Does karma from past lives make sense?

[Omni]

I for one do not agree karma from past lives makes sense. Maybe I'm wrong, and I welcome any intelligent perspectives that may change my opinion(or agree with my opinion). All perspective are welcome.

I feel DNA, conditioning, experiences, and so on effect who we are and what we do. We are maleable a bit. We are not our soul only.

Why should we be punished for something that is just as much if not more of a product of our environment as is our own soul's doing? And do we really learn anything from being punished for something in a past life?

Does the soul grow when it's punished?

Also, body intelligence. If what Inelia says about body intelligence is true(which I don't know all she says about it), would you recieve karma for both your soul, and body intelligence's past lives? Or does the BI not have karma...


I think we can be completely different people given the external-from-soul variables we are subjected to and are affected by from life to life. And for this, to me, karma does not make sense being implemented from past lives. It would be like being punished for someone else's actions in a way IMHO.

Does it make sense to punish someone in their next life for being confused or abused to levels of abusing others? Does it make sense to punish someone for being born the way they are? Or turning into a sour evil person because their DNA or traumatic experiences and so on?

Often people who are abused end up abusing others(not always). So basically with karma from past lives it appears one would be punished for being abused and having the system that makes the abused become the abuser as is the case.


I personally don't see the logic in karma from past lives. Now I am not saying I know my own opinion is reality. I have no clue if it is or not. Just my surface examination points to karma not existing in the forms people think it does as I have faith that the mechanics of the universe are as perfect as they could be given the diversity we have around.

To me, karma for past lives does not make sense. Feel free to point out where I'm going wrong(or right). Your thoughts?

[Tony]

Karma is our habitual patterns, which we acquire. That is turn becomes a personality. These habitual patterns keep us going round in circles.
It is unnecessary software that is clogging up pure perception. So we suffer....Oi do we suffer!

[greybeard]

As far as I understand the The Buddha taught freedom from suffering.
Only the ego can suffer - so to speak.
To be more accurate Identification with the ego story of me creates the potential for suffering.


Chris

[Tony]

The first noble truth was to recognise suffering.

[siggy]

To me Karma makes perfect sense and is logical.
Essentially (in my mind) it's cause and effect; everything which you have done or experienced in your life up to now has formed who you are now, how you think, how you react, etc - so the past effects who you are now.
Now the rub is that you can choose who you'll be (think, react) in the future - so you have free will - but, your past experiences will determine this decision.

Mind blowing when you really think about it!

Now quantum physics / effects might have some role in this - I haven't really given it much thought, but - maybe those thoughts and decisions we all make and that are 'out of character' are quantum events which allow us to evolve outside of our karma path!?!?!?

The fact that karma affects your next lives, again, seems logical to me as long as one believes that all lives are one and that we are all one, single consciousness. Then there is no separation between lives, just a continuation of learning & experiencing in order to, finally, reaching understanding and enlightenment, god consciousness, call it what you will.

Anyway, that's my take on it for what its worth

[greybeard]

Being born a human is a karmic event, one meaning of Karma being action.
The word does not necessarily translate into English that well.
There are consequences for every action.
The action does not cause specific consequences but sets up potential for the inevitable consequences.
You could say there is no past life but a continuum of life.

The mystics say that the whole purpose of incarnation here is to escape the wheel of Karma, realize one true self = enlightenment.
Then there is no Karma to bring one back.
When ones action is surrendered to God then there is no Karma.

One is responsible for the effort-- giving it our best effort but the end result being surrendered has no Karmic (personal) consequence.
I cant speak for the Buddhist take on this but that is the enlightened Indian sage typical teaching.

Chris

Chris

[Tony]

The very same!!!!!!!!

[elysian]

Be do have.

We are human beings.

As we be, we do, that we get.

<3
Namaste

[aranuk]

I posted something last week I think some thread. I'll see if I can find it.

Stan

[Teakai]

My take on karma is that it isn't about punishment, but about understanding a situation from another perspective. For instance - if you abandoned someone in a particular life, in order to understand the full spectrum spiritually you will choose to experience being the one abandoned. Once you have got that experience learned you will have that knowledge under your belt and will be unlikely to repeat that behaviour in future incarnations.
To me it's all about being a well rounded being and that means having the experiences required to make that happen.

No comment on body intelligence- apart from having read that people having received donor transplants have been known to take on the likes and dislikes of the donor.

[aranuk]

I found it. here it is.

Timeline Manifestation and me

Anno I can see what you mean here. I've pondered that also and I didn't get very far in my reasoning. I don't want to change the subject but I also have questioned my own belief system of re-incarnation and karma. I've read hundreds of Rudolf Steiner books which explains all the intricacies of karma and re-incarnation, but the thing that puzzles my wee brain is why, why do we HAVE to forget where we came from (spiritual plane). Blind man's buff was never a favorite of mine as a child. But entering this life without any memory of where we came from seems to me a childish invention, although I have been told by many a guru that this is the rules. How does blundering away in the dark all your life and eventually managing somehow to pay your karmic debts and whilst you are doing this in an unconscious way benefit our soul when we get back to the spiritual realm. Do we congratulate each other souls as having done so well, when in fact we are neither conscious of what we were doing. I think that this dear Anno may involve the merging of both my question and yours. Does this make any sense? I will speak more later.

Stan

[greybeard]

Hi aranuk
I think we dont have memory of past life because if we did there would be the temptation to "work the system"
We would do things for all the wrong reasons, just to get the escape ticket.
Does that make sense?
The thought just came in answer to your post, I never really questioned it before.

Regards Chris

[aranuk]

Say for example that I betray someone badly when they are in need of a friend to support them and let them down. Now there are two possibilities here. Either I have committed a treachery on that person and I will at a later time or a later life will experience the same misfortune. Or I was in an earlier life betrayed by that same soul and so I am really paying back the misdeed by agreement. How do we know for sure that our actions are correct. If by agreement I am destined to pay the other back with the betrayal then THAT action WAS correct. It's very complicated when you start questioning it really.


Stan

[siggy]

If we knew all our past lives, wouldn't we know the one before the 1st incarnation (god) and so be all knowing god?
Or, maybe it'd just be too much for our feable human minds to cope with?
I hadn't really thought about this (non-remberance of past lives) before, hmmmm....

[aranuk]

Posted by greybeard (here)
Hi aranuk
I think we dont have memory of past life because if we did there would be the temptation to "work the system"
We would do things for all the wrong reasons, just to get the escape ticket.
Does that make sense?
The thought just came in answer to your post, I never really questioned it before.

Regards Chris

Chris Honestly I have believed in Karma and re-incarnation since I was 11 when I started zen. If we don't know what we aught to be doing then we cannot possibly avoid doing it. As far as I understood it, our Higher Self guides us to do it in the most innocuous little ways. The way I used to think was that if we look at our past life in this life I mean and at the crossroads where we went this way or that way it is extremely likely that it was a little "innocent" action that kept us on the right track. This is a fascinating subject, I'm loving it!

Stan

[Ian Gordon]

Karma, an explanation which resonates with me was given roughly as, yes we have stages to pass through to gain enlightenment, in each of these stages we have personal lessons to learn. If we error we will be given another bash, with a clean slate (hence no memory). As we pass through each cycle we will touch others on there journeys as we will receive help from the people and events that touch us. Some of these stages will be easier than others and our events in one cycle will impact on our journey next time (which timeline perhaps we start on, just a sudden thought). Whilst we have no memory of a previous life we do take forward the lessons learnt (we have all come across those older, wiser than there years). Hence our trials and tribulations are our teachers and guides, fear nothing embrace everything..........just one of many views, However one thought is, it is not the detail that matters it is the journey and we all have our own path so perhaps the answer is individual depending on what stage your are at.

[Teakai]

Posted by aranuk (here)
Say for example that I betray someone badly when they are in need of a friend to support them and let them down. Now there are two possibilities here. Either I have committed a treachery on that person and I will at a later time or a later life will experience the same misfortune. Or I was in an earlier life betrayed by that same soul and so I am really paying back the misdeed by agreement. How do we know for sure that our actions are correct. If by agreement I am destined to pay the other back with the betrayal then THAT action WAS correct. It's very complicated when you start questioning it really.


Stan

I think to follow one's heart is the best way.

Which is not the same thing as following one's ego desire.

Which is why expanding our consciousness beyond the smallness of ego identification helps. It will allow us to guide ourselves to our soul planned outcome.
This western reality does all it can to keep us in ego identification.

Which might explain why some souls choose to be born in less 'developed' places. It might not have the mod cons - but it might be a much more effective, faster moving soul lesson without the mod con distractions keeping one constantly focused in ego interests and powerful illusion. Just musing there

[Teakai]

Posted by aranuk (here)
I found it. here it is.

Timeline Manifestation and me

Anno I can see what you mean here. I've pondered that also and I didn't get very far in my reasoning. I don't want to change the subject but I also have questioned my own belief system of re-incarnation and karma. I've read hundreds of Rudolf Steiner books which explains all the intricacies of karma and re-incarnation, but the thing that puzzles my wee brain is why, why do we HAVE to forget where we came from (spiritual plane). Blind man's buff was never a favorite of mine as a child. But entering this life without any memory of where we came from seems to me a childish invention, although I have been told by many a guru that this is the rules. How does blundering away in the dark all your life and eventually managing somehow to pay your karmic debts and whilst you are doing this in an unconscious way benefit our soul when we get back to the spiritual realm. Do we congratulate each other souls as having done so well, when in fact we are neither conscious of what we were doing. I think that this dear Anno may involve the merging of both my question and yours. Does this make any sense? I will speak more later.

Stan

Because most of us just wouldn't want to be here.

People who have had to return from near death experiences have been majorly depressed at having to come back.

But, I sould say, just in case to anyone who might be inclined, don't kill yourself to get back there - you'd totally regret it if you did. People who have committed suicide have regretted doing so immediately - because from the soul persepctive they see the whole picture and what they had planned - and suicide just screwed it all up and let others they had agreements with down as well.
Just know that you have picked this life for a purpose - and know that at the end of the trip you get to go home again.

The reason why we don't remember our past lives is because they are totally irrelevant to this life - except for what we learned spiritually from them - and that we always carry with us - we just have to connect to ourself as best we can at this level of existence.

[aranuk]

A wee story about Karma now. My dad and I were driving through a part of Edinburgh many years ago. We were discussing Karma. He hadn't heard the word karma but he knew the subject well enough! He called it the Law of Retribution and Exchange. Anyway we "happened" to pass a wee cottage on the left. My dad said that he fell in love with a young woman after the war before he met my mum. She seemed to be in love with him too. He was invited to tea to meet the girls mother. Later when the room was quiet a wee mouse ran across the hearth and the two women started to blush with embarrassment. In their universe that meant they didn't keep a clean house.(which isn't true at all) The mother and daughter couldn't get my dad out soon enough. The girl agreed to meet the old man on Friday evening but didn't show up. My dad met my mother to be that night and I think I may have been conceived that night. My dad said he often thought that wee mouse was me in another life. Here again the innoccuous.

Stan

PS That wee cottage we passed was the same one that girl lived in.

[Teakai]

Posted by aranuk (here)
Chris Honestly I have believed in Karma and re-incarnation since I was 11 when I started zen. If we don't know what we aught to be doing then we cannot possibly avoid doing it. As far as I understood it, our Higher Self guides us to do it in the most innocuous little ways. The way I used to think was that if we look at our past life in this life I mean and at the crossroads where we went this way or that way it is extremely likely that it was a little "innocent" action that kept us on the right track. This is a fascinating subject, I'm loving it!

Stan

If we listen to our gut, or our heart/conscience - we are more likley to be kept on the path we chose. But people have totally messed up and have done things that they later regret.

We don't suddenly become something or someone else when we die. We just shed the earthly body and regain our memory and as such have a whole new perspective.

And there are those souls who have done really hurtful things to others while following the ego rather than their heart who will feel so ashamed of what they have done.

But everything is forgivable in soul. This is a learning place - and even the most failed lesson can have value if we allow ourselves to learn from it.

I think this is a fascinating subject, too
Have you read michael newton's book? Best books ever!

Not deliberatly singling you out, Aranuk - but you're saying the interesting stuff that's inspiring me to return comment