Karma

Divine Life Society Publication: The Study and Practice of Yoga by Sri Swami Krishnananda

The reaction of the mind in respect of objects, producing the potency of karma, has a past, a present and a future. The past, the present and the future also are illusions, just as the form of an object is an illusion. It is the inability of the mind to comprehend every circumstance at one stroke that is the reason for the belief in past, present and future. There is no such thing as that. Who has made this compartment of past, present and future? There are no such compartments. They are only notions of the mind in respect of certain kinds of experience. There is a pattern, which the mind then compartmentalises due to the notion of the objects which are in space and time. Space, time and motion, we may say, are the causes of this idea in the mind of past, present and future. It is really not true that time has such compartments; it is a continuous duration. Yet the past is kept outside the sight of the mind, and the future is also unknown because of the intense attachment of the mind to a particular group of karmas which are called the ‘present’.

The force of the karma is the cause of this generalisation of the mind – namely, the experiences of the past, the present and the future. It is not enough if we tackle the present merely, as the problems are not created by present factors only. The past has left an impression which is causing trouble even in the present, and as a potency, it will produce further trouble in the future. For karma, there is no past, present and future; it is only for us that it exists. For this universal law of karma, there is no such thing as time limitation. It can work at any time, in any way, when circumstances are favourable.

Hence, the checking of the forces of karma implies the checking of its very roots, whether they are past, present or future. Also, we should not be complacent under the notion that what we are thinking today is the total thought of our mind and that we have to deal only with these thoughts. What we are thinking today is very little, because we cannot remember what we thought yesterday and what we experienced a few years before. Also, we have no idea of what is stored for us in the future. This is a very great difficulty before the mind that it mistakes only the present circumstances for the total reality.

In one place in the Bhagavadgita it has been mentioned that this kind of knowledge is the worst kind of knowledge, where the limited present alone is regarded as the total reality, and the past and the future are ignored totally so that anything that is outside – not inside – the location of the present circumstances is regarded as unreal. Yat tu kṛtsnavad ekasmin kārye saktam ahaitukam; atattvārthavad alpaṁ ca tad tāmasam udāhṛtam (B.G. XVIII.22): Tamasic knowledge, the lowest kind of knowledge, is that which concentrates itself on a particular object only and hangs upon it as if it is the total reality, ignoring every other thing, every other cause or factor which is responsible even for the existence of this object.

Thus, the power of karma is universal; it is not only in one place. It is in the past, it is in the present and it is in the future. This way in which karma works in a universal manner can be checked only by application of a universal method. An individual puny creature cannot tackle this karma. We have to raise ourselves to the status of that capacity to deal with this universal feature which is called the karmic force. Rather, we have to become universal persons before we can face this universal problem. It is not a question to be solved by one individual. And when we are able to face it, we are not any more individuals – we are something more than that. Therefore it is that the yoga system again and again emphasises the need for the individual to raise itself to the status of that particular level of experience with which yoga deals. When we are merely small individuals, we cannot deal with a cosmic problem. We deal only with problems which are commensurate with our present level, and then we go step by step. These are the stages of yoga – the eight limbs of yama, niyama, asana, pranayama, dharana, dhyana and samadhi – which are only stages of the confronting of the problem at different levels of experience.

The tackling of the problem of karma is almost the last thing that we can do when we become universally capable of dealing with every difficulty by proper adjustment of ourselves with that circumstance it has created at that particular level. It again amounts to saying that we have to raise ourselves to an impersonal state gradually; and yoga is nothing but that. Ultimately, we have to become the most impersonal of things – that is purusha. Purusha is not a man. It is the impersonal Reality, and that is the goal of yoga; and we are moving towards it, we are approximating towards it, we are tending towards it, we are aspiring for it, and our aim is only that. Therefore, every step in our effort is a purification of ourselves towards this higher impersonality – though it comes gradually. This sutra – atīta anāgataṁ svarūpataḥ asti adhvabhedād dharmāṇām (IV.12) – tells us that there is a need to deal with karma in all its aspects.

Also, we have noted that karma is not an object; it is the way in which things act. The action and reaction among things is called karma. Our standing outside this action-reaction process is the reason why we get caught up in it. The world has been regarded by us as an external object and,therefore, thelaw of karma acts upon us and binds us. When we become more and more harmonious with the world, which is what is intended in samyama, ultimately, we become more and more harmonious with the object. Ultimately, there is utter harmony, equality of status – a merger of one with the other.

When this harmony gets established, gradually, in greater and greater degrees, the force of karma diminishes in intensity. This is because there is no such thing as karma except prakriti itself acting, the world itself operating – that is called karma. Because we stand outside it as helpless creatures, it is acting upon us forcefully, as if we are subjected to it. Yoga is that technique by which we are raised, gradually, to a greater form of approximation to this world law, which is the law of karma, so that it will not act upon us because we become harmonious with it. For this attainment is the practice of samyama which has been mentioned in various ways in the earlier sutras.

Excerpts from: Karma - The Study and Practice of Yoga by Sri Swami Krishnananda