Good karma is pouring tea attentively.  Bad karma is pouring tea
inattentively.

The transition from inattentive to attentive is a thing we do not cause but
by stopping allow to happen.

Good karm might result in a calm zendo and bad karma might result in a mess
or a burn, but that's incidental at the time of pouring.



 please clarify chris....merle



To share another perspective,  in Soto Zen sometimes Karma is just dealt
with as "action" - no reference to an idea about the past or about the
future.  Each action is complete, with no idea about self or other, harm is
done or balance attained,  whatever. Violence hurts reality.   Some
body/minds may not be aware of the harm.  True.
On Jan 4, 2013 6:35 PM, "Merle Lester" <[email protected]> wrote:




bill.... funny that i never was into the karma thing..

.never could understand folk who repeated it like a mantra..and they really
had no idea what they were referring to.

..yes just is..buddha nature..no karma no free will..just is..in the
awakened state...
much appreciated bill...
trust your new year has began with much joy..merle


Merle,

Joe had a more detailed explanation in his post on this subject. In that
post Joe wrote: "In the awakened state, karma and free will are moot, and
do not operate." That's very close to my understanding of karma and free
will, but using Joe's sentence structure as a model I will elaborate my
opinion further:

When in the awakened state (realizing Buddha Nature) there is no karma nor
free will, there is Just THIS! - only Buddha Nature. Karma and free will
can only exist as illusions in a dualistic state that also supports the
illusions of self, actions, time and cause-and-effect. When in this
dualistic state that generates illusions, you may certainly have the
illusions of karma and free will or even predestination. The number and
quality of illusions you are able to generate is seemingly numberless.

The difference between the way Joe and I expressed our understanding of
karma and free will is that Joe implies they do exist, but "in the awakened
state" they are moot (have no effect, are inconsequential). My position is
they do not exist but are illusory, and only can have an illusory effect on
you when you create/believe in them in a dualistic state. An example would
be a Christian believing he/she has sinned and as a result feels guilty
(and at that point my actually feel like they are already in Hell).

Hope this helps clarify my position.

...Bill!

--- In [email protected], Merle Lester wrote:
>
>
>
> Â please clarify bill...merle
> Â
> Suresh,
>
> My answer to your question about karma is: there is no karma and free
will does exist. IMO the concept of karma is illusory and is just a part of
Buddhist dogma, similar to concepts of sin/redemption and heaven/hell in
Christianity.
>
> ...Bill!
>
> --- In [email protected], SURESH JAGADEESAN wrote:
> >
> > Dear all,
> >
> > "Buddhism teaches that it is due to Ignorance, Hatred, and Greed."
> >
> > Now if we take this case of Delhi rape, why was that 23 year old girl
> > had to suffer like this and die after 13 days of pain. Watching films
> > in night and returning with your boyfriend is common in any country.
> > It is an everyday activity in most of the cities. So that girl had not
> > done some grave mistake.
> >
> > So why innocents were suffer? If I ask this, then all of you will
> > tell, this may be due to past karma. When `Karma' is quoted no
> > question can be asked. If `karma' is quoted, then your words
> > `Ignorance, Hatred, and Greed' all become meaningless, because it is
> > due to my karma, I am ignorant, or it is due to karma I am hatred or
> > it is due to karma I am greed.
> >
> > What is truth? `Karma'? or no karma? Or in other words is there free
> > will exist? Or there is no free will?
> >
> > Best wishes
> > Suresh
> >
> >
> > --
> > Thanks and best regards
> > J.Suresh
> > New No.3, Old No.7,
> > Chamiers road - 1st Lane,
> > Alwarpet,
> > Chennai - 600018
> > Ph: 044 42030947
> > Mobile: 91 9884071738
> >
>










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