Faith in the principle of karma means you have faith in the people who are teaching it, and you have so much faith that you actually try to act in line with it.

"So when we talk about having faith in the principle of karma, it’s not just saying, “Oh, yes, I think that’s a good idea.” It means that you have faith in the people who are teaching it. And you have so much faith that you actually try to act in line with it. The Buddha makes this point over and over again — your actions show what you really believe in. So when you believe in something, make sure that your actions are good.

That provides you not only with the theory but also with the appropriate emotions — a sense of saṃvega, a sense of pasada, heedfulness, equanimity — as these things are needed. This way, the teaching on karma is not just something that you give your intellectual assent to. It’s something you assent to with your whole heart and you carry it out into your actions. Because this is how you benefit the most from it — as you bring your actions into line with the theory.

When the Buddha gained awakening, he learned an awful lot of things. But he taught only the things that he said are useful for putting an end to suffering. And the teaching on karma is one of those useful teachings. So learn how to make good use of it. And you’ll find that the Buddha was right — it really is a necessary part of right view, to give you direction, to give you motivation, so that you can reach the point where you can confirm, “Yes, it is true.”

But we’re not just trying to confirm that. When you reach that point, you’ll also find that you’ve found the ultimate happiness. And that’s what this teaching is all about. Sometimes it seems as if karma is there to assign blame to people who are suffering or to say so-and-so deserves suffering. But that’s not the case. That’s a misuse of the teaching.

The teaching is there to point out that you have this power here in the present moment to do good or to do evil. So be very careful about how you use it. If you use it well, it can take you all the way to the goal that the Buddha found — a deathless happiness."

~ Thanissaro Bhikkhu "Faith in Karma"

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Question habits and intentions. However, faith in karma should be maintained as a working hypothesis all the way to Nibbana.

"When the Buddha described his quest for awakening as a series of responses to questions of the form, “Why am I doing this?” he was indicating the point at which the search for a way out of stress turns inward: the realization that stress may be caused by one’s own actions. He was also indicating that an important part of the path consists of the realization that one’s habits — and in particular, one’s intentions — are not to be blindly accepted or taken for granted. They should be called into question and subjected to honest scrutiny. However, he also was indicating that not everything is to be questioned — in particular, conviction in the efficacy of action should be maintained as a working hypothesis all the way to release." ~ Thanissaro Bhikkhu "Skill in Questions: How the Buddha Taught"
Read more

There are lots of things about karma that are not fair, the Buddha didn't design it

"Some people say Buddhism is selfish or harsh with its teachings on karma, selfish in the fact that each person is looking out after his or her own well-being, harsh in that people are being held responsible for their own suffering. If the Buddha could have saved us all, he would have. He had an enormous immeasurable heart, but he saw that this is the way that karma is. There are lots of things about karma that are not fair. Look at Ven. Angulimala: He had killed almost a thousand people and yet he was able to become an arahant without having to undergo a thousand deaths to pay off that karmic debt. By training his mind, he was able to mitigate a lot of the suffering he would have otherwise undergone. A lot of people were unhappy about that. They felt it wasn’t fair. The Buddha didn’t design the teaching on karma to make things fair or to be consoling. He didn’t design it at all. He just pointed out that this is the way things are, this is how they work." ~ Thani
Read more

Have some positive feelings toward this teaching on kamma. It’s not there just to punish you. It’s there to offer you opportunities. It’s there to remind you that your actions are important.

"Have some positive feelings toward this teaching on kamma. It’s not there just to punish you. It’s there to offer you opportunities. It’s there to remind you that your actions are important. And even though you’ve done unskillful things in the past, you’ve got a new opportunity right now to do something skillful. And then again right now. Each right now. So if you do find yourself in the middle of having made some unfortunate choices, you can say, “Well, I’ll stop.” And the fact that you stopped becomes positive kamma right there. Part of the mind may say, “You’ve been doing unskillful things in the past, you’re going to give in to unskillful impulses in the future, so why bother resisting now?” Fight that. You’ve got to fight it. And you have the freedom to fight it. That’s the important part of our kamma: that element of freedom." ~ Thanissaro Bhikkhu "The Good Side of Kamma"
Read more