The Law of Karma

Western criticism of karma

The Western world has raised several objections to the Law of Karma. Some of these objections are as follows:

The Law of Karma justifies wrongs of this world by making weak people responsible for their own suffering: The idea that suffering in this life should be the consequence of actions in past lives is a very problematic issue for many thinkers of our time. The reason is that it raises a lot of questions as to who is responsible for all the suffering in this world. The most apparent objection to this thought is probably that one can make the inference that the poor and sick of the Western world themselves are to blame for all their problems. Or put in an ultra liberal way: "Every man is the architect of his own fortune". This reasoning conflicts with the fundamental ideas of socialism, as it claims that the causes of all suffering in the world may be ascribed to the injustices of society.

According to the previous paragraph, there is both individual and collective karma intervening in the life of each individual. And as every human being develops a collective karma when being together with his fellow men, the life of each individual cannot be separated from that of society. Thus, it is difficult to make a correct estimate of individual guilt.

It can be added that people who don’t participate in relieving misery when they see it, will meet the consequences of that action. Alice A. Bailey state: "Such is human integration today that it is not possible for any person or groups of people to isolate themselves away from human activities and human welfare. Nor is a negative attitude adequate to the solution of the present world crisis. Those who refuse to share in the world karma and pain will find their entire progress inevitably slowed down, for they will have put themselves outside the great tide of spiritual force now sweeping in regenerating streams throughout the world of men. ". (Discipelship in the new age I, p. 771)

Poverty is mainly caused by collective karma, by what we could call national selfishness, that hits the weakest members of the society. The responsibility of poor people is to fight for the same social and political rights that Western society has achieved. And we – the people of the Western societies - have an obligation to help them in that struggle.

The Law of Karma is without mercy. There is no possibility of forgiveness.
The Law of Karma is not a doctrine of "An eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth". When a man regrets his actions and takes effective measures to reform himself, his painful karma is resolved.

The gospels are full of statements by Jesus , that indicates that karma was a reality for him: "Afterward Jesus findeth him in the temple, and said unto him, Behold, thou art made whole: sin no more, lest a worse thing come unto thee." Joh. 5,1-9 His disease was caused by sin that demanded repentance, if not something worse was to happen. This is a clear example of the activity of karma.

According to the Tibetan: "no man is ever put into circumstances which are insurmountable, once he has reached the point where he has intelligently put himself on the side of evolution , or of God. Prior to that he may, and will, be driven by the gales of circumstance; the press of group and racial karma will force him into situations necessary for the process of awakening him to his own innate possibilities." (Alice A. Bailey, Cosmic Fire. 946)

The Law of Karma is determinism; man cannot do anything to change his destiny. The Law of Karma is often interpreted as being deterministic and subject to fate in the sense that all things happening in the world are the results of past actions against which man can do nothing. However, the Law of Karma is not deterministic. On the contrary, it stimulates the development of the free will. It is also true that it decides such circumstances and situations that the individual and nations must relate to, but it does not decide how we as human beings react to these circumstances.