Rebirth of The Karma Doctrine

About the Book Although the karma doctrine is the most misunderstood topic in the field of metaphysics, it doesn't have to be that way. If you are skeptic about the karma doctrine, this book could change your thinking. This book is the result of an attempt to understand the laws that govern the consequences of our deeds and how they work. Once we understand these laws, we can become the master of our destiny by managing our deeds. The book is written in language that a lay person can easily understand.

Not all consequences of deeds are controlled by the karma doctrine which is based on the laws of nature. This book explains exactly which consequences are governed by the karma doctrine. Two types of consequences are identified: visible consequences and invisible consequences, which are respectively controlled by man-made laws and natural laws. A conceptual and metaphysical model of the karma doctrine is developed using a distinctive approach that resolves the contradictions in the existing notion about karma. The author makes suggestions that can be helpful in daily conduct to reduce the karmic load and provides answers to some unresolved questions related to the karma doctrine.

About the Author , Dr. Subhash Jain, is Professor Emeritus, Department of Civil & Environmental Engineering at The University of Iowa, Iowa City, Iowa. He is keenly interested in delving into the nature of reality.

Introduction We experience certain phenomena so often that we do not consider it necessary to look for explanations of their occurrence. They seem so natural that we never give them any thought. For example, we are aware that something that slips from our hands never goes up but always goes down, though it rarely occurs us to look for the explanation of why things always go down (many of us do not actually understand the law of gravity). We are told about the births of so many children, but we never ask the question why they are here. We observe in our daily life that no two living beings are identical, but we rarely ask why they are different (many of us have little understanding of genetics).

Living beings are physically dissimilar from each other, and we make use of this fact to identify different living beings. It is not difficult to differentiate among plants, animals, and human beings because the forms of their bodies are different from each other. However, this fact cannot be used to make distinctions between identical twins or among clones. In spite of physical similarity between identical twins or among clones, there are functional dissimilarities between them, and we make use of this fact to differentiate between them. In other words, living beings are different from each other because they perform different functions or deeds.

This principle implies that the deeds of a person make him or her unique. Our deeds determine what we are. Put another way, living beings are the consequence of their deeds. It must therefore be the law of nature that every deed has consequences and the doer of the deed has to bear them.

Book's Contents and Sample Pages