Karma

Karma (devanāgarī: कर्म) is a Sanskrit term that "action" or "deed." In in Hindu, Jain, Buddhist and Sikh religions karma refers to a law that regulates causes and effects.

In Hinduism

In Hinduism there are three kinds of karma: Sanchita karma (accumulated past karma), Prarabdha karma (the one ready to be experienced through the present incarnation), and Kriyamana karma (the karma being created in the present incarnation, the fruits of which will be experienced in the future).

In Theosophy

H. P. Blavatsky defined it as follows:

Karma (Sk.). Physically, action: metaphysically, the LAW OF RETRIBUTION, the Law of cause and effect or Ethical Causation. Nemesis, only in one sense, that of bad Karma. It is the eleventh Nidana in the concatenation of causes and effects in orthodox Buddhism; yet it is the power that controls all things, the resultant of moral action, the meta physical Samskâra, or the moral effect of an act committed for the attainment of something which gratifies a personal desire. There is the Karma of merit and the Karma of demerit. Karma neither punishes nor rewards, it is simply the one Universal LAW which guides unerringly, and, so to say, blindly, all other laws productive of certain effects along the grooves of their respective causations. When Buddhism teaches that "Karma is that moral kernel (of any being) which alone survives death and continues in transmigration" or reincarnation, it simply means that there remains nought after each Personality but the causes produced by it; causes which are undying, i.e., which cannot be eliminated from the Universe until replaced by their legitimate effects, and wiped out by them, so to speak, and such causes—unless compensated during the life of the person who produced them with adequate effects, will follow the reincarnated Ego, and reach it in its subsequent reincarnation until a harmony between effects and causes is fully reestablished. No “personality”—a mere bundle of material atoms and of instinctual and mental characteristics—can of course continue, as such, in the world of pure Spirit. Only that which is immortal in its very nature and divine in its essence, namely, the Ego, can exist for ever. And as it is that Ego which chooses the personality it will inform, after each Devachan, and which receives through these personalities the effects of the Karmic causes produced, it is therefore the Ego, that self which is the “moral kernel” referred to and embodied karma, “which alone survives death.”

Accumulation of merits

The idea of performing good actions to accumulate merits is not encourage by Theosophy, since in this case the motive of the action is still self-centered. Mme. Blavatsky quotes "from letters written by the Masters":

". . . Let not the fruit of good Karma be your motive; for your Karma, good or bad, being one and the common property of all mankind, nothing good or bad can happen to you that is not shared by many others. Hence your motive, being selfish, can only generate a double effect, good and bad, and will either nullify your good action, or turn it to another man’s profit.” . . . “There is no happiness for one who is ever thinking of Self and forgetting all other Selves.
The Universe groans under the weight of such action (Karma), and none other than self-sacrificial Karma relieves it . . . How many of you have helped humanity to carry its smallest burden, that you should all regard yourselves as Theosophists. Oh, men of the West, who would play at being the Saviours of mankind before they even spare the life of a mosquito whose sting threatens them, would you be partakers of Divine Wisdom or true Theosophists? Then do as the gods when incarnated do. Feel yourselves the vehicles of the whole humanity, mankind as part of yourselves, and act accordingly . . ."

Lords of Karma

See Lipikas.

Online Resources

Articles and pamphlets

• Karma at Theosopedia
• Elementary Lessons on Karma by Annie Besant
• Karma: A Continuing Creation by Annie Besant
• Karma Once More by Annie Besant
• Karma and Social Improvement by Annie Besant
• On Karma by Annie Besant
• Some Karmic Problems by Annie Besant
• A Stydy in Karma by Annie Besant
• You Create Your Own Future: Deeds and Their Consequences by Annie Besant
• Karma Written down by Mabel Collins
• Aphorisms On Karma by William Q. Judge
• Elementals-Karma by William Q. Judge
• Environment by William Q. Judge
• Is Karma Only Punishment? by William Q. Judge
• Is Poverty Bad Karma? by William Q. Judge
• Karma by William Q. Judge
• Karma in the Desatir by William Q. Judge
• "Men Karmic Agents" by William Q. Judge
• The Moral Law of Compensation by William Q. Judge
• Thoughts on Karma by William Q. Judge
• Karma and Dharma: Twin Keys to the Heroic Journey by Joy Mills
• Karma: The Law of Order and Opportunity by Theosophical Society in America

Books

• Karma by Annie Besant

Audio

• Freedom, Order, and the Law of Karma by John Algeo
• Karma and Human Relations by Dora Kunz
• The Role of Karma in Life by Dora Kunz

Video

• Chance or Law in Human Life? by Geoffrey Hodson
• Karma, Skandhas, and Personality by Shirley Nicholson