Understanding Karma

When you honestly accept emptiness and rebirth, when you fully understand interbeing, it becomes obvious that the actions we take have far reaching consequences. This instills a critical sense of responsibility in our every day lives. The force that drives actions and the consequences that occur is the basis of karma.

It should be noted from the outset that karma is not intended to be some kind of mystical force, some grand judge or divine justice. For a start Buddhism has no such concept of a personified God who would enact that kind of power for his own entertainment.

Karma emerges from the concept of action and consequence, emptiness and rebirth. If we are all not selves but instead part of a universal self, part of Buddha Nature or God, then what we do will have repercussions in a future life or future manifestation. However it shouldn't be viewed as a materialistic or mathematical concept. Karma isn't involved in the material world, but instead manifests in the consciousness as intentions to act.

It is this understanding of interbeing, emptiness and consequences of actions and the intentions that drive those actions that forms the development of compassion in Buddhism.

This is the simplest explanation of karma, but of course there is a lot more. For a start, what does it mean to have good karma or bad karma?

Good deeds do not result in fortune for you in a future life. There are two things wrong with thinking that. Firstly if you honestly believe in noself you will not be thinking in terms of future lives, rather you will be thinking in terms of future manifestations as there is no concept of soul or continuation of soul, there is inter-being and continuation of Buddha Nature. Secondly good karma has nothing to do with fortune.

Remember that the first of the four noble truths tells us that the world is full of suffering. This is unavoidable. Good karma does not eliminate suffering. However good karma can transform suffering and thus eliminate fear and distress.

Imagine a man who has lost his right arm, who was robbed and so lost all his money, was short, had no hair and never married. It might be easy to say that he has bad karma, inherited perhaps from a past life.

However if that man was at peace, despite all the afflictions he suffers, because he is able to have a deep understanding of the nature of the suffering and see through those things to the Buddha Nature, to God, then he probably has better karma than the richest man alive. He is able to take his afflictions, the mud or compost, and transform that into a beautiful lotus flower.

Interbeing tells us that sometimes just a simple smile at a stranger can have far reaching implications. The deeds may not necessarily have any effect on karma, but it could be good karma that caused the intention in the first place.

In Buddhism the consciousness is seen as a garden of seeds, some bad seeds and some good seeds. By watering, by nurturing the good seeds we are able to develop intentions driven by compassion for others and seeing the Buddha Nature in others. This creates good karma. However if we give in to our own selfish needs and water the bad seeds, then we develop bad karma, and interbeing and noself tells us that karma doesn't stop at our self.

Karma is a difficult, if not impossible, concept to fully comprehend. Yet, while easy to dismiss certain events in ones life as being caused by 'bad karma', is a mislead notion. Rather one should meditate on the event and try to gain a deeper understanding of both the event and ones reaction to the event. What is discovered will tell us a lot more about the karma involved in the event.