Theos-Talk Archives (October 2001 Message tt00235)

Tuesday, October 16, 2001

Dear Peter:

I agree with what you have written on Karma and to the
definitions (several) that are implied. There is the KARMA
collectivized of a Universe, a Galaxy, a Solar System, an Earth,
a "race," a "family" and of an individual thinking human. It
centers around the concept that the "UNIVERSE EXISTS FOR THE SAKE
OF THE SOUL'S EXPERIENCE." Patanjali pp 24-5.

Apparently Karma and the Mind that generates ideas and
impressions go hand in hand. But the Mind is the regulator and
controller of the Passions and Desires (Kama) The control of
these leads to "good" Karma. The loss of control, may lead to
"bad" karma for the individual.

I also like the one that states that Karma "is an emanation of
beings." I assume that it comes into being as a result of
choice.

I also like the concept that Karma is carried by the "Skandhas."
These being affected either precipitate the result of their
imprinting immediately or slowly over what appears t us to be a
very great lapse of years when we have forgotten the imprinting,
or even after several life-times when only the imperishable Ego
"remembers."

H.P.Blavatsky in TRANSMIGRATION OF THE LIFE ATOMS [ BLAVATSKY:
Collected Works (TPH) 5 p. 110; and U L T H P B Articles II
249 ] speaks to the latter method -- the reassembly in and to the
perpetrator of the impressions he had made on those "elementary"
Monads of lesser experience. The plane of their action is that
of the Kaka-rupa, she says -- the body of desires.

I hope this is of help,

Dal

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-----Original Message-----
From: Peter Merriott [mailto:nous@btinternet.com]
Sent: Tuesday, October 16, 2001 1:27 PM
To: theos-talk@yahoogroups.com
Subject: RE: Theos-World Karma

Dear Mic, Dal, Jerry & Louis (the list is getting longer!)

I agree with much of what you have all said. However I would
like to add
some further points. Two in fact. First, I think that generally
speaking
we tend to use the term "Karma" in two different ways, and its
important to
distiguish between them.

One way to use the term "Karma" is when we are referring to the
"Law of
Karma" ie that law of harmony which adjusts cause and effect.

The other way we use the term is when we are referring to the
pending
effects of those causes we have set in motion in the
past/present; or those
effects acting in the present as a result of past causes set in
motion by
ourselves. This is what we call our personal or collective
Karma. (In a
sense, our present personality is a bundle of our current Karma.)

HPB uses both meanings of the term Karma in the following
passage:

"Karma is simply action, a contatenation of causes and effects.
That which
adjusts each effect to its direct cause, that which guides
invisibly and as
unerringly these effects to choose, as the field of their
operation, the
right person in the right place, is what we call Karmic Law." (CW
XI 144)

But she goes on to point out that Karmic Law is not God dishing
out rewards
and punishments. As far as 'personal Karma' is concerned this
impersonal
law is driven and guided by our own actions.

S.D. I 304-5 :

"This Law--whether conscious or unconscious--presdetines nothing
and no one.
It exists from and in Eternity, truly, for it is ETRNITY itself ;
and as
such, as no act can be co-equal with eternity, it cannot be said
to act, for
it is ACTION itself."

"it is not the wave that drowns a man, but the personal action of
the
wretch, who goes deliberately and places himself under the
impersonal action
of the laws that govern the ocean's motions "

"Karma creates nothing, nor does it design. It is the man that
plans and
creates causes, and the karmic Law adjusts the effects ; which
adjustment is
not an act, but universal harmony, tending ever to resume its
original
postion, like a bough, which bent down too forcibly, rebounds
with
corrresponding vigour. It it dislocates the arm that tried to
bend it out of
its natural position, shall we say that it is the bough that
broke our arm,
or our own folly has brought us to grief ?"

The second thought I would like to suggest is that we mustn't
limit our
understanding of the Law of Karma to the level of personality.
In other
words, it may be true to say that potentially it is possible to
act without
creating 'personal Karma' ('good' or 'bad') if we can act
altuistically but
that does not mean that the Law of Karma ceases to exist or that
there is
not other kinds of Karma besides the 'personal' kind.

In the Mahatma Letters we find the Mahatma KH writing:

"We have several sorts of Karma and Nirvana in their various
applications --
to the Universe, the world, Devas, Buddhas, Bodhisatwas, men and
animals --
the second including its seven kingdoms. Karma and Nirvana are
but two of
the seven great MYSTERIES of Buddhist metaphysics; and but four
of the seven
are known to the best orientalists, and that very imperfectly."
(Letter No.
16)

We might well assume that Devas and especially Buddhas do not
have
personalities, as such. The personality and its sense of
seperateness
having been destroyed by those who have attain Buddhahood.

In the Secret Doctrine we find that even the Dhyan Chohans, the
Planetary
Spirits are subject to Karma. (Interestingly, the Mahatma also
point out in
another letter that when Gautama first reached Nirvana and
attained the
highest Adeptship attainable on this planet he became a Planetary
Spirit.

The Mahatma also refers in general terms to the Karma of
Planetary Spirits
when He writes:

"....after the completion of the great cycle: either a long
Nirvana of Bliss
(unconscious though it be in the, and according to, your crude
conceptions);
after which -- life as a Dhyan Chohan for a whole Manvantara, or
else
"Avitchi Nirvana" and a Manvantara of misery and Horror as a ----
you must
not hear the word nor I -- pronounce or write it. But "those"
have nought to
do with the mortals who pass through the seven spheres. The
collective Karma
of a future Planetary is as lovely as the collective Karma of
a ---- is
terrible. Enough. I have said too much already."
Letter No. 23b

I think the Karma we talk of (ie the so called 'good' or 'bad')
in relation
to the personality is important yet quite exoteric. It is far
more complex
than that.

...Peter