The Issue of Karma

Originally Posted by serenesam

Soldiers kill people and are trained to do so. Do they incur karma? Cannibalism has occurred many times in North Korea? Do they incur karma? Holy ****, I think I am starting to become atheist or agnostic!

How does determinism conflict with karma? Don’t people understand that there are certain situations that would drive a person to do something horrific? What about acts of self-defense like someone breaking into your home and tries to kill you?

Hi there,
Your questions are valid ones for sure. The whole theory of karma is predicated upon intention. What matters most is the intent with which an action is performed.

The reason intention matters is because it is under the force of intention that subtle mental impressions are created in our mind. Our mind is similar to a computer's hard disk. Just as we have to apply the force of a magnetic field in order to store data on it, similarly it is under the force of our intentions that our mind stores mental impressions.

Now why is the mind important?

The mind is what we take with us when we die. When you leave your gross physical body, most people (unless they are liberated souls) exist on the other side in their spiritual/subtle bodies which is the carrier for the mind.

Because of our stored mental impressions, our mind constantly draws us back to the earth plane, for a rebirth. In this way our mental impressions can be worked out through actions. Good impressions will lead to good actions and bad ones to bad actions and hence bad consequences.

Thus for example if you killed bugs in your house with the intention of keeping your home clean, it will not matter, but if you kill it with the intention of cruelty then it will matter.

Same for a soldier - the intention of a soldier is to protect his country and so even war is a valid karma in those situations where your nation is under a real threat, (as was explained in the great Indian epic the Mahabharata which records a war of good over evil).

This is a simplified answer, but I hope it clarifies your doubt.

Originally Posted by serenesam

Soldiers kill people and are trained to do so. Do they incur karma? Cannibalism has occurred many times in North Korea? Do they incur karma? Holy ****, I think I am starting to become atheist or agnostic!

How does determinism conflict with karma? Don’t people understand that there are certain situations that would drive a person to do something horrific? What about acts of self-defense like someone breaking into your home and tries to kill you?

Karma isn't a punishment for 'bad' or 'good'. And theoretically, if that were the case, then people thinking that others were experiencing 'bad' karma would in turn experience 'bad' karma for thinking it lol.

Karma is simply how energy works. I guess it's effect can be seen as life bringing you what you need to fill in that part of the puzzle.

What you give out returns to you in some form at some time. The more spiritual you become, the faster it happens. You cannot escape the law, but once you know about it, it returns to you quicker.

Karma is very simply the Law of Cause and Effect...

Originally Posted by Lapis Lazuli

What you give out returns to you in some form at some time. The more spiritual you become, the faster it happens. You cannot escape the law, but once you know about it, it returns to you quicker.

That aligns more with how I hear most people use the word karma,
saying What you did wrong has got a way of coming back to you in turn.

This is not to say that's how I only understand it,
as wrongdoing can just be put to right.
The Law of Cause and Effect on soul level (while most of us here is aware of) is something not everybody out there fully really knows.

[trixiewilbury]

I've been thinking a lot about karma, I know there have been many threads, but this one is the first to have caught my eye.

I do get weary of people thinking of karma as reward and punishment. To me, might as well go back to thinking about God smiting us and heaven and hell if you're going to go that route. I think karma is a cause and effect, and very much based on intent. Intention seems to be the key in almost all religions. You can do something "nice" for someone but if your intent is for personal gain or manipulation that's not going to make the same type of karmic ripple as when you do something nice out of love, or because it feels good and you want to bring light into the world.

[Black Sheep]

@Trixiewilbury,
Me too! I grew up with karma held over my head as a burden. I've seen karma used abusively, such as you better do what I want or I'll be upset, and you'll reap the karma of hurting me. Or you owe me for being born, it's your karma(she also said I forced her to be pregnant as she never wanted a baby, so it's my Karma for her suffering). I could go on...

To me, it's rather ignorant really, karma isn't a reward or punishment someone doles out, I'm not responsible for another's karma(or decisions), it's something like some of you all have already said, training wheels, a natural event, etc.

From Dolores Canon's book Between death and life:

The law of cause and effect is "one of the underlying principles of karma that supports the entire structure."
No matter what we do, even the simple act of breathing, creates future karma.

What it comes down to is that there will always be karma because it makes energies (everything is energy) move or dance. The more a soul advances, the nicer its future karma will be.

"The energy from each individual life is like a universe in itself, and the way it intertwines and reacts to all the other energies in your universe, particularly the energies put out by other life-forms, weaves the complex tapestry that we call karma." "Each life influences all the others."

Originally Posted by Mr Interesting

Karma, to me, is merely the music of life... well not merely maybe, but alike music the interrelationship of vibrational tendencies.

Ah, yes...