April 9 – Manila | The Sutra of the Wise and the Foolish speaks of two individuals – the wise one who is very mindful of his Karmic actions, and the foolish one who is mindless of his actions.
Karma is the foundation of Buddhism.
For Buddhists, Karma is not a system that the Buddha created. When the Buddha became enlightened, he obtained full omniscience. Using this, he was able to identify all causes and effects, from the gross to the subtlest levels.
Thus, a bulk of his teachings teaches how to create good causes and avoid harmful causes for ourselves. Finally, he taught how to be liberated from Karma altogether. That is the Buddha state.
The concept of Karma is very complex. There are too many factors influencing one’s collection of Karma. To trace one particular effect to a single cause is rare.
However, in hundreds of stories in the Sutras, Buddha Shakyamuni did exactly this. This is so that his listeners can easily understand that negative effects will eventually lead to negative results. Also, the listeners can understand that even the smallest actions, such as a moment of anger expressed to a Buddha, Bodhisattva or Arhat, can lead to big, unfortunate results.
We share three well-loved stories here. They come from the popular Sutra, Sutra of the Wise and Foolish. This Sutra has been translated into Tibetan, Chinese, English and Mongolian.
Download PDF here (English)