If everything is under karma are terrorists wrongdoers or simply instruments for punishing wrongdoers?

Transcript

This is an AI-generated transcript and may contain some errors.
If everything is governed by the law of karma, then are the people who are doing bad things, such as the Taliban is killing people, are they also a part of the circle? That means, are they giving, are they doing a part of punishing those who are wrongdoers? So, will they be punished or are they simply being instruments? Yes, this is a good question. Thoughtful question.
Here, we have to understand that karma is very complex. And the law of karma can use different people to do different things. But whether those people think that we are the instruments or not, that is important.
That means, let’s say, if A kills B, and then as a reaction, A is to be killed in future. Law of karma is complex. I am giving a simple example to the strangers.
So, A kills B and A is supposed to be killed. And in a future, C and A get into a fight and C kills A. Now C, now the death of A, we can say is a reaction because A killed B in the past. But C was not thinking that, you know, I am giving the karmic reaction to A. C was angry with whatever was the particular issue and C did it because of that.
So, we have to see that, actually, when people do something wrong, violence or crime or murder, they are responsible for their actions. They are responsible for their actions and they will be punished for that. Now, what about their victims? We can see that from two perspectives.
From this lifetime perspective and from a multi-lifetime perspective. From this lifetime perspective, they are innocent victims. And society or the world governments need to come together to prevent such victimization of innocent people.
That is the meaning of the rule of law or traditionally what we can call as dharma. Dharma is religious duty. Dharma has many meanings.
One meaning is proper duty. So, when a person is suffering because of some wrongdoing, because somebody else has done something wrong, then we are not meant to judge that person and say that because you did this, you must be suffering because of some past life. No, from this life perspective, they are victims.
And they need to be protected. But, if for some reason the protection doesn’t come, then they accept that, I must have done something in the past because of which I am getting the reaction. So, the point which I am making is that there is what happens to us, whatever the world does to us, that is the result of our past karma.
But, past karma is not the only thing to be considered. Our present dharma is also to be considered. What is my duty right now? When Ravan abducted Sita, Ram did not think, Sita must have done some karma because of which she got abducted.
So, let her stay abducted. No! She fought a war to protect her and to regain her. When Draupadi was dishonored, the Pandavas did not think, must be some past karma.
No, not at all. So, when we are interacting with others, we have to consider, what is the present dharma? What am I meant to do? And we have to act best on that, based on that. But, if sometimes, despite the best effort, some bad things do happen, then we understand, this is the result of past karma.
So, the karma, the understanding of karma is not meant to make us hard-hearted. It is meant to make us clear-headed. Hard-hearted means, we just don’t feel anything for anyone.
We don’t feel for other people’s suffering. No, we want to be not just sympathetic, we want to be empathic to whoever is in distress, as in terms of our capacity. But at the same time, we want to be clear-headed.
That means, we shouldn’t become resentful, negative, pessimistic, when we see bad things happening. Because there is a higher level of order that is present in the universe.