karma is righteous actions and dharma is righteous duty. did i read this right and in hinduism is there a righteous action that is not a duty? What is the relationship between karma and dharma?
karma is thoughts and deeds. further classified as good karma and bad karma. its believed to be nature's/god's fixing of accountability on who indulge in that. you are right about dharma. intensity of a same karma varies when one does it for personal gain & when does it as part of his dharma. murder is a bad karma but when done as per dharma (eg soldiers) to save others it would not be that bad, but still bad. hinduism/buddhism insist doing good karma itself is one's duty-dharma. but it also happens, like in any other religion, some people define their own dharma and justify their karmas as good. In abrahamic religions the reaping happens on judgement day and thereafter, in hiduism/buddhism the reaping happens in this birth and/or in succeeding births. there is no eternal hell/heaven in hinduism/buddhism. one of the unwanted side effects of karma theory is exploitation by caste discrimination. simply, good karma and dharma are righteous thoughts&deeds and righteous way.
Karma supposed to mean the cause-effect relationships similar to as you sow, so shall you reap. Somehow Karma also got connected with Yoga to mean that if you choose to have a path such as say a teacher or be a blacksmith and do your job according to the social standards, best practices - you can reach your destiny in the after life. This means that you will have hopefully a stable life as long as the society does arround you. THe Karma as in Karmic cycle is that cause-effect which is part of the laws of the universe. The butterfly effect is in full force here. Navigating through that Chaos-Order cycle is difficult.
I didn't think there was good karma and bad karma, just karma, the word itself encompassing the whole actions and consequences process as a singular. ie stealing a car then crashing it, injuring yourself, is karma. and i thought dharma was simply the word for the universal life force? I'm probably wrong on both counts but thats my impression!
- I may be making a jump here, but i thought karma was the connection we have to our lives lived in samsara, so wouldn't all karma be essentially negative?
"dharma and karma" doctrine is central part of authoritarianism. for the former is 'DUTY' (expected), and latter is what happens if you dont DO it of course i can see how actions may effect one in this life. say you drink lots of alcohol. the LIKLIHOOD is that you will more dependent on it, and may end up an ahbitual user, and end in a degrading mess and also do your liver in. If you eat too much sugar and salt--not good int long run, etc etc ANYone with savvy can get this. but what the opportinistic-authoritarians did/do is use that to propigate a doctrine that says that if you suffer in this life--due to poverty, disablment, etc then that is due to bad karma from a past life. Thus the then dont have to take any responsibility for any inhumane culture which favours the rich and their 'GOOD' karma. this idea has what has happened in India with its terrible poverty, and the ignoreing of it by the "higher castes" going about doing their "dharma"
