Is it possible to burn off old kamma — say, by simply putting up with pain?

Question 15. Is it possible to burn off old kamma — say, by simply putting up with pain?

Thanissaro Bhikkhu: No. In the Buddha’s time, an ascetic group called the Nigaṇṭhas believed that they could burn off old kamma by not reacting to the pain of their austerities, and the Buddha reserved some of his sharpest ridicule for that belief. As he said, the Nigaṇṭhas should have noticed that the pain they experienced during their austerities ended when they stopped the austerities, which meant that the pain was the result not of old kamma being burned off, but of their present kamma in undertaking the austerities [MN 101].

Still, it is possible to weaken the results of bad past kamma. The Buddha compared past bad kamma to a big lump of salt. If you put the salt into a small glass of water, you can’t drink the water because it’s too salty. But if you toss it into a large, clean river, it doesn’t make the water of the river too salty to drink. The river here stands for a mind that has developed four qualities:

• unlimited goodwill [mettā] and equanimity: wishing for the happiness of all beings, and yet being equanimous when seeing that some beings are currently beyond help, in that they refuse to create the causes for true happiness, so that you can focus your energies, not on the futile attempt to change their ways, but on areas where you can make a difference;

• mature virtue: avoiding killing, stealing, illicit sex, lying, and taking intoxicants;

• mature discernment: understanding the causes for suffering and mastering the skills needed to put suffering to an end; and

• the ability not to allow pleasure or pain to overwhelm the mind.

When the mind has strengthened these four qualities, then the results of past bad kamma hardly touch it at all [AN 3:101].

~ Thanissaro Bhikkhu "Karma Q & A: a Study Guide"

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