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I am confused about Karma and souls. If souls do not exist and everything is an illusion, why does karma exist? Isn't this a conflict? ~Steffy
2 Comments
Tony
11/29/2019 05:55:31 am
This is a very good question that challenges our very concepts of ourselves and existence. When we think of a soul, we think of something that is permanent to ourselves, but the Buddha taught that everything is nonpermanent and always changing. Just as there is no self during our lives, there is no soul after we die. What we think are permanent is actually constantly changing with every thought moment. And death is merely another moment. So it there is no self, and no soul what is it that receives the karma? The actions receive the karma. What we think is our self and our soul is merely a collection of our thoughts and actions. As every action must have a reaction, the karmic reactions follow the source of the actions in the life and the next. Now you might think, can't we just call your collection of thoughts and actions a soul and make everyone happy? You can, and it would not be completely wrong since when our selves change, and even when we die, we do still carry some of our prior selves with us. However, it is not a soul in our generally accepted definition of a soul, which is a permanent marker of our self and identity. Leave a Reply. |
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