The Dhamma Times, 19 May 2004
By A.G.S.Kariyawasam

The kamma theory is one of the two basic teachings in Buddhism, the other being its related doctrine of rebirths or more correctly, re-becoming (punabbhava). Along with its non-thestic explanation of the existence of living beings and of the world-systems and its related soteriological theory of final liberation, Buddhism offers an exhaustive clarification to the problem of man in the universe and his fate therein.

Kamma or Karma simply means the self-operative law of moral causation. It is action and reaction in the ethical domain, which is implicit as the nature of every causal event in the world. This action-reaction explanation in its operative process in the field of Buddhist ethics teaches that all living beings inherit the wholesome as well as unwholesome consequences of their past volitional actions as their inevitable inheritance from previous lives.

What is practically significant here in this doctrine is the opportunity it affords to the individual to regulate and guide his or her life by conforming oneself only to actions, whether of word, deed or thought, that are ethically rewarding. Then he or she can regulate the living pattern correctly by engaging only in wholesome (kusala) actions, because both wholesome and unwholesome aspects are constantly in operation irrespective of the perpetrator's willingness or unwillngess.

Accordingly the avoidance of all evil actions of word thought or deed (akusala) and the performance of all good actions (kusala) is given as the common advice of all the Buddhas in the oft-quoted stanza:

Sabbapaapassa akaranam kusalassa upasampadaa Sacittapariyodapanam,
etam Buddhaanusaasanam

With this much said about the kamma and its theoretical presentation, the intention of the present article is to demonstrate how this causal doctrine of ethics at times operates somewhat relentlessly over living beings to the extent that in this particular aspect it is named as death itself under the term Maara.

It is commonly accepted that the Buddha Gautama was a Sammasambuddha or a perfectly enlightened Buddha who has conquered all evil and became enlightened by himself and then promulgated the teaching he discovered thereby establishing a widely-accepted religious system (saasana) in the world. To say that even the Buddha had to face some of the evil consequences of his past kamma may sound somewhat unusual. Yet, it has happened so because the theory of kammic fruition has several divisions in its operation, depending on the type of kamma committed.

Accordingly, the actual fruition of a kammic action can take place either in the very life in which it was committed (dittha-dhamma) or in the succeeding life or in any of the future existences.

Thus, in the case of the Buddha, even in his final existence as the Buddha, some of the left-over evil consequences surfaced and acted their part, although mildly, in the sense that such evil consequences did not result in their full force because he had become a Buddha. The big moral lesson this phenomenon teaches us is that as the nature of kamma is its inevitability of fruition, one has the opportunity of regulating one's life along a less troublesome path in one' journey towards the ultimate freedom of Nirvana. In the case of gautama Buddha, certain acts committed by him have become responsible for the various forms of "sufferings" he had to face even in his final birth as the Buddha.

Accordingly, the six-year period of self-mortification he had to go through was the evil consequence of speaking disparagingly regarding the Buddhahood of the Buddha Kassapa, who was his predecessor. Gautama Buddha was missing the correct path to enlightenment for six years as the evil consequence of this calumny aimed at his predecessor. He was once born in the sudra caste as a drunkard named Munaali and he committed the evil of abusing a powerful paceekabuddha named Surabhi with the words "this monk is of evil behaviour (dussila) and given to all kinds of evil acts (paapadhamma)".

This had become the reason for his being opposed and challenged by the other religionists (teerthaka) even when he was biding his time for Buddhahood in the Tusita heaven. These teerthakas had gone to the extent of introducing and developing sixty-two evil doctrines in the Indian society thereby erecting a confused and hence a challenging backdrop for him. By these activities they had earned much popularity and power in the contemporary Indian society thereby making his task much more difficult. Even the accusation that the Buddha and his disciples had sexual connections with the woman Sundarie, whom they later murdered and attributed it also to the Buddha and the bhikkhus, was also as the consequence of this same else kamma.

Another past akusala kamma contributing to the calumny surrounding Sundarie was his using abusive language on a paccekabuddha named Isigana, calling him a "sensualist" and getting his pupils also to do the same when he was once born as a learned brahmin. It was also due to abusing a Buddha that he had to face the accusation of neglecting the woman Chincaa, when she claimed pregnancy through him.

Once he had killed the step-brother by hurling them down a precipice in order to appropriate the family wealth only to himself. It was as a result of this will act that Devadatta attempted to take his life by hurling down a rock on him. Once, as a boy playing on the public highway, he threw a stone at a paccekabuddha who was passing by. This resulted in his having to face the attempt on his life by Devadatta through hired archers as contract killers. Once, born as a mahout, he drove his elephant against a paccekabuddha and this misdeed had the consequence in having to face the fierce elephant Nalagiri.

Born as a king once he passed judgement in a case by sentencing seventy individuals to death, which became the cause for his having to bear up severe pains when a splinter pieced his foot. As a fisherman's son once he enjoyed the suffering of dying fish when caught in a net. This became the cause for his severe headache (seesa-dukkha) which set in with the hearing the news of the slaughter of the Sakyans by Vidudabha. In the time of Phussa Buddha he had ordered the bhikkus to live on barley instead of rice, resulting in his having to eat barley for three whole months at Veranja. For having killed a wrestler he had to suffer from a cramp in his back. Once as a physician he caused discomfort to a merchant by getting him to purge excessively, as a consequence of which he had to suffer his last illness of dysentery.

It was as a collective result of these many unwholesome acts that he became one of the most short-lived Buddha in history. However, owing to the six-year struggle of austerities, Gautama Buddha Sasana will last longer.

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