Week 6 Lab

Storybook Research

My storybook theme is karma. I have a basic idea of what karma is, but I want to know more about how exactly karma works and how it is calculated, so that will be the focus of my research here.


(Krishna tell Gota to Arjuna, Source: Wikipedia)

  • This article points out that Karma creates a consequence for that person "at some time in the future" which could be in that same lifetime or another. A possible angle for a story could be looking at karmic debts that were clearly paid off in that lifetime, and creating new consequences for actions that were not paid off that will carry into their next life. My first thought was the 5 husbands story where she prayed for a husband 5 times, but the consequence of 5 husbands was fulfilled in her next life, not her current one. 
  • "Karma is concerned not only with the relationship between actions and consequences, but also the moral reasons or intentions behind actions, according to a 1988 article in the journal Philosophy East and West." This means when Rama went after the deer, the karma is complicated because he had good intentions of fulfilling Sita's desire for the deer. 

  • "Basically, the Law of Karma states that every action you take will have an equal reaction. In Hinduism, this concept is explained through a garden metaphor: if you plant wholesome seeds, you will grow wholesome fruit."
  • "Basically, your actions can be categorized in two ways. Either they are wholesome, or they are unwholesome. Try not to conflate these terms with ''good'' and ''evil''; that sort of dichotomy doesn't hold up as well in Hinduism. An action is wholesome if it has positive effects in the world, while it is unwholesome if it they are negative."
  • Example: "if you start stealing, then you become dishonest, your neighbors will stop trusting you, friends will abandon you, and you could end up alone and miserable."
  • If you get enough unwholesome karma it will carry into your next life
Kauai's Hindu Monastery
  • Not remembering past lives is a natural protection to guard us from reliving past traumas, but we are still a cumulation of past lives.
  • There is sum karma that applies to groups of people, like family, community, nation, race, and religion.
  • Karma is not determinism 
Bhagavad Gita
  • This story in the Mahabharata keeps popping up in research. For further research I could read different versions of this to see what it says about karma. 






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