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Karma-Its Operation and an Appraisal
It is not true to say that the Karma theory does not give any incentive to social service. The Upanişads enjoin social service and sacrifice, although on the highest level one has to transcend social morality. The five vows to be observed by an ascetic and the layman (śrävaka) imply the recognition of dignity and equality of life. Schweitzer maintains that the attitude in the ancient Indian thought was that of world and life-negation. Still the problem of deliverance in the Jaina and the Buddhist thought is not raised beyond ethics. In fact, it was the supreme ethic. The deliverance from reincarnation is possible through the purity of conduct, and the soul cleanses itself from the besmirching it has suffered and altogether frees itself from it. What is new then, in Jainism is the importance attained by ethics.32 An event full of significance for the thought of India.33 And Karma is not a mechanical principle, but a spiritual necessity. It is the counterpart in the moral world of the physical law of uniformity.34 Unfortunately the theory of Karma became confused with fatality in India when man himself grew feeble and was disinclined to do his work.35 Still the importance of Karma as aftereffects of our action and determining the course of life cannot be easily underestimated. Karma has to be looked at as a principle involving explanation of action and reaction. Fatalistic theory of life was presented by Makkhali Gośäla, a contemporary of Mahāvīra. He considered himself a rival of Mahāvīra. He said that happiness and misery are measured to one as it were in bushels. The duration of life and the transmigration of souls have their fixed forms. No human effort can change them, Mahāvīra and the Buddha opposed Gośāla most vigorously.
2. The theory of Karma explaining the inequality of human life and behaviour as fruits of Karma has been interpreted as determinism and fatalistism, It is, therefore, necessary to study the problem of determinism and human freedom and to justify the ways of God to man and of man to man.
Determinism is a general philosophical theory which asserts that all events are caused. Everything that happens is determined by preceding conditions. (i) The development of physical sciences in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries inspired the philosophers to deterministic theories. All events are determined by preceding conditions. Neither moral consideration nor the will of God determines human actions, but like other events they are determined by eternal and immutable laws of Nature. (ii) With the advancement of psychology in specialised directions like Psycho-analysis and Psychiatry, the determinists have gained added strength. All events
32. Schweitzer : Indian Thought and its Development, pp. 82-83. 33. Radhakrishnan (S.): Hindu View of Life, p. 73. 34. Radhakrishnan : Indian Philosophy, Vol. I, p. 224. 35. Radhakrishnan : Hindu View of Life, p. 76.
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