Understanding Kamma and Its Effects on Life : หน้า 121/164

Suzanne Jeffrey " Meditation and concentration help us to discover and understand all of this. One of our jobs, as you well know, is to train the future leaders so that they will understand this, too. We have the material to start the fire, but we need the people to ignite the mind: We know what is right, what is Dhamma, but we need those people who understand this to teach it! We, ourselves, must not be afraid to teach this. And hopefully, we are not too late! "So what motivates humans? Who teaches us right from wrong, or how do we gauge between right and wrong? In discussing this topic, we have to discuss kamma. Kamma, once again, is action with intention. It is, simply, cause and effect. If we do something good, then good will return to us. And, vice versa. When we talk about the retribution of Kamma, we talk about actions that happen because of the initial action that a person does. Retribution of Kamma can be in this life or future lives. Some actions have immediate effects – like growing vegetables or fruit – and depending on the kind of fruit that we grow. Some vegetables are almost immediately available to us. Sometimes it takes many seasons. This is the same as kamma. Kamma can be good or bad. Some kamma bears fruit in this lifetime, and some in the future, although we should know the results of our actions. "Meditation also works in this way. If we meditate and continue to meditate we create boon which comes back to us. If we offer food to the monks, we see the results of this immediately as well. Baap, or bad kamma, works in the same way. Suffering will be the retribution of the corrupt or immoral act itself. So what are the acts that are considered unwholesome? We would have to break them down into three areas: (1) Body, (2) Speech, and (3) Thoughts. For the body, the three acts causing retribution are killing, stealing, and sexual misconduct. For speech, the acts causing retribution are lying, using divisive speech, using harsh speech, and idle chatter, or speaking without any benefit. For thoughts, the acts are covetousness, having a vengeful mind, and having the wrong view - or having the wrong theory or philosophy of life. These are: thinking that there is no such thing as good or bad kamma, thinking that there is no reason to be born, believing that there is no afterlife, believing that the mother is not worthy of respect, believing that the father is not worthy of respect, believing that spontaneous beings do not exist, believing that there is no Heaven or Hell, and believing that Arahants do not exist – or that a person cannot become self-enlightened. "Unwholesome acts, then, bear an unwholesome result. If we could go to the unwholesome realms, we would see that the retribution of doing unwholesome acts is to be born"