Karma and Grace

[Dharmavidya]

I would like to outline here a basic issue in Buddhism which may repay some thought. I will simply outline the issue and invite comment as I think we could have some valuable discussion. The issue is this.

If everything that I am and everything that ever happens to a person is a product of their own inexorable karma, how is it possible for one person to help another - and, by extension, how is it possible for the buddhas to help us?

Or, if the help that we give to one another is the important thing and, par excellence, the help that we receive from the buddhas is the most important thing in life, over-riding personal effort toward salvation, what happens to karma and personal responsibility?

This is one of the age-old questions of Buddhism. What do you think about it?

[GH Ho]

I would like to contribute to this discussion so that I could be corrected if I am wrong.

To me, past karma has been created by ourselves inadvertently.. well before we realise the best way to practise, and to me it is Amita's way.

In order that we do not create more karma especially bad ones in this life we have to follow a way and the way has been expounded by Siddharta Buddha in the Sutra called Amita Sutra when he spoke of Amita Buddha even without any questions from his disciples..

It is true that each individual has their own past karma to repay either in this life or next. As practitioners of Amita Buddhism, we hope to be able to stop creating more karma that we may have to continue to repay as we undergo the cycle of birth and death. When we undergo an experience, be it a suffering or a pleasure in this present life, we have to take it as repayment for past karma and let it pass with equaminity.

To follow the teachings of attaining the six perfections, and using the chanting of Amita 's name we will be helped in our practice to attain the six perfections and thus liberate ourselves from the cycle of birth and death We will also create an affinity with Amita Buddha and all the other Buddhas .

When we are able to liberate ourselves, then we will be able to help other sentient beings to achieve their goals and it is when this happens that the other buddhas or boddhisatvas will come to to our aid. .. This is when unexplained things happen to the individual..

Other persons will also experience their past karma as they go through life but some appear to have an easier affinity to the Buddha teachings than others.. why? certainly,their past karma is the determining factor. As practitioners if we can liberate ourselves from our own past karma and overcome all the karmic obstructions, then only can we help other sentient beings. If it may not be this life, I hope at least in the next life . And to be reborn in Pureland certainly will helps. Cheers.

[Bhaktika]

This question interests me - draws me in, even though as an age old question it may be unanswerable.
The question seems to invite us to identify with being a helper or being helped. As an alternative, we can focus on the act of 'helping' - two or more people engaged in something that could be called helping - perhaps based on an intention, with an unknown consequence. At any one moment someone can identify as a helper and another as helped, but this is not fixed, in an instant it can change. I thought I was helping but realise I am being helped.

The question then becomes "Is helping a Buddhist activity?" There is a lot of evidence that the Buddha both helped others and was helped, so yes. One may ask "Why help?" It seems to be an important human activity, as aspect of our culture, our belonging - one way that love manifests.

That we are limited and fallible and can never know in advance the consequences of our actions does not change this - we do what we can. As a Buddhist I do not believe in an Almighty, all knowing God, so I don't expect or seek this. Buddha is not infallible, but is an all embracing loving presence, which inspiries me to trust the process - and to notice when my expectations risk derailing me. Getting attached to roles seems to be a problem behind the question.

I wonder if I even understand the question, but appreciate that it is being asked.

Bhaktika

[Susthama]

Hi Marie,

I found what you wrote interesting and wondered if the identification of helper could be a result of one's karma or whether that was an act of grace?

[Susthama]

I liked the link Bhaktika made between the act of helping and a manifestation of love. To me this speaks of something different from karma which I feel is an important variable in this equation of merit, debt, which may or may not lead to a better rebirth.

Personally, my sense is that the help we receive from the Buddhas is totally separate and different from Karma. What we receive has nothing to do with karma but is instead the Buddha's Dharma coming into our life. The nature of help or 'love' received from the Buddhas is eternal and absolute and when it's received it is 'par excellence' because of its power to transcend all dimensions that we know of. It brings us a vision of the realm of no suffering, no evil, no dukkha. The land in which all Buddhas dwell. Perhaps one can see this as an instance of salvation?

When we glimpse this vision or feel this power of the Buddhas love or even be open to receive the Dharma this will create karma in us and our subsequent actions. When our actions are guided by the Buddhas one could say that all subsequent actions are of a helping nature but to what end, and in what way, and how one goes about it is varied and diverse.

[Clint Davis]

All of life, dare I say "reality as it is", is a mixture of karma and grace, and sometimes the opposite of grace! I would also speculate that the universe doesn't run as neatly or as expectedly as we might want or imagine, and so the idea that somewhere, somehow, each of us will "pay!" for every one of our sins, or be paid for every one of our merits, is maybe somewhat at odds with reality. Taking the almost mathematical calculation of salvific status away from the table, we get a chance, because of grace, to truly be ourselves, to do good deeds just because they're good, not because we'll be rewarded for it, to avoid harmful activities because they are indeed that, not because we're afraid of what will happen 3 lifetimes from now. We also get the opportunity to forgive ourselves for our failures and not be in fear all the time that we'll be in deep trouble forever and ever in an endless karmic chain of suffering.
It is more than apparent to me that the idea of grace, and the rightly accompanying attitude of gratitude, is a gift from the Mayahana ancestors. We are freed to be just who we are, already, right here and now, without attainment or failure looming in our minds.

[Modgala Duguid]

Thanks clint, lovely reply
Namo amida bu
Modgala

[GH Ho]

In the course of my readings, I gather that as human beings, if we could cultivate our minds to get a state of single pointed thinking and clarity of thoughts , inadvertently, this will help us to create more positve karma than negative ones in our daily life.

Thus, the various methods of buddhist mental cultivation, like insight meditation and chanting of mantras or the buddha's name certainly help us to have this clarity of thoughts leading to purity of speech, actions and ideas. In my experience, I feel that the "fear factor" naturally becomes obliterated as mentioned in the writings of many Mahayana Buddhist teachers.

As a side discussion, I also realise there is similarity between Pureland Buddhism and Christianty and when I talk to my Christian Friends, I also tend refer to God,,,, to me meaning Amitabha Buddha although I also understand that he is not God.. Maybe you have more wisdom to comment on this?

[GH Ho]

Hello Ron

Its a real pleasure hearing from you. I really appreciate you sharing with us, your experiences . I will reflect on what you have shared and also all that we have discussed with everyone here. Then I will pick your brains again. ..Cheers..and thank you.

[John Wylder]

I've always been a little fuzzy, though, on what constitutes a "deliberate" act. If I get drunk, and drive, and run over a child on a bicycle, I didn't "deliberately" kill him, but I did set up the likely hood of it happening.

On a less, to me, obvious front, if I am simply so wrapped up in my own life that I fail to notice the people around me, if I just don't consciously register the homeless man I'm stepping over on my way to the bank, am I morally, karmically, culpable? Did I make "deliberate," if unconscious, decision not to see?

I can't help feeling that decisions made below the level of consciousness count in some way, too. Acting out of habit is no excuse.

[John Wylder]

I agree, if I did it, it counts.

Of course, I suspect that stepping on the cat at 3:00am as I stagger towards the bathroom counts differently than punting the cat down the hallway because he scratched me, but I still think the cat and I would both be happier if I didn't do either.

[Joan McCann]

I've been thinking a lot about this issue and the more that I think about it the more I find to think about and keep changing my mind. Sometimes I've been thinking that “If everything that I am and everything that ever happens to a person is a product of their own inexorable karma” that this is ok because it is also the reality that Amida accepts & loves us just as we are and through Amida's love and acceptance of us I feel it is possible for one person to help another. And that when we accept both these realities: of inexorable karma and feeling that we are loved just as we are it is possible for the Buddhas to help us because we open ourselves up to be helped.
But when I start thinking about what karma is and personal responsibility I start feeling muddled. I see karma as the consequences of my thoughts and actions, part of the mundane world, and being bonbu, much of what I think & do isn't particularly helpful and creates many karmic obstacles to seeing the sublime and I feel that grace comes from the sublime and can cut through the mundane.
So I've been thinking does this mean that when we receive help from the Buddhas to help others not everything that happens to us is a product of our karma? On the occasions that I've felt that I'm being helped it doesn't feel like anything to do with me or what I've done, my karma, but something completely different and separate - but at the same time also part of the same thing. But where does this leave personal responsibility? I notice that it's the times when I feel personally responsible that I'm not too good at helping others and when I try less hard and have faith in Amida that things seem to work better.
Namo Amida Bu

[Dharmavidya]

Well this has certainly stimulated some good reflection. I think the docrinal point is - as Joan hints - that karma is inexorable but karma is not everything - karma puts in a frame, as it were, within which there are still options - it puts up fences, but there is still a field between them. Thus we have freedom, but within parameters. However, there is also the fact that what matters from the Dharma perspective is more the quality of action than exactly what the action is. A small gift may be as effective as a big one if it comes from a good spirit of generosity. A big gift may be as unproductive as a small one if it is given resentfully. So karma is inexorable and we are still completely free in the aspect that matters.