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KARMAS AND DISEASES

SRI SWAMI SIVANANDA

Sri Swami Sivananda

Founder of

The Divine Life Society

SERVE, LOVE, GIVE,

PURIFY, MEDITATE,

REALIZE

So Says

Sri Swami Sivananda

A DIVINE LIFE SOCIETY PUBLICATION

First Edition: 1959

Second Edition: 2000

(2,000 Copies)

World Wide Web (WWW) Edition: 2001

WWW site: http://www.SivanandaDlshq.org/

This WWW reprint is for free distribution

Printed on the occasion of the 80th Birthday

Anniversary of Sri Swami Sitaramananda as an

offering at the lotus feet of H.H. Sri Swami

Chidanandaji Maharaj on 17th October, 2000

Published By

THE DIVINE LIFE SOCIETY

P.O. SHIVANANDANAGAR—249 192

Distt. Tehri-Garhwal, Uttaranchal,

Himalayas, India.

CONTENTS

Karmas and Diseases . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1

Karmas and Birth . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 6

Karmas and Hells . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 8

iii

KARMAS AND DISEASES

(Swami Sivananda)

Introduction

It is common nowadays to hear it said that the Puranas are very unreliable scriptures and that

they indulge in unlimited exaggeration about very many things. These critics say that the Puranas

contain gross overstatements and preposterously puerile attempts to cajole or to cow down the

reader with citations like the grandiose descriptions of heavenly regions and their joys as also of the

awful pictures of hell fires and its torments. To criticise a subject requires very little wit or wisdom.

For simple and direct condemnation without caring to consider the pros and cons of a matter is the

inborn nature of the human mind. But even to these biased ones a little thoughtful consideration will

forthwith reveal that the sagely writers of the Puranas had a special purpose in writing certain thing

in the manner they did. They deliberately emphasised and laid particular stress upon some subjects

with a definite end in view. Underneath this graphic and detailed descriptions of the Karmas and

their consequences there is a shrewd psychology and insight being put to make a practical purpose.

Until and unless Self-realisation is attained, Knowledge-Absolute is gained, there is ever

the ebb and flow, the constant see-saw between the animal and the man in every human being. The

beast or the brute is never completely absent or overcome except through a final Divinisation of the

individual. As long as there is the human, side by side there will be the animal also, now the one

having the upper hand, now the other. It is only when the Jiva gets above and beyond both these and

gets transformed and established in the third and hitherto dormant aspect of his nature, namely the

Divine aspect, that he becomes “Mriga-Nara-Atita.” Then onwards there is no more of this

tug-of-war between the animal and man natures to gain precedence and dominate over the field of

Jiva-consciousness. For now the Divine Kshetrajna Himself reigns supreme over the Kshetra.

Now until this state is attained we find therefore that man is in turn animal and human

according to the Vritti that possesses him. He shows himself alternately to be noble and petty. He

swings between the sublime and the bathos. His two different aspects react to the external stimuli in

their own distinctive manners. And equally likewise only particular modes of external approach

succeed in evoking the desired response from these dual aspects in man’s consciousness. Thus it is

that we find in persons who have evolved themselves to some fair extent and acquired a good

measure of Sattva, of refinement, culture and character, the purely gross and degenerate impulses

and temptations fail to have effect. They succeed only in exceptional situations when the person

unfortunately happens to be in some rare moment of weakness due to a revival of Samskaras.

Whereas in gross natures such temptations readily and immediately work havoc, and vice versa,

noble impulses immediately influence a fine nature but fail to evoke any response in a gross person

of low animal mentality. This has given rise to the proverb in the Marathi language “To the

cobbler’s deity worship is by shoes,” or again the current Tamil saying “Without the cane the

monkey will not dance.” The same is the case with noble sentiments too, as is amply exemplified by

the overcareful psychology applied by the famous Dr. Arnold of Rugby in appealing to the worthier

instincts in his boys. No less striking is the historic example of Mark Antony skilfully exercising his

persuasive and provocatory eloquence upon his Roman audience, first to evoke compassion by

playing subtly upon their human side, and then rousing a frenzy of revengeful violence by

inflaming their strong animal passion of anger.

It is this deep human insight and admirable penetrating psychology that is at the basis of the

Hell and Retribution ideas in the Puranic Hindu Religion. They knew that sweet whistling will not

make the buffalo move, whereas whipping will. We know how on the eve of building the great

bridge to Lanka, when requests failed to make the Ocean-King behave suitably, Rama took out an

arrow in anger. The very next instant had the Sagara-Raja pleading with folded hands before Rama.

Likewise to goad man on to noble deeds, high aspiration and righteous conduct, the Puranic sages

held out before him bright prospects and extolled the untold benefits and blessings of a good life.

Here they tried to appeal to man’s human side. But when he indulged in extreme sin and bestial acts

of gross sensuality, they knew it was not the occasion for mincing matters. The beast could only be

chastened through a true and vivid description of the inevitable results of his actions. Here we must

note that they did not exaggerate or utter any falsehood, but gave a special importance to and

emphasised the matter by dilating upon it in graphic detail and spared no pains in doing this. They

therefore confronted the Jiva with a terrific array of dire consequences that would inevitably accrue

to the evil actions of the sinner. They gave graphic descriptions of the various punishments awaiting

the wanton transgressor of moral and spiritual laws. They vividly related past instances of

transgressors and the retribution that overtook them, to testify to this truth. The Puranas abound in

fearful examples of life-long sufferings in lower wombs suffered by people like Nahusha, Jaya and

Vijaya, the well-known Gajendra and many others.

They do not stop with that. As though it were not enough to give instances of the “Phalas” of

positive sinful actions and crimes, they cite certain cases when even the indulgence in a

comparatively harmless, good emotion like affection, brings about grave suffering upon man. The

warning implied in the story of the past lives of Sage Jadabharata is an instance in point. Also the

accidental participation in a seeming falsehood was enough to send a soul to take a sight, though but

for a moment, of the awful hell-fire. The incident of the great Yudhishthira’s Naraka-Darshan is

referred to here.

Fortunately or unfortunately, out of the numerous Puranas very few are studied by the vast

majority nowadays. Those few devoted people that read the Puranas or listen to their recital rarely

go beyond the four or five classical Saivaite and Vaishnavaite Puranas that are popularly current

throughout the country. We may say that Purana perusal is generally confined to the Skanda,

Markandeya, Vishnu or the Srimad Bhagavata. It is not the scholar or the orthodox Brahmin section

that is meant here but the common man-in-the-street who goes to form a distinct and important part

of the population. Thus this whip-crack of the Karma and Karma-phala citation does not sound

nowadays to chasten the sensual beast in man. And as a result of this it is running amok as never

heretofore. But laws, be they mundane or divine, are inexorable. The ignorance of the Penal Code

does not lay a premium on indulgence in crime nor does the offender go scot-free. He burgles and

he gets jailed. He murders and is hanged. Likewise also he sins and he suffers. If this truth of the

inescapable order of cosmic Law is placed before him in unvarnished and distinct outline it may

serve just a little bit to persuade him to give up vice and follow virtue, to renounce Adharma and

embrace Dharma. To do so is the purpose of this little tract on “Karmas and Diseases.” It has

purposes confined mainly to the physical and mental forms that this heavenly retribution takes, and

also to the forms it takes upon this earth-plane. For modern man is held by the motto “seeing is

KARMAS AND DISEASES

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