Three Types Of Karma – In Gita Verse 18.4 O best of the Bhāratas, now hear My judgement about renunciation. O tiger among men, renunciation is declared in the scriptures to be of three kinds.
Krishna is saying that there are three types of renunciation. He will be guiding us for the same.
Before we understand three types of renunciation let’s understand three types of Karma.
Let’s understand through Panatnjali’s sutra: By performing samyama on the two types of karma, active and dormant, or upon omens and portents, the exact time of death can be predicted. The Eastern analysis of karma says that there are three types of karma. Let us understand them.
First is called sanchita. Sanchita means the total, the total of all your past lives. Whatsoever you have done, howsoever you have reacted to situations, whatsoever you have thought and desired, achieved, missed – the total – the total of your doings, thinkings, feelings of all the lives is called sanchita. Sanchita: the word means the all, the accumulated all.
The second type of karma is known as prarabdha. The second type of karma is that part of sanchita which you have to fulfil in this life, which has to be worked out in this life. You have lived many lives; you have accumulated much. Now a part of it will have the opportunity to be acted out, realised, suffered, passed through in this life. Only a part of it, because this life has a limitation – seventy, eighty, or a hundred years. In a hundred years you cannot live all the past karmas – the sanchita, the accumulated – only a part of it. That part is called prarabdha.
Then there is a third type of karma which is known as kriyaman. That is today’s karma. First the accumulated whole, then a small portion of it for this life, then even a smaller portion of it for today or for this moment. Each moment there is an opportunity to do something or not to do something.
Somebody insults you: you become angry. You react, you do something; or, if you are aware, you simply watch, you don’t become angry. You simply remain a witness. You don’t do anything; you don’t react. You remain cool and collected; you remain centred. The other has not been able to disturb you.
If you are disturbed by the other and you react, then the kriyaman karma falls into the deep reservoir of the sanchita. Then you are accumulating again; then for future lives you are accumulating. If you don’t react, then a past karma is fulfilled – you must have insulted this man in some past life, now he has insulted you; the account is closed. Finished. A man who is aware will feel happy that at least this part is finished. He has become a little more free.
Somebody came and insulted Buddha. Buddha remained quiet, he listened attentively, and then he said, “Thank you.” The man was very much puzzled; he said, “Have you gone mad? I am insulting you, hurting you, and you simply say thank you?” Buddha said, “Yes, because I was waiting for you. I had insulted you in the past, and I was waiting – unless you come I will not be totally free. Now you are the last man; my accounts are closed. Thank you for coming. You might have waited, you might not have come in this life, then I would have had to wait for you. And I don’t say anything anymore, because enough is enough. I don’t want to create another chain.”
Then the kriyaman karma, the day-to-day karma, does not fall into the reservoir, does not add to it; in fact, the reservoir is a little less than it was. The same is true about prarabdha – the whole life, this life. If in this life you go on reacting, you are creating the reservoir more and more. You will have to come again and again. You are creating too many chains; you will be in bondage.
Try to understand the Eastern concept of freedom. In the West freedom has a connotation of political freedom. In India we don’t bother much about political freedom, because we say unless one is spiritually free, it does not make much difference whether you are politically free or not. The fundamental thing is to be spiritually free.
The bondage is created by the karmas. Whatsoever you do in unawareness becomes karma.
Any action done in unawareness becomes karma because any action done in unawareness is not action at all; it is a reaction. When you do something in full awareness it is not a reaction; it is an action, spontaneous, total. It leaves no trace. It is complete in itself; it is not incomplete. If it is incomplete then some day or other it will have to be completed. So if in this life you remain alert, then the prarabdha disappears and your reservoir becomes more and more empty. In a few lives the reservoir becomes absolutely empty.
Now it will be very easy for us to understand what Krishna will be saying to us regarding three renunciations.
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