable destiny of man. The Fates assigned to every person his or her fate or share in the scheme of things. Their name meant 'Parts', 'Shares' or 'Allotted Portions'. Klotho, whose name meant 'Spinner', spinned the thread of life. Lakhesis, whose name meant 'Apportioner of Lots' - being derived from a word meaning to receive by lot -, measured the thread of life. Atropos (or Aisa), whose name meant 'She who cannot be turned', cut the thread of life.

The Non-Eurocentric universe has a very different outlook, because unlike the Eurocentrics, they believed that man's nature is honest and that man is worthy of trusting and believing in himself and in his actions. 

Those actions are called KARMA.


The Pali term Karma literally means action or doing. Any kind of intentional action whether mental, verbal, or physical, is regarded as Karma. It covers all that is included in the phrase "thought, word and deed". Generally speaking, all good and bad action constitutes Karma. In its ultimate sense Karma means all moral and immoral volition. Involuntary, unintentional or unconscious actions, though technically deeds, do not constitute Karma, because volition, the most important factor in determining Karma, is absent. 

Buddhism teaches the solution to human suffering and provides a way to overcome or transform this sense of helplessness. Ultimately, it teaches that the cause of misery lies not with any external force or circumstance, but with ourselves. Buddhism looks nowhere beyond the sufferer for both the cause and the solution to suffering. 

According to Shakyamuni Buddha: “If a person commits an act of good or evil, he himself becomes the heir to that action. This is because that action literally never disappears (Udana).”

KARMA means action

The Sanskrit word KARMA means action. And Buddhism divides the actions that constitute karma into three categories:

Actions of the body (behavior)
Actions of the mouth (speech, language)
Actions of the mind (thoughts).

The latent force of both our good and bad actions remains in our lives. Once committed, any human action, whether good or bad, does not simply vanish into the past with time. Each act remains in one’s life at the present as a potential force or energy, influencing the course of one’s existence from the point of that action forward. In this sense, rather than simply viewing karma as “action,” it may be more appropriate to think of it as action plus that action’s potential influence on one’s life. 

Sometimes times the Eurocentrics like to think that we can overcome our past actions by doing extremely good deeds and thus redeeming our selves. However, we can think of it as when one burns down a tree in the forest. And, in repentance plants another tree in its place. Eventually, that tree will stand ta;; and firm in a place that was once burnt and barren. But! The original tree will never be again. And the roots, and fruits, and shade of that tree can never be regained. Those memories will be with us, forever. Yes, new fruits and roots and protection will blossom in our lives, but they will not and can not be the same. And in that light, the memories of our former deeds are always with us.

Fate versus Our Will

In simpler terms, karma may be seen as life’s ingrained habits, leanings or tendencies—actions that tend to repeat themselves, or that we tend to repeat. For many of us, when the sun rises in the morning, we believe it is daylight and time to get up. When the sun sets, we believe that it is night fall and it is time to rest and sleep.

The Buddha says: 

"I declare, O Bhikkhus, that volition is Karma. Having willed one acts by body, speech, and thought." (Anguttara Nikaya) 

Every volitional action of individuals, save those of Buddhas and Arahants, is called Karma. 

The exception made in their case is because Buddhas and Arahants, by virtue of attaining their state of mindfullness, are delivered from both good and evil. The mindfullness of the Eightfold Noble Path has libreated them from the Sansara and has eradicated all of the ignorance and cravings that form the base of the roots of Karma. 

"Destroyed are their germinal seeds (Khina bija) and in this way selfish desires can no longer grow. This is stated in the Ratana Sutta of Sutta nipata. 

The deeds of the Buddhas and Arahants are accepted as good and moral, and inturn those deeds are lacking creative power as regards themselves. For in Understanding Things as they truly are, they have finally shattered their cosmic fetters – the chain of cause and effect. 

What kind of actions form immutable karma? In the Buddhist scripture A Treasury of
Analysis of the Law (Jpn. Kusha Ron ), they are described as:

1. Actions arising from strong earthly desires (delusions, illusions); or conversely, actions arising from a very pure heart and mind.
2. Actions that are continually repeated over time.
3. Actions taken toward the correct teaching of Buddhism.
4. Actions taken toward one’s mother or father.
   

Buddhism does not teach that we should simply resign ourselves to the effects of karma as in the Fates of the Greeks, be they good or bad. Submission to fate, to “one’s lot in life” or to some will outside our own is not a correct Buddhist view. 

Rather, Buddhism is correctly understood as a forward-looking, empowering teaching that stresses personal responsibility and hope. “If I am the one who made myself what I am today, then I am the one who will create the ‘me’ of the future,” is the ideal attitude of a Buddhist.

Karma does not apply to our circumstances as much as it applies to our own internal thoughts, words and deeds about our circumstances. About our actions in regards to them.

Things do not happen to us, we make them happen. We act in a habitual way when they do happen. These habits can only led us on the same path as before which leads us to the same habitual situations.

We made what we are and experience now, and we are at this moment making what we will be and experience in the future. That is karma. So to change karma means to change our lives right now; that is, the way we think, speak and do. The best way to positively transform the effects of our past bad karma, enjoy the effects of past good karma, and create good karma for the future is to infuse our actions with the fresh life force of the wisdom of the Eightfold Noble Path.

The Law of Cause & Effect

In short, Karma is the law of cause and effect in the ethical realm. It is this doctrine of Karma that gives consolation, hope, reliance and moral courage to a Buddhist. When the unexpected happens, and one meets with difficulties, failures, and misfortune, the Buddhist realizes that he is reaping what he has sown, and he is wiping off a past debt. 

Instead of resigning himself, leaving everything to Karma, he makes a strenuous effort to pull the weeds and sow useful seeds in their place, for the future is in his own hands. 

By our own doings they have created our own Hells, and by our own doings we can create our own Heavens, too. 

A Buddhist who is fully convinced of the law of Karma does not pray to another to be saved. But confidently relies on him for his own emancipation. Instead of making any self-surrender, or calling on any supernatural agency, he relies on his own will power, and works incessantly for the well-being and happiness of himself and of all. This belief in Karma validates his effort and kindles his enthusiasm, because it teaches individual responsibility. 

To the Buddhist, Karma serves as a deterrent, while to an intellectual, it serves as in incentive to do good. He or she becomes kind, tolerant, and considerate.


Ignorance (avijja), or not knowing things as they truly are, is the chief cause of Karma. Dependent on ignorance arise activities (avijja paccaya samkhara) states the Buddha in the Paticca Samuppada (Dependent Origination). 

Associated with ignorance is the ally craving (tanha), the other root of Karma. Evil actions are conditioned by these two causes. All good deeds of a world ling (putthujana), though associated with the three wholesome roots of generosity (alobha), goodwill (adosa) and knowledge (amoha), are nevertheless regarded as Karma because the two roots of ignorance and craving are dormant in him. The moral types of Supramundane Path Consciousness (magga citta) are not regarded as Karma because they tend to eradicate the two root causes. 

Who is the doer of Karma? 
Who reaps the fruit of Karma? 
Does Karma mould a soul? 

In answering these subtle questions, the Venerable Buddhaghosa writes in the Visuddhi Magga: 

"No doer is there who does the deed; 
Nor is there one who feels the fruit; 
Constituent parts alone roll on; 
This indeed! Is right discernment." 

For instance, the table we see is apparent reality. In an ultimate sense the so-called table consists of forces and qualities. 

For ordinary purposes a scientist would use the term water, but in the laboratory he would say H 2 0. 

In this same way, for conventional purposes, such terms as man, woman, being, self, and so forth are used. The so-called fleeting forms consist of psychophysical phenomena, which are constantly changing not remaining the same for two consecutive moments. 

Buddhists, in an actor apart from action, in a perceiver apart from perception, in a conscious subject behind consciousness. 

Who then, is the doer of Karma? Who experiences the effect? 

Volition, or Will (tetana), is itself the doer, Feeling (vedana) is itself the reaper of the fruits of actions. Apart from these pure mental states (suddhadhamma) there is no-one to sow and no-one to reap. 

Karma and Vipaka 

Karma is action, and Vipaka, fruit or result, is its reaction. 

Just as every object is accompanied by a shadow, even so every volitional activity is inevitably accompanied by its due effect. 

Karma is like potential seed: Vipaka could be likened to the fruit arising from the tree – the effect or result. Anisamsa and Adinaya are the leaves, flowers and so forth that correspond to external differences such as health, sickness and poverty – these are inevitable consequences, which happen at the same time. 

Both Karma and Vipaka pertain to the mind. 

As Karma may be good or bad, so may Vipaka, - the fruit – is good or bad. As Karma is mental so Vipaka is mental (of the mind). It is experienced as happiness, bliss, unhappiness or misery, according to the nature of the Karma seed. Anisamsa are the concomitant advantages – material things such as prosperity, health and longevity. When Vipaka’s concomitant material things are disadvantageous, they are known as Adinaya, full of wretchedness, and appear as poverty, ugliness, disease, short life-span and so forth. 

As we sow, we reap somewhere and sometime, in his life or in a future birth. What we reap today is what we have sown either in the present or in the past. 

The Samyutta Nikaya states: 

"According to the seed that’s sown, 
So is the fruit you reap there from, 
Doer of good will gather good, 
Doer of evil, evil reaps, 
Down is the seed and thou shalt taste 
The fruit thereof." 

Karma is a law in itself, which operates in its own field without the intervention of any external, independent ruling agency.