This fashionable notion seems to render us in an existential mode, made of mechanical actions and reactions – but what does it refer to? And above all, what would be liberating in this predetermined vision, and what about free will?
Derived from Sanskrit, karma means action in all its forms, and also the consequences of our deeds, the balance of good or bad consequences from past actions which thus determine subsequent incarnations.
Taken in this way, it not only refers to the retribution of actions, but to their maturation. According to this meaning, there would not be divine intervention in the events, but rather a maturing of the actions in their consequences. To cope with these consequences, the human always seeks to improve his karma, by assessing his actions and words moment to moment, and by choosing good deeds, in the hope that he or she will inevitably leave the cycle of death and rebirth (samsara), and to attain to the final liberation called Moksha or Nirvana.
For Hindu mysticism, just as some other occult currents, there is a kind of fatalism to the extent that “whatever happens, happens,” regardless of the aspirations, efforts, prayers and deeds of man.
The law of karma consequently appears as the most powerful law in the universe; which regulates, castigates, represses and rewards good and bad deeds.
“I am staying away from mad people, the vicious, the lecherous, the envious and greedy, the murdererous and irreverent; I give them up to the vengeful demon to be flayed, and then seared with the fire of desire, which excites their senses, and thereby gives them more opportunity to act out merciless actions in order to aggravate their punishment still further.”
The complexity of this karmic perception of human existence, is rigidly deterministic and alienating. What would be the humans’ leeway in a determinism made of inalienable and incorruptible laws? In the case that everything seems already written, and in the event that man is no more than the mere underling of an existential frame so conditioned, what would he have to do to get his salvation?
The answer to that appears to be more problematical than in the sacred language, where Jesus, answering the centurion, asserts “It shall be done to you according to your faith.” This dispensation delivered by the Christ would be more in harmony with the idea of free will, in which the individual must choose his path of action, and define his timing, tools and methods.
In actual fact, metaphysicians have often been divided between freedom and necessity, between compatibility and incompatibility. The reflection here focuses on the compatibility or the incompatibility between the Laws and personal initiative, between determinism and free will. How can one think of being both dependent on natural laws and responsible for one’s actions?
Are several futures possible?
In the case where there is agreement on the conditioning wrought by the time and place of birth, and the importance of the nature of the host family, the debates are more about the management of one’s memories, experiences, actions, conquests and frustrations.
For modern kabbalists, karma refers to a series of hardships that one has chosen just before birth, thus resulting in the purpose of life being to overcome these ordeals, the remaining life to be lived as desired in free will.
In accordance with the theosophical and anthroposophical approaches, karma refers to the law of retribution or law of cause and effect.
Meanwhile, the belief that an individual’s actions at any time can change the course of his or her destiny is gaining ground.
This possibility to “create destiny” at any time seems to interest modern researchers. In fact, in the field of personal development, they are invited to explore the confines of the personality, in it’s conscious, unconscious and subconscious aspects, with the goal of being masters of their destiny, or to widen their consciousness and acquire greater self-control.
The perspective of transfiguristic philosophy also seems to point towards a Self-Freemasonry; but in this case based on the knowledge of the Spirit Spark Atom, whose awakening renews both the inner and outer aspects of the Microcosm, and which must take the lead in our life.
But, if there were no chance to escape from karma, could there be a free construction?
If one supposes that salvation is itself planned in advance, and that it would be enough to activate its “positive karma”, this would result in some being endowed with the possibility of escape, and others who would immediately be condemned by their heavy karma. This vision appears to be somewhat unusual, indefensible, and unbearable to any conscience concerned with the fate of suffering humanity.
On the other hand, based on the belief that an individual’s action can change his/her destiny, several alternatives seem to appear to the individual and collective consciousness, and there would be a choice to constantly make in our lives. In this perception, every idea put forward, any desire, any individual or collective action would bring up to date man’s destiny, which would not be a linear path, but a complex web of virtual paths, with the possibility of each human being to alter it’s own and other’s lives.
As long as we remain on the horizontal plane of life on earth, the human being is under the control of the fate that leads and abuses him. But when he frees himself from this fatal dependence, everything that he experiences only happens for his elevation and that of his fellows.
The Universal Fraternity, made of the Microcosms that had not fallen, plus those who have reintegrated with the Divine Order of Life, brings a remedy to this world: the Law of Love, to which all human beings can connect, and thus escape the natural karmic prison.
Trying to accumulate the karma of “good deeds” could ease one’s suffering, and allow one to live an acceptable natural life; but this would not offer a lasting liberating solution. To make him or her self worthy to receive this divine gift brought by the “Elder Brothers”, the divine mysteries candidate, who until then was under the iron rule of the karma of the natural soul, must awaken the divine soul, and thus the luminous clothing whereby he will escape from Nemesis, the blindfolded goddess symbolizing karma.
By the quality of the soul, everything inside himself will do an about-face, and the candidate will thus avoid the vengeful demon as he or she chooses a virtuous life cycle, evolving from magnificence to magnificence. This does not necessarily mean that the candidate will no longer experience impediments and difficulties inherent with life in matter.
Rather, he will look at the circumstances and events of his life through a new set of eyes that will turn them into “accelerators of consciousness,” and later raise them to the paradoxical status of “building stones” for the freeing of mankind.
