Is there such a thing as indirect and direct karma?

Question

An example of direct karma would be if someone murdered someone, then obviously the cops would come and that person is going to go to prison.

An example of indirect karma would be if you were with a friend driving on the highway, then the car has a tire blowout and you both are seriously injured.

Basically, can karma from other people affect you? Could this be considered indirect karma or is all karma entwined?

Answer 1

Yea I think so.. Be a a$$hole all your life; it will catch up to you one day..

Answer 2

No, you can only get your own karma. There is no hereditary karma as such. You and your friend might have done same or similar things either together or at different occasions, that's why you two experienced the same result.

Answer 3

There is "shared" karma and "individual" karma but otherwise karma is karma.

Other people's karma can't affect you except in the sense that you share the same rebirth in a world that the causes and conditions exist that you caused by your own past actions. If you have the karma to be injured, when that blowout happens you're going to be injured.

It's like the tale of the 4 guys in the boat speeding under a low overpass, three guys lose their heads and "something" made the one guy duck at the last second and he didn't lose his head. Or all the people on one plane are killed except for one or two survivors.

Answer 4

The first poster is right ... there is no good karma or bad karma, there's just karma. Karma is just the principle of reaping what you sow ... cause and effect. When you pay off your karmic debts, you get to jump off the cycle of samsara ... you no longer have to come back and try to get things right. Some proponents of reincarnation believe that you only come back as a human, once you've made it that far. Other beliefs say you can be reborn into a lower realm of existence, including the animal realm. Still others say being reborn into those realms is purely metaphorical. But to answer your question to the best of my knowledge ... an ant would have no self-consciousness, but it could still suffer as a result of past karmic deeds when it existed as a higher being. A kid could burn up the ant under a magnifying glass, its anthill could get squashed by someone's tires, or it could become an anteater's breakfast. Stuff like that. You pay off those debts and then work your way back up the reincarnation food chain, so to speak. I don't believe in any of this, but I know a little about it from having studied Hinduism and (mainly) Buddhism.

Answer 5

That's a pretty good question. I believe that karma is meant for the individual. If it's not meant to be then it's not meant to be. People who go through things together for some reason have a reason why they are going through that together. So I don't believe other peoples karma can effect you, no.

Answer 6

Hello =)

On more than one occasion, the Buddha expounded a doctrine of "Individual Karma, and Common Karma".

Individual Karma is the result of your own actions, of course, but is much more complicated than you have illustrated above.

Common Karma, is something that affects a group of people, based upon their association, or membership, in a group, or nation, by their acquiescence. This is best described as this:

You are a Republican, and you voted for George Bush, and later, it is apparent that Bush has violated your trust, and is actually causing harm and death to persons in the world. Since you voted for him, you share in some of the responsibility, and hence, some of the negative Karma. At least some of the blood on his hands, is also on yours, even though you do not approve of his actions now. This is common, or collective, Karma. It is not as potent as Individual Karma, but still, you owe a debt of retribution for it.

So, it is less "lethal", in terms of Karma to be associated with a murderer, than it is to murder directly. But neither is acceptable. Thus, those who do vote, must do so with EXTREME prejudice, as not to imperil their own Karma.

From my perspective, as a Buddhist, it is best not to vote at all. This however can bring about its own negative Karma, if, for example, my vote would have kept an evil man out of office.

Namaste,

--Tom

Answer 7

A tire blowing out on the car is, unforseen circumstances, not Karma. The other is called - Premeditated Murder, not Karma.

Answer 8

Basically Karma is Karma

Answer 9

Indirect karma is hereditary, so to speak. It's kind of like us having to pay for Adam & Eve's sin, even though we weren't directly involved.

Direct karma is what we are doing now.

Yes, I would say we are getting indirect karma of all mankind too.

The concept of indirect is that we have no actual power but by virtue of being connected to or sourced by something we are a part of it, and thus the actions of that entity are indirectly ours.

Answer 10

That's a good question, karma is not a reward or retribution but
only balancing life force flow,that is in direct proportion to what
an individual gave out, so I would think only direct would apply

Answer 11

yes. karma can be direct (from your actions) or indirect (from your intentions)