I. “O Gautma, just as a sprout has a seed for its hetu as there is a hetu
for happiness ad misery; since it is a karaya. That hetu is
the karman” We find in this life persons, having the same means for
enjoying happiness, misery, in this life, is too much of a fact to be
ignored. It is also true that there is abundant inequality in the status
and experiences of individual men, which is inexplicable by our empirical
methods of enquiry. Good men suffer ad the evil prospers like the green
banyan trees. It is necessary to explain this provident inequality in the
status and development of individuals.
Attempts have been made
to refer this inequality to man’s first disobedience and the fruit of that
forbidden tree. Others have denied the existence of evil and the
consequent inequality; still others would like us to think of this word as
training ground for perfection. But life is to a pleasure garden and God a
sort of a Sata Cause whose main duty is to please his creatures. It is
necessary to find a solution on the basis of autonomous nature of ma and
his responsibility to shape his o destiny. The Indian thought has found it
in the doctrine of Karma.
II. The doctrine of Karma
is one of the most significant tenets of Indian thought. It has profoundly
influenced the life and thought of the people in India. it has become the
‘logical pricus of all Indian thought’ It is the basal presupposition of
Buddhism, Hinduism and Jainism (of course with minor differences). As a
man sows, so does he reap: our actions have their effects. These effects
cannot be destroyed. They have to be experienced and exhausted. If we
cannot exhaust the effects of our actions in this life, we have to
complete the visual of birth ad deaths to ear the fruit for al that we
have doe. No ma inherits the good or evil of another man. The doctrine of
Karma is, thus closely associate with the transmigration of souls. Every
evil deed must be expatiated, and every good deed must receive its reward.
If it is not possible to reap the fruits in one single empirical
existence, it must be experienced on earth in fresh incarnation. Plato has
made a reference to this theory in the Law, perhaps under the
influence of orphic mysticism, and refers to ‘the tradition which is
firmly believed by many and has been received from those who are learned
in the mysteries. In Indian thought, the Jainas have developed the
doctrine of Karma o scientific basis.
Karma etymologically
whatever is done, any activity. It got associated with the after-effects
of actions, both physical ad psychical. Ever Jiva (living being) is
constantly active, expressing the activity in the three-fold functions of
body, speech and mind. It leaves behind traces of after-effects in the
physic and psychic forms. Every action word or thought produces, besides
it visible, invisible and transcendent effects. It produces under certain
conditions certain potential energies which forge the visible effects in
the form of reward or punishment. As in the case of a bond which continues
to operate until, but loses it validity on the repayment of the capital
sum; so does the invisible effect has disappeared. Actions performed in
this life would be the causes of future life, and the present life is the
result of actions performed in the precious life. So it’s the chain of
life connected in the series of actions and their effects realised. The
Karma doctrine involves the idea of a eternal metempsychosis. 5 Kerl
potter in his presuppositions of
India’s
has tried to interpret
Karma as a form of habit. Human being faces challenges from many sides
which have to be met by birth, social act ion and by the application of
scientific techniques in order to be free from the bondage in life. But
the more subtle challenges lie underneath the surface, and ‘arise form
habits themes, which continues after the conditions that engender them
have been removed, and which engender new habits which in turn must be
removed somehow. This round of habits breeding habits is a part of what is
called in Sanskrit samsara, the wheel of birth, which is governed
by Karma, the habits themselves’ 6 Karma is described in the Jaina
philosophy as a kind of dirt which accretes to the other wise pure Jiva by
virtue of one’s actions. In the bhagaadgita the dirt is described
as of three kinds. “one may think of these as types of habits” 7 I have
not been abe to understand how potter interprets Karma as a type of habit.
One must be steeped in the Indian tradition in order to understand the
nature and significance of Karma.
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