Why do bad things happen to good people? (The intricacies of karma)

Some see karma as some form of fatalism, where our destiny is fixed, and we don’t have free will, but this is a misunderstanding. Karma simply means we receive back the result of our actions.

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One of the basic features of material life described in the Vedas is the law of karma, the system by which our material desires and actions produce corresponding reactions that bind us to a cycle of repeated birth and death in this world. Many understand karma as some kind of belief, but karma is just an intrinsic part of this material world. It doesn’t even have to do with God; it is simply a universal law that works automatically, just like gravity. Even if one wants to be an atheist, one has to face the results of his or her actions.

As Kṛṣṇa explains in the Gītā, no one can live in this world without acting, even for a moment. Some actions are performed out of desire, some kind of work we perform in the hope of obtaining a certain result, and others are performed out of necessity, just to maintain the material body. As Kṛṣṇa explains, no one can refrain from doing something, not even for a moment. According to the quality of our actions, we receive certain results. When we perform pious actions, we receive back good material facilities, take birth in comfortable situations, and so on, while one who just causes suffering to others receives the same in return.

Some see karma as some form of fatalism, where our destiny is fixed, and we don’t have free will, but this is a misunderstanding. Karma simply means we receive back the result of our actions. The results of our past actions put us in a certain material situation, and the actions we perform from here determine our future condition. For example, choices I made in the past resulted in me having a certain kind of job, but my choices from now on determine what kind of job I will have in the future. I may perform my work well and be promoted, I may become lax and end up being fired, I can study to get another job, and so on.

We can see that desire is an important part of the whole system. Desire not only influences how we act but also influences how we receive the results of such actions. One can obtain what he desires, but only to the extent his karma allows. That’s the problem with books that describe the law of attraction like “The Secret”: they account for the desire factor without taking into consideration the effects of karma. That’s why it doesn’t work. Material energy is going to satisfy one’s desires only to the extent one deserves it, and the currency for that is one’s past good deeds. It’s true that one can get things according to his desire, but only to the extent his karma allows. The principle is that one has certain desires, and by obtaining the proper knowledge, he can act in certain ways and then eventually receive what he desires. Once one understands this law, he can start changing his destiny by changing his actions and consciousness.

This is a process described in the sections of the Vedas that deal with karma, and was a process well known to people who were following Vedic culture until a few thousand years ago. Even while in Vedic culture, not everyone was a devotee of Viṣnu; they all understood well the implications of the law of karma.

Even today, fragments of this knowledge survive in the culture of Eastern countries. That’s why many people in these places are vegetarian; for example, they understand that unnecessarily killing animals results in bad karmic reactions that are against their own interests.

However, there is an apparent contradiction in the law of karma. If we receive good and bad according to our actions, then why can we observe that sometimes terrible things happen to good people, and at the same time, bad people receive much more than they apparently deserve? If there is a universal law, why can we observe such inconsistencies?

The point is that karma does not interfere with free will. Even if one does something bad, it’s not that a meteor will instantly fall from the sky on his head. Every action is compared to a seed that is planted.

This karma that still didn’t fructify is called aprārabdha-karma, or karma that is still not giving fruit. This is just like a plant that is still growing. It’s there, but it is not yet producing anything. This type of karma is unnoticeable in the sense that it is not resulting in any reaction, for now. In due time, these plants fructify and become prārabdha-karma, or karma that has already fructified and is now giving fruit. This is the category of karma we are experiencing the results of right now.

There is thus a maturation process for every action we perform. The fruits don’t come instantly, but they come in due time. This delay allows the existence of free will, since people have the freedom to pursue certain activities according to their desires without immediately suffering the consequences, but the reactions will catch up with them in the future, just like someone who is loaning money now will have to pay it back later. Life presents us with a set of choices, and we are free to make our choices according to our desires, but once we make a choice, we commit to receiving the results of such a choice later on.

One who is committing violence or performing dishonest acts now may not be aware that in due time these acts will fructify and result in unpalatable reactions, but such reactions will come in due time, be later in this same life, or in future lives. Similarly, one who is performing pious acts now may not notice any instantaneous change, but the results will eventually come. Therefore, good persons may be suffering now because of some bad deeds they performed in the past, and bad persons who are now enjoying good fortune are just reaping the results of some good deeds they performed previously. Since all of us perform a mixture of good and bad deeds, we all experience a mixture of happiness and distress. The difference is that the pious person is creating a brighter path for himself, while the bad person is creating a dark future, which will ultimately just result in suffering. That’s why many prefer to believe that everything ends with death, and there is nothing beyond that: they don’t want to be held accountable for their actions. However, being an automatic law, karma does not take into account what one may believe or not; it just acts mechanically, just like one who puts his hand into the fire will burn it, regardless of his personal beliefs.

There is, however, another factor related to karma: it acts only while one is conditioned, or in other words, only as long as one’s consciousness is absorbed in matter. Just like clouds may cover someone who is on the ground but not someone capable of going high in the sky, karma acts only as long as our consciousness is grounded in matter. As we elevate our consciousness, karma starts to act less over us, and when we attain a transcendental platform, karma stops completely. In the transcendental platform, there is contact with Kṛṣṇa, who is just like a sun that dissipates the darkness of the influence of karma and the modes of material nature. Even simple spiritual activities, like offering obeisances to the deity or abstaining from grains on the ekādaśī days, can have profound transformational effects on our karma.

The way to elevate our consciousness is by acquiring transcendental knowledge and following a spiritual process. That’s why the Vedas include so many books, covering from the most elementary to the most elevated knowledge.

In the Bhagavad-gītā, for example, Krsna describes successively more advanced processes of yoga that work as a ladder that starts with pious life and progresses with the processes of karma-yoga, jñana-yoga, and aṣṭāṅga-yoga (which leads one to Brahman or Paramātmā realization) and culminates in bhakti-yoga, which leads to the ultimate goal of Bhagavān realization.

As Kṛṣṇa explains in the Gītā:

“Just fix your mind upon Me, the Supreme Personality of Godhead, and engage all your intelligence in Me. Thus you will live in Me always, without a doubt. My dear Arjuna, O winner of wealth, if you cannot fix your mind upon Me without deviation, then follow the regulative principles of bhakti-yoga. In this way develop a desire to attain Me.
If you cannot practice the regulations of bhakti-yoga, then just try to work for Me, because by working for Me you will come to the perfect stage. If, however, you are unable to work in this consciousness of Me, then try to act giving up all results of your work and try to be self-situated. If you cannot take to this practice, then engage yourself in the cultivation of knowledge. Better than knowledge, however, is meditation, and better than meditation is renunciation of the fruits of action, for by such renunciation one can attain peace of mind.” (Bg 12.8-12)

Karma affects the souls who have forgotten their spiritual nature and are now trying to lord over this material world. As we remember our original spiritual nature and start to act on the spiritual platform, we elevate ourselves over the clouds of karma.

This stage is called jīvanmukta, where one is already liberated, although still living in this world. In such a stage, the stored karma is destroyed, and he has only to wait for the effects of the prārabdha, or fructified karma, to finish. This delay allows this enlightened soul to remain for some time in this world and thus illuminate others. Due to this arrangement, a devotee continues living in this world until his body expires, even after attaining perfection.

Why is it that one has to continue living in this world for some time even after becoming liberated, still reaping the fruits of his prārabdha-karma? Why not go back to Godhead immediately?

There are two reasons. The first is that pure devotional service is achieved after the stage of liberation. Although we practice devotional service starting from the first day, the result of this preliminary devotional service is to elevate us to the platform of liberation. After we achieve this platform, real devotional service starts, which brings us to the platform of love of Godhead. This means that liberation is just a step on the way: even after becoming liberated, a devotee still needs time to perfect his devotional service. A second reason is that while perfecting their devotional service, these devotees can teach others.

One who is fixed in the devotional platform becomes active in serving the Lord and teaching others about Him, helping them to attain the same stage. These activities are the basis for the system of paramparā that Krsna describes in the third chapter of the Bhagavad-gītā. One may not be perfect when receiving transcendental knowledge from the spiritual master, but by practicing and teaching this knowledge without change in the essence, one gradually realizes it and is elevated to the highest platform. Later, one gets his or her own students, who may not be perfect at the beginning but also gradually progress and later on also become perfect, teaching their own students and thus maintaining the chain generation after generation.

In the Gītā (7.3), Krsna says that, “Out of many thousands among men, one may endeavor for perfection, and of those who have achieved perfection, hardly one knows Me in truth.” By spreading the glories of the Lord, we become one of the rare transcendentalists who attain this platform. As He also explains in texts 18.68-69, “For one who explains this supreme secret to the devotees, pure devotional service is guaranteed, and at the end he will come back to Me. There is no servant in this world more dear to Me than he, nor will there ever be one more dear.”

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