Issues with karma

Benj96

Karma is the idea that past actions both negative and positive circle back to impose or influence on current or future prospects of an individual.

My issue with karma is the idea of personal continuity. Are we always the same in essence from one moment to the next? Karma in this sense doesn’t permit the ability to change for the better or for the worse. This is a form of unjust eternalism. “Type-casting” as it were.

However problems also occur if we consider the contrary - that our essence does in fact change with the progression of time. The individual who committed the deed is not the same who receives the resulting karma. This is the opposite extreme - nihilism/ annihilationism- the person we are from moment to moment is fundamentally different/changed. And so karma should not apply to this ever changing individual and be just in doing so.

The third option is that karma doesn’t a). Apply to a specific person or b). Depend on their prior actions/ deeds. In this case, negative or positive deeds and actions from random instigators impact other random people at various unrelated times by chance. This leads one to believe that morality and ethics wouldn’t at all apply and that Justice in a universal sense is false- it’s an “everyone for themselves” or “dog eat dog” world scenario and that all actions are justified as the consequences would be random and not necessarily affect to original doer.

None of these three scenarios seem particularly reasonable or palatable. So I struggle to assume a notion of universal karma.
I welcome you to discuss your personal takes and interjections

Tom Storm

↪Benj96

Which account of karma are you assessing?

Agent Smith

There seems to be some controversy regarding Buddhist beliefs.

The idea is rather simple: Deny both eternalism and nihilism and what you end up with is pure uncertainty/doubt - is there a soul? Is there not? What's the most rational course of action? That there's hell or there's no such thing? Pascal's wager!

Karma is simply an extension of known laws of ethics: what goes around comes around, one good turn deserves another, a taste of one's own medicine, you reap what you sow, you get the idea, tit for tat, quid pro quo, a law encapulated in the word "reciprocity".

Think of karma as an assumption in a conditional proof/reductio ad absurdum proof - it, in the end, needs to be discharged and for this we havta have souls.

I like sushi

Karma is simply an extension of known laws of ethics: what goes around comes around, one good turn deserves another, a taste of one's own medicine, you reap what you sow, you get the idea, tit for tat, quid pro quo, a law encapulated in the word "reciprocity". — Agent Smith

Well, if only! The buddhist view is basically that children with bone cancer have bone cancer due to what they did in a previous life. Them having cancer is ‘karma’.

There is a much darker side to buddhist beliefs many prefer to ignore.

Agent Smith

Well, if only! The buddhist view is basically that children with bone cancer have bone cancer due to what they did in a previous life. Them having cancer is ‘karma’.

There is a much darker side to buddhist beliefs many prefer to ignore. — I like sushi

Buddhism, to my reckoning, is agnostic as to the existence of souls, souls that are a prerequisite for the claim that children suffer because of the bad karma they accumulated in past lives.

The point to Buddhism is not to claim knowledge for that's impossible given the givens, but to play around with doubt. The results are better: Buddhists are generally more peaceful than Christians, Moslems, etc.

unenlightened

There is a much darker side to buddhist beliefs many prefer to ignore. — I like sushi

Yes. The idea of karma is rather similar to 'the Secret' and 'the power of positive thinking' in the way it gives comfort to greed and privilege.

Buddhists are generally more peaceful than Christians, Moslems, etc. — Agent Smith

You say peaceful, I say apathetic, complacent, and fatalistic. Not all, but much of Buddhist tradition, like Christian tradition is concerned with maintaining power relations in society. One says you deserve your misery in this life because of your past life and the other that your misery in this life will be rewarded in the next.

Wayfarer

↪Benj96

Karma is not determinism. It generates tendencies and likely outcomes. There’s lots of mythology about it.

Karma in this sense doesn’t permit the ability to change for the better or for the worse. — Benj96

It should also be pointed out that Buddhism has always accepted the reality of karma - that all volitional consequences have actions - but not that any person, or anything, has a fixed essence or unchanging self. Here’s a primer https://www.accesstoinsight.org/lib/authors/thanissaro/karma.html

I like sushi

↪Agent Smith

Merely a matter of geography. Buddhist doctrines can just as easily be used to kill and maim. Extremists can exist in any institution.

The general message in every religion is one of peace and love. Some seem to need more reforming than others … not denying that. A bullet to the head is still a bullet to the head. The gun it comes from generally doesn’t matter too much.

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baker

↪Benj96

Which account of karma are you assessing? — Tom Storm

Seconded. It's meaningless to discuss "karma" without reference to a particular doctrine of karma (there are several of them).

Benj96

Seconded. It's meaningless to discuss "karma" without reference to a particular doctrine of karma (there are several of them). — baker

I gave three of interest. Eternalism. Nihilism or absurdism. Have a read over the post again and see what you think :)

baker

↪Benj96

No, I'm talking at least about some Hindu doctrines of karma, Buddhist doctrines of karma, popular doctrines of karma.

It seems you're implicitly trying to figure out which doctrine of karma is the right one, yes?

Agent Smith

You say peaceful, I say apathetic, complacent, and fatalistic. Not all, but much of Buddhist tradition, like Christian tradition is concerned with maintaining power relations in society. One says you deserve your misery in this life because of your past life and the other that your misery in this life will be rewarded in the next. — unenlightened

That's a misconception of Buddhism. Being of skeptical nature, it never claims to know stuff (with certainty); it simply brings to our attention possibilities and then we're left on our own how best to deal with what could be rather than what is.

Kinda like Pascal's wager, we must err on the side of caution: Karma maybe real or not, but it's better to assume it is. You know, just in case. The same line of reasoning applies to everything else.

It appears that, in congruence with the Oracle of Delphi who is alleged to have warned "surety brings ruin", Buddhism endorses doubt/skepticism as a better; don't we, after all, recommend "a healthy dose of skepticism" to all?

Coming to the suffering of children; it's simple and rational to infer that pediatric illnesses must be caused by something not in this life (Bartricks, in another thread, argues that children are innocent and ergo, antinatalism) and hence in the process of sense-making a hypothesis emerges - karmic debt from past lives.

This - our misfortunes are our own doing - doesn't imply that those who're in a tight spot should be left to the mercy of bad karma. They need to be given all the help they ~~deserve~~ need!

Agent Smith

Merely a matter of geography. Buddhist doctrines can just as easily be used to kill and maim. Extremists can exist in any institution.

The general message in every religion is one of peace and love. Some seem to need more reforming than others … not denying that. A bullet to the head is still a bullet to the head. The gun it comes from generally doesn’t matter too much. — I like sushi

Buddhism doesn't have the concept of crusades/jihads (holy wars). Violence is only permitted, but not advocated in Buddhism. A last resort of sorts, for cornered cats.

Agent Smith

The OP raises a good point: how do we reconcile anicca (impermanence, constant change) with karma? The former explains itself in that if there are souls, they're in constant flux such that each stage is different from the others. The latter, however, necessitates an unchanging/constant being/soul that should face the music (of his/her own past deeds).

For karma, there's got to be an eternal soul. Anicca, if real, precludes such an entity. Inconsistency detected!

However, if we remind ourselves that Buddhism isn't about knowledge, but about ignorance, the inconsistency becomes a feature and not a bug.

I like sushi

↪Agent Smith

Are you really that naive? That is like saying violence is not permitted in Christianity and ‘turn the other cheek’ is always employed.

Myanmar. Plenty of instances of violence there openly encouraged by buddhist monks.

Go back several decades and in the UK muslims would pretty much never get involved in violence. The doctrines don’t matter too much when corrupt leaders of institutions wish to flex for political gain. Religious institutions are political institutions.

Agent Smith

Are you really that naive? That is like saying violence is not permitted in Christianity and ‘turn the other cheek’ is always employed.

Myanmar. Plenty of instances of violence there openly encouraged by buddhist monks.

Go back several decades and in the UK muslims would pretty much never get involved in violence. The doctrines don’t matter too much when corrupt leaders of institutions wish to flex for political gain. Religious institutions are political institutions. — I like sushi

Good points! All I can say is this: Buddhism, unlike other religions, doesn't have a loophole that could justify initiation of violence. It does sanction self-defense (black's move in chess).

I like sushi

↪Agent Smith

I don’t completely agree there, but in general I would certainly agree that in its current guise it is probably no more harmful than Christianity (although several orphanages would probably prove otherwise?).

I was interested in this topic because the philosophical position of ‘karma’ and ‘past lives’ is something that is often swept under the carpet. I think viewing misfortune in this life as some kind of penance for misgiving in some imagined previous life is an abhorrent idea that essentially has some people categorised as ‘deserving their fate’ by simply being born with some form of disability or other.

Wayfarer

Myanmar. Plenty of instances of violence there openly encouraged by buddhist monks. — I like sushi

Yes indeed, Burmese buddhist nationalism has been a pretty horrible stain on the religion. So to the involvement of Japanese Zen Buddhists in World War 2. Although none of that invalidates the basic idea of karma, which in my view is a logical and consistent basis for ethics.

I think viewing misfortune in this life as some kind of penance for misgiving in some imagined previous life is an abhorrent idea that essentially has some people categorised as ‘deserving their fate’ by simply being born with some form of disability or other. — I like sushi

Totally agree, but I think as soon as it's used for justification of the suffering of others, it's a misreading of the principle. Also the rationalisation of disability or illness as 'bad karma' is, I think, pretty abhorent all around. When understood as a regulative principle for one's own actions it's a very different story.

Agent Smith

I was interested in this topic because the philosophical position of ‘karma’ and ‘past lives’ is something that is often swept under the carpet. I think viewing misfortune in this life as some kind of penance for misgiving in some imagined previous life is an abhorrent idea that essentially has some people categorised as ‘deserving their fate’ by simply being born with some form of disability or other. — I like sushi

As I already mentioned to you disease in children begs for an explanation if we are to consider them innocent of any wrongdoing (for obvious reasons) in this life. The principle of sufficient reason would require us to posit a previous life whose bad karma has now come back to bite these unfortunate people.

That said, this if you care to notice is just a hypothesis; if one feels that justice should be served and you find karma abhorrent, the onus is on you to come up with an alternative hypothesis. Can't eat your cake and have it too, oui monsieur?

I like sushi

↪Agent Smith

How can I find ‘karma’ abhorrent’? I said those espousing ‘karma’ as a justification for people less fortunate as themselves as ‘abhorrent’.

It is especially silly when based on a steadfast belief in reincarnation from one body to another.

Where is having the cake and eating it? I don’t quite understand what you are getting at with that line?

unenlightened

This - our misfortunes are our own doing - doesn't imply that those who're in a tight spot should be left to the mercy of bad karma. — Agent Smith

It justifies it, because it justifies everything, by making justice a property of nature. And that means that any amount of exploitation is justified.The dogma of karma comforts the fortunate and privileged and blames the afflicted and exploited for their misery. It is entirely natural and commonplace for the privileged to come to believe they deserve their privilege, and karma is simply the Indian version of godswill and the white-man's burden. It fits right in with the caste system, and helps to sustain it along with rampant toxic sexism. I am not the expert, but my suspicion is that the doctrine does not come from Buddha himself, but is an accretion that probably predates him. rather like Roman cultural accretions to Christianity unconnected with the reported words or deeds of Jesus.

Wayfarer

. I am not the expert, but my suspicion is that the doctrine does not come from Buddha himself, but is an accretion that probably predates him. — unenlightened

Incorrect. In the Buddha's day, meritorious karma was accrued by performing the appropriate ritual sacrifices, and for the laity by supporting the Brahmin priesthood. The Buddha kept the basic principle but attached it wholly and solely to the qualities of intentional actions and their results. For him, a brahmin is not an hereditary privilege but the mark of true virtue. It's a bedrock principle of Buddhism from the beginning, although I agree that when it is used to rationalise fatalism it has been misappopriated. Again see what Bhikhu Thanisarro has to say on it (he's an American monk alive and practicing today) https://www.dhammatalks.org/books/NobleStrategy/Section0005.html

instead of promoting resigned powerlessness, the early Buddhist notion of karma focused on the liberating potential of what the mind is doing at every moment. Who you are—what you come from—is not anywhere near as important as the mind’s motives for what it’s doing right now. Even though the past may account for many of the inequalities we see in life, our measure as human beings is not the hand we’ve been dealt, for that hand can change at any moment. We take our own measure by how well we play the hand we’ve got. If you’re suffering, you try not to continue the unskillful mental habits that would keep that particular karmic feedback going. If you see that other people are suffering, and you’re in a position to help, you focus not on their karmic past but your karmic opportunity in the present: Someday you may find yourself in the same predicament they’re in now, so here’s your opportunity to act in the way you’d like them to act toward you when that day comes.

('The first will one day be last' - some famous religious teacher.)

It fits right in with the caste system, and helps to sustain it along with rampant toxic sexism — unenlightened

Not the way the Buddha taught it. It's one of the main reasons Buddhism did not survive in India. There's been a political movement towards Buddhism amongst the Dalits (outcastes) in the 20th Century because it's outside of the caste system.

unenlightened

↪Wayfarer

Thanks.

Although many Asian concepts of karma are fatalistic, the early Buddhist concept was not fatalistic at all.

This is almost what I was suggesting - that karma functioned already in society to maintain privilege, and early Buddhism attempted to undermine this function. Nevertheless, the old fatalism persisted in the name of Buddhism, just as the Roman Empire persists in the Catholic Church. The usual story of the establishment perverting the spiritual insights of spiritual leaders.

Agent Smith

It justifies it, because it justifies everything, by making justice a property of nature. And that means that any amount of exploitation is justified.The dogma of karma comforts the fortunate and privileged and blames the afflicted and exploited for their misery. It is entirely natural and commonplace for the privileged to come to believe they deserve their privilege, and karma is simply the Indian version of godswill and the white-man's burden. It fits right in with the caste system, and helps to sustain it along with rampant toxic sexism. I am not the expert, but my suspicion is that the doctrine does not come from Buddha himself, but is an accretion that probably predates him. rather like Roman cultural accretions to Christianity unconnected with the reported words or deeds of Jesus. — unenlightened

Excellent point! Gracias señor!

Karma indeed justifies exploitation by convincing people that they deserve it. However, to play the Devil's advocate, I'd say this: There's a long lead time between suffering, even of the severest kind, and the awareness of it & the will to end it! This too is karmic in essence i.e. our wish to put an end to our pain occurs only when/after our karmic IOUs have been paid off. In other words, sticking to the issue of exploitation, the need to improve our state of affairs marks the beginning of a debt-free life, karmically speaking.

To cut to the chase, the need for liberation from dukkha (dissatisfaction) of all kinds, including but not limited to exploitation, is nothing but good karma.

Agent Smith

How can I find ‘karma’ abhorrent’? I said those espousing ‘karma’ as a justification for people less fortunate as themselves as ‘abhorrent’.

It is especially silly when based on a steadfast belief in reincarnation from one body to another.

Where is having the cake and eating it? I don’t quite understand what you are getting at with that line? — I like sushi

We all want that justice should be served, but when justice is served, we recoil in disgust! What gives? This is our bad karma for we fail to see the light. I'm gonna get roasted for this.

unenlightened

This too is karmic in essence i.e. our wish to put an end to our pain occurs only when/after our karmic IOUs have been paid off. — Agent Smith

Your attachment to the karmic explanation stinks. What is this 'our pain' you speak of? I want my pain to end immediately. You speak of our pain by way of appropriating the pain of others and then use the notion of karma to justify your complacency about it.

Agent Smith

Your attachment to the karmic explanation stinks. What is this 'our pain' you speak of? I want my pain to end immediately. You speak of our pain by way of appropriating the pain of others and then use the notion of karma to justify your complacency about it. — unenlightened

You're on target, but in my defense I'd ask for an alternative explanation for childhood suffering. Why do innocents, sometimes, go through hell? What hypothesis do you offer? Remember PSR (the principle of sufficient reason).

Agent Smith

Karmic death spiral/debt trap.

Do evil and you're born in a condition/in circumstances that are not conducive to your well-being, this in turn makes you unable to see the light of Buddhism and you sin more. This means your next life is even worse and you sin even more...so on and so forth until you find yourself in the center of jahanam. :fear:

unenlightened

↪Agent Smith

The innocent suffer because to live is to be vulnerable. Life is a losing game - everyone dies. So rather than pretend it is not so, let us use our intelligence and social interdependence to mitigate suffering where we can, by feeding the hungry, housing the homeless, healing the sick, and sharing our common resources wherever there is need and suffering. You never know, your next life might be one of those whose suffering you did, or did not alleviate in this life.

Inasmuch as ye do it unto the least of these my children, ye do it unto me. — Jesus

This is the radical karma of Buddhism, that since the self is an illusion, you yourself are the Buddha and the tyrant and the innocent sufferer, and to alleviate the suffering of another is as commonsensical as for the right hand to bandage a cut on the left hand.

Agent Smith

The innocent suffer because to live is to be vulnerable. Life is a losing game - everyone dies. So rather than pretend it is not so, let us use our intelligence and social interdependence to mitigate suffering where we can, by feeding the hungry, housing the homeless, healing the sick, and sharing our common resources wherever there is need and suffering. You never know, your next life might be one of those whose suffering you did, or did not alleviate in this life. — unenlightened

Good call! Count me in! Be warned though I don't usually put my money where my mouth is. Apologies! Medici, cura te ipsum. I can't help when I myself am in need of help. I would be the laughing stock of the very cosmos. Nevertheless, I do my bit (when I can).

Inasmuch as ye do it unto the least of these my children, ye do it unto me. — Jesus

Alhamdulillah!

This is the radical karma of Buddhism, that since the self is an illusion, you yourself are the Buddha and the tyrant and the innocent sufferer, and to alleviate the suffering of another is as commonsensical as for the right hand to bandage a cut on the left — unenlightened

I'm not under any llusions as to what karma is or is not. It seems to provide a fairly good albeit unpalatable explanation for evil - recall the problem of evil, a thorn in the side of Christianity, an irresolvable inconsistency vis-à-vis an omnibebevolent deity.

Issues with karma

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