​If we help someone and we both get into trouble, is such trouble due to past karma?

Answer Podcast

Transcript

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So, are the consequences of our actions, what happened to us, is it all determined by past karma? Say if a person tries to help somebody else who is in danger and while trying to help both of them are killed.
Then is all this because of past karma? See, first of all past karma is never to be seen as a substitute for present dharma. Past karma is never to be seen as a substitute for present dharma. That means, say if a person is robbed by a thief and then this person who has been robbed, he goes to a king.
He tells the king, I have been robbed. And the king says, it is because of your past karma you are robbed. What will happen to justice at that time? Or to take it even more ludicrous extreme, you know if a baby is crying.
Mother thinks he is crying because of his past karma. Let him cry. What will happen to love? What will happen to relationships? If we start ascribing past karma to all actions or all situations, all order, all justice, all love, everything will collapse.
So, we are meant to deal with people based on their present situation, present actions. So, yes, if a baby is crying, now the baby may have a stomach infection and the stomach infection may say that although my parents have taken good care of the baby, still because of past karma the child has got a stomach infection. So, now, the important thing for the mother is what is my dharma? My dharma as a mother is to take care of my baby.
So, I can’t go into looking at what is the past karma because of which this happened. Similarly, in every situation, for the king, the king’s first situation is not to think about what made this person get robbed. This is my citizen and it is my responsibility to maintain law and order, therefore I have to rectify this.
I have to find the thief, punish the thief, recover the wealth, whatever it is. So, like that, in general, when we have to take decisions, we focus on our dharma, not others’ past karma. In this situation, what is the right thing for me to do? We don’t get into people’s past karma.
Now, when even after doing our dharma, others will not help, then we understand there is a past karma also involved. That means, there is a linear chain of cause and effect in this life. And we focus first and foremost on that.
Say, if… I’ll give you repeating the earlier example. Now, if I eat 10 ice creams on a cold night and then I wake up with a completely ruined throat and then I say, this is because of a past karma. Yes, it is because of past night’s karma.
It is not past life’s karma. Isn’t it? So, normally, we look at cause and effect in terms of this life. Now, sometimes, when we look at cause and effect in terms of this life, we may not get answers.
So, one night I sleep perfectly okay, I have not eaten anything to aggravate my throat and next morning I wake up with a terrible throat. Then I understand this is because of some other past karma. That means, there is a linear cause and effect chain.
When the normal cause and effect chain doesn’t explain adequately, then we may look at past life’s karma. So, past life’s karma is simply to extend the explanatory framework. It is not to replace the present life’s explanatory framework.
So, applying this to the present situation, now, if one person helps another person who is in danger and then both of them are become victims. Then what we have to understand is this person made the right choice and that person by making the right choice did their dharma and they will get the good consequences of that in future. It is a courageous act to do to help someone who is in more threat.
And they will get the results of that courageous activity in future. Now, how they, they were killed at that time, both of them, that means, that at that particular situation, there was some karmic complication because of which they had to suffer. So, we don’t blame that person for making that choice.
At the same time, we recognize that we have to, if things go ultimately wrong, see, our focus should always be on learning how we can make wise choices. So, that means that if things go terribly wrong because of certain choices, then we have to evaluate whether those choices, we could have done them better or not. Whether we could have done them better or not.
And we leave it at that. At that time, some devotees were going for food distribution and they were speeding far beyond the legal limit. And then they met with an accident.
The whole van got topped. It was long, many many years ago. And then some of the devotees were, they died in that.
When the news came to Prabhupada, was it their destiny? Was it their responsibility? Why were they driving so fast? That means, we have our intelligence and we are meant to use our intelligence to act properly. So, beyond that, if we start analyzing too much, you know, what happened because of what karma, we will become paralyzed. So, we focus on simple, trying to find out cause and effects as far as is our possibility.
And when things are beyond our possibility, beyond our capacity to comprehend, we leave it and focus on what we can do. Say, if I am walking along the road, along this, and there is water spilled over there. I slip and I fall and I get a fracture.
Now I can say that, okay, why did I get the fracture? Was it because of the past karma? Or was it because of somebody’s carelessness that they kept the water over there? Or was it because of my own inattention that I didn’t see the water was over there? Or if somebody was asking me a question, they were asking me a question because of which I got distracted. So, they are to be blamed. Once we go into the blame game, we will never get anywhere.
So, we can learn both, always possibly. Okay, whoever spilled the water, they should not spill the water. If I am walking along, I should be attentive when I am walking along.
If others are talking also, they should not distract. Whatever is to be learned, we can learn from it. So, we should not get into a, especially when it comes to karma, it is very easy to get into a paralysis by analysis.
Should I do this? Should I do that? Should I do that? We get completely confused and lost. So, best thing to do is what can I learn and what can I do right now? We focus on what is our dharma. We do that using our best intelligence and move on, whatever consequences come up.
And if sometimes something goes wrong, we learn from that and we try to act in wiser ways in future. Does this answer your question? Thank you very much, Dr. Gopal.