Karma Quotes

“He believed fully that whatever suffering we experience is due to our own doing, and not due to a divine hand. Therefore, the pacification of suffering is also in our own hands. This was his idea of karma.”
― Traleg Kyabgon, Karma: What It Is, What It Isn't, Why It Matters

“Buddha teaches that there are many causes and many conditions and always refers to causes and conditions in the plural, never just as cause and effect. We are presented with a very complex picture of how things work.”
― Traleg Kyabgon, Karma: What It Is, What It Isn't, Why It Matters

“What we do as individuals in daily life will affect not just us but other people, the world at large, and even the universe. At”
― Traleg Kyabgon, Karma: What It Is, What It Isn't, Why It Matters

“Nevertheless, critiques of karma often center on this notion of individual responsibility and suggest it produces an unsympathetic attitude toward others and leads to a dubious tendency to blame. The poor are blamed for being poor, and so on. Buddhism is said, falsely, to assign fault to individuals for all their circumstances and to deny agency. If we are poor, for instance, it might be thought, more or less automatically, that we will stay that way until our karmic debt runs out, and then, after we die, we may then be reborn in fortunate circumstances, becoming a wealthy entrepreneur perhaps. This type of thinking cannot be reconciled with Buddhism’s emphasis on the interconnectedness of all things though, which fully acknowledges the fertile complexity of influences on persons, including their environment.”
― Traleg Kyabgon, Karma: What It Is, What It Isn't, Why It Matters

“There are some additional cultural problems to be overcome in discussing karma in the modern context, as we have stopped talking about ethical issues altogether, not just specifically issues around karma, but ethics generally. There is an ever-increasing level of discussion around rights and justice, and who is entitled to what, and who deserves a share of such-and-such, but very little about how we should behave and treat each other, and how we should live together, and why.”
― Traleg Kyabgon, Karma: What It Is, What It Isn't, Why It Matters

“The prevalent idea that karma is a superstitious or archaic belief probably stems from the simplified versions of the idea that emerged from old-world Asia. In poor conditions, among uneducated people, the Buddha’s teachings were usually delivered very simply. People in such circumstances tend to express their wish to create good karma by making ritual offerings to ordained members of the sangha, or by worshipping Buddha images, or by doing circumambulations of Buddhist shrines and reliquaries, or by feeding the poor, and so on. In a modern context, karma tends to be associated predominantly with this type of generalization, again invoking the primitive, superstitious image.”
― Traleg Kyabgon, Karma: What It Is, What It Isn't, Why It Matters