As you sow

In the physical sciences we all know the famous law of Newton which states that action and reaction are equal and opposite. Every action naturally begets a reaction. Long before the physical sciences, men studied human interactions and activities and propounded certain laws. In the Orient there is the ancient law of karma which deals with a man's actions in life and the results that accrue. The reactions of physical objects are immediate and directly observable and measurable. But the results of a man's actions in life are often not immediate nor observable so directly. One of the ideas behind the karmic laws is similar to the Biblical saying, "As you sow, so you reap." Of course this is not a mathematical formula wherein you put in quantities a and b and obtain results c and d invariably. This is the difference between lifeless objects and life-filled beings. But if one observes human beings and the innumerable incidents in their lives one cannot help wondering and making certain correlations and drawing conclusions.

I spent my boyhood in a small town of a population of 30,000. One day, while we kids were playing in the street, our leader, a bully ordered a boy (say Tom) to kick another boy of five, for no apparent reason.. Tom kicked that small, groaning kid viciously and thoroughly just for the fun of it.

Within three months a small dark patch appeared on the calf muscle of Tom. Soon it began to grow in size and fester. It appeared to be a variety of ringworm infection. Tom's father was a stanch advocate of native herbal medicines and he treated his son with all kinds of herbs and powders and pastes. Nothing worked. The infection aggravated and Tom's flesh began to rot. The stench of the rot was so strong, even his parents could not bear it. It seemed as if Tom was going to lose his leg; it was more than one year since the infection had set in.

One day a well-wisher brought a packet of zinc oxide and advised the boy to apply it on the rotting flesh – much against the wishes of the father, who hated using western medicine! Miraculously Tom was cured in seven days.

Actually I had completely forgotten this little anecdote. A few years back I met Tom by chance in the city where I was working. He was now a well grown adult – mature. He himself reminded me of the above incident. He had made the connection .He related that his leg began to rot because he had so unmindfully kicked an innocent weak little boy. "Moreover", he remarked wistfully, "Fate taught a little lesson to my father too. He stubbornly hated western medicine and in the end western medicine what his herbs and powders could not do for more than one year."

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In the same town we had a teacher teaching English to us kids at the high school. To us he was the epitome of all knowledge. He was reputed to be a great scholar and everybody including the elder and learned persons of the town revered and feared him. But the man had a striking fault. He was extremely haughty and arrogant and filled with overbearing pride. Enormous pride in his knowledge and contempt towards others of little learning. That was the one feature that everyone who came into contact with him remembered. Pride is one of the deadly sins. (I make this remark more to remind myself than to point a moral finger at another person.)

Many years later, after I left the town I heard about that teacher through an ex- schoolmate. The teacher had a son on whom he doted much. It so turned out that the son's brain did not develop normally. He is a full grown adult by now, nearing his mid-thirties. And yet his behaviour is that of a five year-old child. No formal education was possible. He became a moron – dim, dull-witted, without a vestige of learning – the very thing his savant father used to look down with contempt.

I have observed innumerable examples like this of the mysterious workings of karma. Since this is to be an essay of limited length I will quote one last example.

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This may look like a ribald joke but I assure you that it is not my intention. It is an actual happening that beautifully illustrates the point we are making.

I was working in the city of Hyderabad at that time and I had to deal with many groups and kinds persons. This particular person, X, had gone to Delhi on a tour along with four of his pals. X was not exactly famous for his standard of behaviour in public or private. During those days Delhi was famous (sic) for its eve-teasing youth. This person X, it seems was fond of riding the over-crowded buses there, just to rub against ladies or pinch their bottoms or pass his shoulder against their breasts and so on. On four occasions he took out his penis in the overcrowded bus and while in a standing position tapped it on the shoulders of women sitting in front of him. Later, in the lodge where they stayed, he would narrate his adventure to his mates during a drinking orgy and laugh boisterously.

The party returned to Hyderabad. Three months later X met with an accident while riding his bike. He was a sturdy robust, healthy man. His face and limbs were left intact in the crash – almost untouched.

In the crash , some sharp metallic shard somehow entered the space between his thighs and had severed his pudenda from the rest of his athletic body. Amen.

V.S.SURY

Tags & Keywords : karma, justice, laws, medicine, herbs