Secular extrapolation

The Hindu orthodox schools of thought have always been geared to strict adherents. Back in the day, you had people who studied this stuff for the sake of studying it and they devoted their lives to it. You didn't dabble in it from time to time, and you certainly didn't separate it from its elements. I think it's pretty apparent that things don't work that way, especially now. It's not so practical for people to completely devote themselves to learning yoga, or saaMkhya, or taantra yoga or something. But, that doesn't mean we can't still benefit from it.

In the past century, you have a large influx of "Eastern thought" and most of that has been adapted in some secular form. "yoga" conjures up images of crazy body positions and breathing exercises, not of traditional meditation or the austere ascetic lifestyle. On the one hand, you lose some of the original meaning. This may or may not be a problem for you. On the other hand, you gain a lot of benefits, like healthier life choices. This may or may not be a plus to you. Bottom line is that this secular extrapolation and development provides many avenues for many different people. For those "soccer moms" and "serious atheletes" who love haTha yoga (deva: हठ योग), they can perform their postures. For those "intellectual students" and "introspectives" you can find plenty of meditation centers for raaja yoga (deva: राज योग).

One of the larger problems that occur with this is that many unique concepts lose their distinction. If you look at the migration of Buddhism into the US over the past sixty years or so, you can see that in many cases entire schools of Buddhism are misinterpreted. You have Zen/Chan Buddhism mixed up with Taoism, and Vipassana Buddhism often losing its core methods of meditation. Words and concepts get mixed up and infused with entirely different meanings (partially leading to my four part post on karma). You lose distinctions that are important in the context of specific schools, and while they may not be important to the people who are frequenting the monastery, it is important in the larger scheme of things. This is because as students progress, they reach important teachings which have a context. Having no context, or having the student relearn concepts integral to that context, provides a steep incline for the learning process.

It may be that for this reason, we should think of a tiered system. One tier for concepts common to all schools, and the next diverging into branches based on concepts. Not unlike how high school, college, grad school, etc. form a tiered educational system.

I'll post more on this another day. I just really feel that things need to be reorganized, or at least thought out in a better way. Secularization is not new, and it's fairly inevitable, especially with the way trends are going now. But, if we put some thought into things, we can shape it in a way that makes much more sense. If we can avoid something like this, then why not?

karma, III

karma has a lot of interesting subtleties. It's been expanded upon for a long time, but that doesn't mean we can't find modern metaphors for older concepts.

Credit for the translation of the concepts and the application of the metaphor go to my sanskrit teacher, "Dnyanada" (no last name, and in fact, she had a great story about how she got rid of it years ago, and when she came to the US, no one could comprehend the fact that she chose to not have one. The computers had a field-day with that one!).

My sophomore year at Rutgers was when I took sanskrit, and Dnyanada often went on tangents about certain tidbits of information. She took a stance against "sanskritizing" and recreating etymologies for words in modern Indian languages, for example. While these tangents didn't directly correlate with our lessons, they did provide a useful boost of interest for others in the class, but I loved the trivia.

One day in particular, she talked of karma being misused and happened to mention two interesting types of karma. Now, I don't know her sources, but she was a well-read woman and so I will take her word as a secondary source to this, especially considering just how much she knew of everything we brought up. She described how further developments on the theories of karma led to what we might in this day and age call "credit" karma and "debit" karma.

"Credit" karma is what we face when we act on something, spontaneously or not, and for which we will later reap the fruits of. Whether we're eating dairy and we're lactose-intolerant, or we're gossiping about the coworker two cubicles down, it's all credit karma here. This doesn't mean that we are acting completely originally; when it comes down to it, nearly everything is a reaction. The distinction here, however, is that the real, dominant fruits are forthcoming.

"Debit" karma, on the other hand, describes the karma "used" when we react to something. Here, we're acting from fruits we have come to acquire without having actually acted. Revenge is an excellent example. Let's say actor A does something horrible to actor B. Actor A created credit karma. Some of the fruits of this action have gone to Actor B and motivated him to seek revenge. When he finally acts, it will have been out of debit karma. This situation primarily applies when actor B did not instigate actor A, or if actor B somehow acts out on a third actor, actor C. Otherwise, it really is no different from standard reaction.

To extend the metaphor, we can act from our checking accounts or our savings accounts. If we act from our checking accounts, we are acting on karma that is marked "to spend." This is often recent karma. When we react on things that are more or less direct, then this is from checking. This applies in the above case when actor B happens to be irate from actor A's actions, but takes it out on actor C. We can say that his acting out on actor C was because he was still under the influence of A's actions. He was still angry and so it passed on this way.

For a moment, let's take a look at a completely different example. A husband gets home late from work irritated about his boss. His wife cooks him a meal, but he doesn't like it. They argue. That's from his checking karma. But, let's say his wife takes a cheap shot at him during an argument when she's right. He doesn't argue and goes along with it because, after all, she is right. A week later she argues with him about something else and she's wrong. In his anger, he suddenly remembers the lousy feeling from her comment previously. He's further infuriated by this and now he says something that crosses the line. This action is savings karma. For a week, he was not bothered by her comment, thinking that he had let it go. Then, in a separate event, that comment comes up and helps to propagate whatever he's thinking at that time. Because of the comment's dormant period, we can say that it was put into savings. Later, he remembered it and used it to fuel something else, i.e. he transferred it into his checking account before using his debit card.

Why on earth is this useful to us? Aside from being yet another tool that lets us further analyze and understand our actions, it directly calls into question our motives. Direct karma (credit karma), redirected karma (debit, checking), and forced-direct karma (debit, savings) help to explain why we do things. The danger here is not unfamiliar, however. People have a way of using whatever they can to justify their actions.

karma, however, is a law of the universe. We do not have a choice to participate or withhold in its games. No matter what actions we take, we are most definitely influencing something and that yields reactions. The benefit to us would be to see patterns and tweak our behavior to benefit us. It's fine that things go into our savings accounts. We shouldn't spend on stuff that's frivolous, though. If we're saving for something, like fuel during our workouts, or inspiration for songs, or something else that acts as a positive channel, then we're hacking the system to our benefit. And, we need to know when act and how to make it productive. And, when to let go.

I'll bet this really brings more meaning to the old adage, "Don't write a check your butt can't cash."

karma, IV

One of the more "artistic" interpretations of karma is related to choice-making.

The idea is that karma doesn't doom us to relive things just as they happened before. It makes us relive those moments in which we made a "wrong" choice, or a choice we're bound to by regret or sadness, or habit, or pleasure, and presents itself until we make a choice that frees us from this bondage.

This is definitely a modern concept of karma, and definitely not one I'd mark as "authentic," but it is very thought-provoking. It also raises a good point in that karma is not meant to be so concrete. It's not something that forces us to undergo the reciprocity of an action we previously made. And, it's something we bind ourselves to. It's more like a bias, really.

Let's take some simple: every guy named Larry you've ever met was a jerk. The next time you meet a Larry, you could assume that he's a jerk. Or, you could take a page from David Hume and take this is a separate, unrelated event, and take it as is.

If any of you have ever played Enter the Matrix, you may recall a scene between Niobe and Ghost. The weapons program loads up, they choose their weapons, and Ghost checks the cartridges in his guns. Niobe mentions that the program loads the same way each and every time, yet Ghost never fails to check his guns manually. She asks him why. In response, he says,

Hume teaches us that no matter how many times you drop a stone and it falls to the floor, you never know what'll happen the next time you drop it. It might fall to the floor, but then again it might float to the ceiling. Past experience never proves the future. (source)

Not a bad way to approach things, I might add. Going about things this way allows you to approach things from a fresh perspective each time. While it's quite an exercise, it forces you to shed biases and often makes it easier to peel apart layers from things when you're feeling very overwhelmed.

Bias is very useful. If we touch a hot stove, we get burned. We learn not to do it again. However, things aren't so black and white in every case. I don't think I need to point out how irrational it is to assume the next Larry you meet is going to be a jerk. But, that is how our brains work, sometimes even if it happens sub-/un-consciously.

karma can work in a similar way. If we're faced with one situation over and over, we can very easily take a pitfall and assume things will unfold the same way. We often have to work to realize that we can actively make a different choice, or influence the event in different way.

There's also another choice, one that's "neutral." We can let go. Instead of waiting for a karmic credit card bill or tossing something into our karmic bank accounts, we can choose to just let go. We can accept something as is, react without emotional attachment, and move on. Notice that I said "without emotional attachment," and NOT "without emotion." There's a large difference here that amounts to more than one word. If we bind ourselves to things and have to unbind ourselves from them later, we can also choose to not be bound in the first place.

Personally, I feel that part of life is having these bound experiences, and part of it is learned to act without having to bind yourself. Your mileage may vary, of course.

In nearly all of the various schools on Indic philosophy, orthodox and heterodox, you see that people who have attained their respective goals do no produce karma. That is not to say that there is absolutely no interaction with karma, as they can just be spouting out a balance of zero. I think I previously mentioned that it does not necessarily imply causation, either; by tweaking your karmic output to zero you may not find "liberation," or "enlightenment" or what have you. But, that doesn't mean you can't improve your life.

Giitaa-based philosophy and death

Two more posts on karma and a book review of Palace of Illusions pending, I felt particularly introspective in a different way whilst reading the giitaa tonight.

It occurred to me that in some simplistic way, a great deal of philosophy from the early chapters of the giitaa can be distilled. Once, in a Buddhist Philosophy class, a classmate (who majored in philosophy) asked how something would apply in a life or death situation. While other bemused classmates (myself included) snickered, she raised the point that any philosophy, at its basis, can be tested most easily and pertinently by looking at the ramifications it has in a life or death scenario. While that's not to say that there is no point to living by a philosophy, it does make sense to test its boundaries in such a way.

Thinking along those lines, it's pretty easy to simplify the giitaa's philosophy (at least from the earlier chapters). The idea of knowledge of renunciation of action, meditation (that knowledge's application), and so forth can be applied at the point of death to ease one's passing, karmic accumulation, etc. There are quite a few problems that arise such as remembering that stuff when dying, to say nothing of our ignorance of our deaths. What we practice is what comes to us almost instinctually, and so if we live via those ideas then we will also remember them upon our death. And, if we practice them in life, we can perhaps gain some sort of insight into our elation and suffering alike. Maybe we can make better decisions and learn to live with our mistakes.

While some are inclined to think of rewards of cosmic proportions after death, many of us are just looking to cope with various aspects of life, are we not? For us of the latter persuasion, desires of lofty Heavens and fears of stupifying Hells doesn't help much. We want some sort of elixir that makes it easier to live with the horrible things that we've done (or had happen to us) and helps us to appreciate the finer, subtler pleasures in life. Not fine wines, mind you, but the fine aroma of a summer evening, even if it is just outside the sweatshop/cubicle-farm. And, while some of us search ceaselessly for this magical elixir, I don't think there is one (though if there is, please let me know!).

For me, I'm content to try to figure out some of life's great awe-inspiring, though usually mundanely simple truths one at a time. When things get really rough, it's nice to have some help remembering. aadi sha.nkaraacharya said that our two best friends should be Death and Knowledge, as they never leave our side. Death reminds me to be in a constant appreciation of what's going on. I feel that maybe the knowledge gained from the giitaa's philosophy (Chapters Two and Three particularly speak to me, but I often wonder what doesn't...) can predominate the personality of my friend Knowledge. It's not the worst way to live, and if it gets me by during the trying times in life, then so be it. If not, my innate thirst for more spirituality will more than compensate.

Sure, there's more to it than that. It's never just that simple. But, from all that I learned from Buddhism, the concept of upaaya (deva: उपाय, "method" or "skillful means") burns brightest and most true. Sometimes, in life, a person needs to hear or see something in some particular way and at a specific time and place, maybe from some person in particular. Sometiimes, that's what it takes to learn something. We've all been there, and there's nothing wrong with that. And, maybe my oversimplified moment-of-death-centric view of philosophy will spark something in someone someplace sometime. *BLATANT GENERALIZATION*

I think there's nothing wrong with hoping for that.

Example of the importance of language

A few days ago I came across a great example to illustrate the importance of language, especially with regards to scripture. Granted, this example is not from scripture, but at one point it was not uncommon.

"God executes indifferent justice."

The key word here is "indifferent." Here, we're looking at a meaning of 'impartial,' not 'apathetic,' as pointed out by the source of this example and analysis (my thanks and credit to John Dierdorf). Also, Mr. Dierdorf kindly points out that "executioner" and "executor" have a related etymology and were used interchangeably, both meaning 'one who carries out.'

On a tangent, one would have to say "to execute to death." Again, Mr. Dierdorf kindly points out that due to the original meaning of the word, that phrase was not redundant, as it is now. Similarly, "damn" meant 'harm.' ("Damn" has one of the most interesting etymologies, btw.) So, it was not redundant to say "to damn you to hell."

Linguistic tangent aside, my focus here was to show how language changes, and in today's age, it has the potential to change very quickly. Because of this, we need to remember to take scripture, and whatever we read, in its proper perspective. Words that mean one thing now may mean something entirely different in ten years, let alone hundreds, and that's to say nothing of translation and further extrapolation, interpretation, etc. Remember, context is really important.

karma, II

When people think of "karma," they automatically think of reincarnation. This isn't to say that karma only applies in conjunction with reincarnation; many people believe in reincarnation but reject karma. It works just as well in the Christian paradigm of life in the world and an eternal Heaven or Hell afterward. The thing is, you'd have to explain why some people just don't have a good lot in life from birth very differently. When you believe in reincarnation and karma, you can blame karma for that, as well as for the other good and bad things within your life that don't seem to come from anything you yourself have done.

A major criticism of karma is that it reduces our choices, decisions, and actions to a mechanical input-output equation. It's like how people don't like to believe that emotions are caused by physiological and chemical changes. Not that I'm saying they are (correlation is not causation), but I'm just pointing out how people often don't like to believe that. Behaviorism in psychology is another example. Things become too mechanical. The reality is that while these things do have an effect on things, they don't necessarily cause them, nor are they the sole cause of things. In practice, things are much to complicated to be reduced to a very simplistic definition.

That's exactly what the concept of karma has been reduced to. You can't just say that someone got murdered because they murdered someone else in a past life. You can't just assume that if you do good, you'll get good in return. It's not simple and straightforward like that. Sure, sometimes it presents itself that way, and you'll always hear people say things like that. I think that's a dangerous way to look at things though. You run the risk of reducing a very potent concept to something that you have to either take on faith or throw away. karma is not a catch-all explanation of things, as some may believe.

As we experience things in our lives, we learn how to act and respond, and what kind of responses we can expect. We get biases in our judgements. In this way, we can say that karma lingers on. Things that we've experienced directly in a negative way, for example, often outweigh negative things that we haven't experienced but know to be horrible. In the same way, we strive for things we know to be good instead of things we accept as good but haven't experienced. It takes a lot of effort to rise above and beyond this type of behavior.

It really pisses me off when people call "karma" when something that was bound to happen happens. Yes, it is karma, but no one calls karma when someone gets away with something. karma is so disjointed from its real use (and along with this, one day I'll post why I hate what Buddhism has become), and it's annoying how people say things without ever really knowing what they're talking about, or what they mean. My karma is that my own words get so miscontrued so often that I can't help being annoyed. Some good karma would be to learn to not get annoyed.

But, the idea of karma as "points" in some sort of cosmic game lingers on and placates some. It's a great teaching for lay people, those who don't know about, care about, or have time to learn the intricacies of deeper religious thought or spiritual experience. It's easy for someone who's wrapped up in other things to accept simpler explanations for why bad things happen to good people, and maybe that's all they need. That doesn't mean there's not more there, however.

karma is important in understanding action as a whole. Many descriptions of mokSa (deva: मोक्ष, "liberation" and often used to denote the goal of various mystical practices) include the idea that once it is attained, a person no longer creates karma. karma binds us to life and its woes and joys, and to the cycle of lives and afterlives (beforelives?). The Jain doctrines even consider it to be physical, the weight of which holds us down to life (literally). In fact, many paths teach that to stop karma is to stop the grip of saMsaara. Reminiscent of an old Taoist movement that misinterpreted wu wei, they attempt to create no karma by doing nothing at all, good nor bad. But, as the adage goes, "indecision is a decision." You can assume, as some do, that doing nothing creates neutral karma, but the bigger point is that doing nothing is missing the point. And, as we know from statistics, correlation does not mean causation.

If we see karma as something that binds us to life, then someone who is liberated cannot create karma, otherwise he/she would be bound to life. But, that could also just be a by-product of being liberated. It could also be an assumption based on that particular definition of karma. Dangerous assumptions from dangerous simplifications, and again, karma isn't so simple.

The bigger focus is how we receive actions, how we act, and how we feel we should act and react. Just because we feel a certain way doesn't mean we're justified in doing so. And, when we can choose to receive things differently, why not do so? What's so wrong with doing good? Even if it's for our own sake, the bottom line is that good is being done. And, if it's selfish, at least the karmic equation will account for that...

karma, I

karma. A term many of us hear everyday.

karma (deva: कर्म, from sanskrit root कृ "to do"/"to make") is a very heavily loaded word. It always has been. One can see by the myriad of varied uses it has in sanskrit how loaded the word is. kR, as the "to do" verbs in many languages are wont to do (seriously, no pun intended), you have tons and tonnes of related terms and phrases, idiomatic usages, and loaded meanings associated with the verb. Let's take things a little bit at a time, shall we?

Action. If we take kR as "to do" or "to act," we get "action." Simple enough, at least until we consider the repercussions of an action. When we act, there is a result from that action. We call that a reaction. The idea of karma is that of action and reaction. It's not enough to think of what we do; we must also consider what kinds of effects that has and how those effects propagate. Newton's laws and forces do well to illustrate karma, really.

When we act, the effects ripple outwards. We affect other things and people when we do something, anything, regardless of how small the action. I won't get into "butterflies flapping their wings" here, but it's true. Let's take this into a less concrete layer here. When one acts towards another it can be considered either good, bad, or neutral. After all, when we think of karma, we think of a sort of "point system" do we not? Thus, we see a reaction. Usually, when people are acted upon positively, they respond by feeling positive. Sometimes, they also do positive things back, whether directly to the actor or to others. When people are acted upon negatively, they respond in kind. When people are acted upon by a neutral act, they usually think it's weird, ignore it, or take it as good/bad and act in kind. Sometimes they do all of the above. Now, when we think in the realms of human experience and action, there's one important thing here to consider: the reception of the action. If people take things to be good or bad, they act in a way that propagates that feeling. On occasion, however, we can see people who act differently.

Ever see the annoying optimist? That really annoying person who takes good news from bad news, or tries to always see the bright side of things? How about the nay-sayer? How about those people who really get overly dramatic over nothing? It's useful to try to take a bad situation and make it better, but when someone tries to do things for us, or doesn't do it in an incredibly sensitive way, we easily get annoyed. At the same time, when good things happen, some people just don't want to take it. Usually, it's a way to preemptively divert disappointment that may come when a good thing turns out to not be so good. At any rate, we can see this as a way to change the karmic effects of an action.

People sometimes make something out of nothing, too. Usually, this is because something passive strikes a nerve of a person and they end up taking it in a negative way. Since you can't make something from "nothing," per se, you have to assume there's some sort of action that doesn't have any good or bad effects in and of itself. That's what neutral karma is. And, there are those that try to appreciate the subtleties of life. They look at things that affect them neutrally and change them to have positive effects. Now that I think about it, being genuinely happy for others sort of falls into this category as well.

If you can change your reception of an action, you can change how it affects you, how you respond, and how that response can affect others (depending on their reception). Take that piece of advice any way you will.