Talk:Karma in Buddhism: Difference between revisions

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	== April 2007 ==
	This article contained a fair amount of nonsense, and hardly anything is sourced. For the monent I've altered it to agree with Theravada doctrine, except where it specifically refers to Mahayana. I hope people who know about other schools can note any differences. ] 14:46, 18 April 2007 (UTC)

	== Proposed External Link: karma-Buddhism Yahoo Group ==

	] 12:44, 7 August 2007 (UTC)

	== Errors in the article? ==
	I'm note sure how the following quote from the page makes sense: "In Buddhism, Karma is simply there as a guide and an indication of what the reason for your present state is and how one's future can be made better by self effort. Fatalism and pre-determinism is the anti-thesis of the notion of perfection or self-conquest -- which is the primary aim of Buddhism." In particular, Buddhism never advocates any "self effort" as there is no "self" to excert the effort, and an enlightened being only observes (hence, generating no karma). There are no goals of "perfection or self-conquest" in Buddhism, only the idea of realizing the truth (since an elightened being has no clinging, it can't possibly have goals). It seems as the entire passage is wrong, but I don't feel I have sufficient knowledge to modify the article.

	I'm not sure that the revisions improve the article. This article lacks citations for assertions such as Karma only refers to "cause" -- and this is important because if you look at the way Karma is generally used everywhere, nobody uses such a definition in practice. This might be a place where one should talk about the different views of Karma within Buddhism rather than adding a sectarian view and not citing the source other than a personality. <span style="font-size: smaller;" class="autosigned">—Preceding ] comment added by ] (]) 00:51, 28 January 2009 (UTC)</span><!-- Template:UnsignedIP --> <!--Autosigned by SineBot-->

	== Universal karma ==
	* Seems to be important, but maybe it does not match with wikipedia's linklines.
	:Austerlitz -- ] (]) 10:20, 9 November 2008 (UTC)

	== the article has the word arhaticide, can someone please explain what that is, word is not found in any online dictionaries, is it spelled correctly? ==

	someone needs to explain the meaning of "arhaticide" please. thanks <span style="font-size: smaller;" class="autosigned">—Preceding ] comment added by ] (]) 21:47, 20 February 2010 (UTC)</span><!-- Template:UnsignedIP --> <!--Autosigned by SineBot-->

	:It's a neologism for sure, but it seems like the most concise way to spell it out - it means just what it appears to mean: killing an arhat. The meaning should be clear from both the construction and the context.] (]) 05:12, 21 February 2010 (UTC)

	::"Killing an arhat" would probably be a more straightforward way of doing this than a neologism. ] <span style="font-size: smaller;" class="autosigned">—Preceding ] comment added 07:39, 2 April 2010 (UTC).</span><!--Template:Undated--> <!--Autosigned by SineBot-->

	== AN.5.110? ==
	This sutta is given as a source for a claim which is controversial in some circles about whether or not karma is the supreme natural law. The Theravada position seems to be that it is just one of several laws, but I'm trying to clarify my understanding. However, I can't find this sutta online; or else I did find it but didn't see how it supported the claim -- see http://www.metta.lk/tipitaka/2Sutta-Pitaka/4Anguttara-Nikaya/Anguttara3/5-pancakanipata/011-phasuviharavaggo-e.html linked from http://www.suttacentral.net/disp_sutta.php?subdivision_id=63&subdivision_name=Pañcaka%20Nipāta&collection_name=Pali&division=AN&acronym=5&type=Subdivision ] (]) 07:27, 25 March 2010 (UTC)
	:I think the only public English translation of it is the Pali text society edition. The sutta you linked is AN 5.11 not AN 5.110, unfortunately. You could ask ] for more about this. He has the PTS translation I believe, and I think he knows Pali anyway, so he could look at the Pali source too, which is online. ] (]) 08:12, 25 March 2010 (UTC)
	::Thanks for your reply. I also noticed that the text is labeled "011" instead of "110" but wasn't sure if I was just missing something else. I suppose I should email suttacentral.net to let them know their link is incorrect. Thanks for the pointers on where to look. ] (]) 09:21, 25 March 2010 (UTC)

	== Fallacious justification for claim of non-determinism ==

	In the section on ], we find the following text:
	"The theory of karma is not deterministic, in part because past karma is not viewed as the only causal mechanism causing the present. In the case of diseases, for instance, he gives a list of other causes which may result in disease in addition to karma (AN.5.110)"

	This reasoning is fallacious. If a given type of event can be brought about by multiple types of causes, it doesn't either:
	A) Imply that causation by a given type of cause (here, karma) is non-deterministic (i.e. that that type of cause "could have" failed to bring about that effect in any given case), or
	B) That there is not deterministic causation by the whole list of possible types of causes.

	There seems to be a misunderstanding here whereby "the doctrine of karma is deterministic" is confused with "the doctrine of karma holds that karma is the only type of cause." I'm not expert enough to correct this confidently, but I would be pleased if someone who was took care of this. ] (]) 07:56, 2 April 2010 (UTC)

	::Well, let's first define determinism. American Heritage Dictionary has the following: "n. The philosophical doctrine that every state of affairs, including every human event, act, and decision is the inevitable consequence of antecedent states of affairs." The Online Etymology Dictionary has "in theology (lack of free will); in general sense of 'doctrine that everything happens by a necessary causation.'" Maybe the sentence in question should read, "The theory of karma is not comprehensively deterministic"? ] (]) 14:13, 2 April 2010 (UTC)

	:::Hm. Not sure I see how that helps. The point is that the text in question implicitly presents itself ("karma is not deterministic... because..." etc.) as offering some point against the view that the karma doctrine is deterministic (the definitions you present seem perfectly workable), but in fact it does no such thing. Asserting that there are other types of causes fails altogether to bear on the question of whether the actions of karma are deterministic, or indeed whether the world view that it forms a part of is deterministic. Imagine if I were to say "The doctrine of people falling off a cliff because they slip on a banana peel is not deterministic, because people are caused to fall off of cliffs by events other than slipping on banana peels." You can see that this makes no sense, because the existence of other causes of falls off of cliffs bears neither on the question of whether banana-peel induced cliff falls are deterministic (ie brought about inevitably by antecedent events), nor on whether falls off of cliffs in general are deterministic (in that same sense). ] (]) 13:44, 4 April 2010 (UTC)

	::Well, it seems to me that what the article is trying to say is that there seems to be a sense that in theories of determinism, particularly ], everything is said to happen by a necessary causation and furthermore the agent of necessary causation is ultimately ''singular''--an omnipotent deity. In which case, a model whereby causation can be attributed to multiple factors cannot be properly called determinism.] (]) 18:14, 4 April 2010 (UTC)

	==9/1 edits==
	I reverted these because reliably sourced sections were deleted and too many tags were added to what are clearly reliable sources. You may not agree with David Loy (and I myself don't), but he is an academic who is published widely and his opinions are valid in the section.] (]) 14:48, 1 September 2010 (UTC)
	:Most of my edits were valid, and you should not have mass reverted ''all'' of them, just because you disagreed with ''some'' of them. If you disagreed with something, you should say why, and discuss it here or re-add that part, not blanket remove everything. I've undone your removal of my edits, and we can discuss each of them here. I'll momentarily discuss each of them. -- ] (]) 14:57, 1 September 2010 (UTC)

	A few notes on my edits:
	* '''Tagged sources''' -- You said "many tags were added to what are clearly reliable sources". No, they were not. Academic publishers and scholarly journals were not tagged. These are "clearly reliable sources". Things like "kalachakranet" were tagged. Could you explain to me how this is a "clearly reliable source" under ]? In general, we should use scholarly sources, per ], since this topic is widely covered enough in the scholarly literature, that we don't need to resort to less scholarly sources.-- ] (]) 15:04, 1 September 2010 (UTC)
	* '''Loy''' -- I did not say that Loy's views were removed because they are not valid. I said that they were given undue weight. See ]. His views on Karma do not warrant 3 or more paragraphs. After hundreds of years of Buddhist studies, why do David Loy's views warrant such enormous weight? (Especially when there are plenty of higher-quality scholarly sources on the subject)
	::This not even close to an undue weight problem. We're talking about three short paragraphs in a relatively small section of a long article. In this ''particular section'' ("Modern interpretations and controversies") most of the hundreds of years of Buddhist studies are not relevant--they were already given a thorough airing in the balance of the article. Aside from his academic credentials, Loy is widely published and read by the general Buddhist audience and is one of the most most prominent voices on the subject.] (]) 19:03, 3 September 2010 (UTC)
	Anyhow, I don't know if there is anything else you disagreed with, but that's because you didn't say what you disagreed with and why. If you have any other problems, please let me know, and we'll discuss them. -- ] (]) 15:04, 1 September 2010 (UTC)
	::My concern is that if you can't recognize Lamotte's translation of the Karmasiddhiprakarana as a reliable source, then you don't have sufficient familiarity with the field to be weighing in on what is and isn't a reliable source. You are tagging ''Numen'', which is easily verifiable as a leading academic journal by anyone remotely familiar with Buddhist Studies, as not being a reliable source? Seriously? And to add an RS tag to a book by a tenured professor of Buddhist studies and published by a leading Buddhist publisher? That's just ridiculous. The RS tag isn't something to be added indiscriminately to articles when you have zero familiarity with what is and isn't a reliable source on the topic in question and can barely be bothered to find out.] (]) 18:33, 3 September 2010 (UTC)

	== Shoot for FA? ==

	This article is amazingly thorough. Perhaps we should aim to get some recognition for this. Credit goes mostly to Sylvain! ] (]) 05:06, 2 November 2010 (UTC)

	:: I think that the sections on East Asian and vajrayana needs substantial improvement before it could deserve any recognition. but some parts are definately good. <small><span class="autosigned">— Preceding ] comment added by ] (] • ]) 15:39, 25 March 2011 (UTC)</span></small><!-- Template:Unsigned --> <!--Autosigned by SineBot-->

	== Thanissaro Bhikkhu quote ==

	The article, directly under the Mahayana heading, contains this quote without any context:

	], a Theravādin monk, speculates that the development of the karma doctrine in the direction of determinism necessitated the development of the Mahāyāna concepts of ] and savior Buddhas (see ]): <blockquote><nowiki>n</nowiki> later centuries, when the principle of freedom was
	forgotten ... Past bad kamma was seen as so totally deterministic that there seemed
	no way around it unless you assumed either an innate Buddha in the mind that
	could overpower it, or an external Buddha who would save you from it.
	- Thanissaro Bhikkhu, "Freedom from Buddha-nature", page 4. Available online: .</blockquote>

	Now, I do not know exactly why Thanissaro Bhikkhu is being used as an expert on Mahayana, because he is certainly not a specialist in this area. He is widely respected in Theravada Buddhism, but there should be no illusions that he is NPOV regarding Mahayana. His writings often contain tinges of spite and derision regarding Mahayana or bodhisattvas, or subtle attempts to write them off as being spurious inventions. In this case, Mahayana belongs to the dark "later days" of Indian Buddhism when "freedom" had been forgotten, and all the ignorant Buddhists could do was cling to nonsensical whims about savior buddhas. Frankly, this sort of quote isn't even on the NPOV radar, so I have removed it from the article. ] (]) 00:52, 24 March 2011 (UTC)

	== AN 5.292 ==
	I can´t find this sutta online. Can you please offer a link or cite the original (English) quotation? Actually I am not sure if it is a good thing to cite this specific sutta at all. I think it is too fatalistic for an introductory text to karma without further explanation. ] (]) 12:13, 28 July 2011 (UTC)
	:It is cited in a secondary source - I've now provided the citation. Whether or not it would be perceived as "too fatalistic" by some readers, besides being entirely subjective, is not something that is a legitimate consideration in editing wikipedia articles. They are intended to be accurate and NPOV as possible, not edited to make their subject maximally appealing to the imagined sensibilities of the readership.] (]) 16:57, 18 August 2011 (UTC)

	==DN 3.217 ==
	This does not seem to be a correct reference to sutta 3 in the Digha Nikaya (DN). In a commonly used English translation (Maurice Walshe) there is no subsection 217 to DN 3. ] (]) 17:36, 12 August 2011 (UTC)
	:Unfortunately, there is more than one convention used in citing Pali scriptures. I'll dig up the secondary source where this reference was given. But from what I can tell from the Walshe this occurs on pg 484.] (]) 16:58, 18 August 2011 (UTC)

	== 'blaming the victim' ==

	''The question of the Holocaust also occurs in the Jew in the Lotus: A Poet's Re-Discovery of Jewish Identity in Buddhist India, which describes a group of Jewish religious leaders who meet with the Dalai Lama. They ask one of the Dalai Lama's party, a Buddhist scholar named Geshe Sonam Rinchen, if the Holocaust would be attributed to past karma in the traditional Buddhist view, and he affirms that it would. The author is "shocked and a little outraged," because, like Loy, he felt it "sounded like blaming the victim."''

	I don't dispute the source of the above, but OTOH it doesn't suggest that there was any opportunity for a rejoinder either. I have no published source, but oral explanations from teachers of the same lineages as Geshe Sonam Rinchen have repeatedly clarified this issue as follows:
	* All beings have been generating karma endlessly.
	* Until we are very accomplished on the path or if we have purified or previously ripened it, the vast proportion of our negative karma is unripened, waiting for the circumstances under which it may ripen.
	* This implies that anyone (not just jews or any other group) in the same circumstances would have undergone the same fate.
	* The remarkable thing is regarding those for whom the karma wasn't present (and therefore didn't ripen)
	* It gives us an idea of how many people in the world would survive a global disaster of similar proportions - about 9%.
	* So, for any given circumstances (such as the holocaust) there is a 9/10 chance that you have the karma for that to ripen in you.

	There are also all sorts of other problems about using terms like 'victim blame' - the notion of blame is not present in Buddhism, in that the agent of one's actions is not the person, but the intentions arising in a mental continuum. Instead we are, as Dennett (1992) puts it, “centers of narrative gravity.” That is not to say that persons or their actions do not exist, but rather to say that our mode of existence is merely conventional, merely imputed. (For more on this see Garfield 2006 and Newland 2009). If we are to ascribe agency and responsibility (notions that underpin the idea of both 'victim' and 'blame') then we will be ascribing agency and responsibility to the nominal entity of 'person' only.

	Moreover, and this is probably the most central issue in terms of the purpose of Karma in Buddhism, is that it is used as a didactic methodology for establishing a strong grounding in responsibility for one's actions, and it most emphatically is not used for explaining historic events. The entire emphasis of Karma within Buddhism is the inevitability of consequences to one's actions. (] (]) 11:36, 26 September 2013 (UTC))

	==Main Karma article needs attention==

	Perhaps some of the experts who wrote this article might like to look over the main ] article? I've tagged it as "needs attention of expert" because it says many things that are not in accord with Buddhist ideas of karma.

	First, a minor point, the ] section says "Most types of karmas, with good or bad results, will keep one within the wheel of saṃsāra, while others will liberate one to nirvāna" - do any Buddhists say this? I thought that nirvana was liberation from cycles of karma - how can karma liberate you from karma?

	Then the ] section attributes difficulties to Buddhist ideas of karma making many false assumptions about what those ideas are.

	I don't feel able to correct the article myself. Thanks! ] (]) 17:11, 9 September 2014 (UTC)
	: Thanks for the comments. I will review the article. It may take a little while to get to. Cheers, ] (]) 00:13, 11 September 2014 (UTC)

	:: Okay great! No hurry, it's probably been like that for a fair while :)

	:: I've found out a bit more since then, the issues in the section ] mainly occur because it is incorrectly positioned and labelled - the source material is a series of articles about an attempt to apply Buddhist and Hindu ideas of Karma to construct a Theodicy (attempt to explain how a just God permits suffering) in theistic religions. Which explains a lot so I've suggested that it should be moved to the Western section and appropriately labelled.

	:: However the short section on ] I think also needs attention - I suggested adding the four characteristics of Karma from this article as bullet points, to permit easy comparison with the other ideas of karma on that page - just a suggestion - additionally though I think the paras already there need a review and rewrite. See ] ] (]) 10:33, 11 September 2014 (UTC)

	==Storing text from the "Buddhism" section in article "Karma"==
	This presentation of karma looks accurate, but I have not yet found any sources that present karma in the same manner, using similar language. So I am storing this text here so that we can research and determine the source for this presentation--specifically the presentation of karma as "within the group or groups of cause in the chain of cause and effect". I think this explanation is explaining karma with the context of the twelve links, which is important to note, but it is a somewhat advanced explanation, and not how karma is typically presented to beginners.

	:In Buddhism, karma (Pāli ''kamma'') is strictly distinguished from '']'', meaning "fruit" or "result". Karma is categorized within the group or groups of cause (Pāli ''hetu'') in the ] of ], where it comprises the elements of "volitional activities" (Pali ''sankhara'') and "action" (Pali ''bhava''). Any action is understood as creating "seeds" in the mind that will sprout into the appropriate result (Pāli ''vipaka'') when met with the right conditions.

	:Karma is one of five categories of causation, known collectively as '']'', the first being ''kamma'', and the other four being ''utu'' (seasons and weather), ''bīja'' (heredity, lit. "seed"), ''chitta'' (mind) and '']'' (law, in the sense of nature's tendency to perfect). - ] (]) 16:00, 13 September 2014 (UTC)

	==Omniscience article==

	First, thanks so much, ], for fixing the Karma article.

	Just to say - this isn't directly to do with this article like the Karma article, just a mention in the intro. Also, like karma, it is a word that's easily misunderstood by Westerners, and has different shades of interpretation in Buddhism.

	So anyway - just drawing attention in case anyone wants to take a look at it. The ] section is highly technical (I haven't much idea what it is about myself). And I think there are useful things that could be said there to introduce the Buddhist idea of omniscience and especially its special characteristics compared with Western ideas.

	See ]. Though once again I don't feel at all qualified to do that myself.

	So - I just wondered if you ] or anyone else would like to have a look at it also.

	Thanks! ] (]) 15:11, 15 September 2014 (UTC)
	: Hi, Robert. I agree the Omniscience section could use work, preferable a separate article for "Omniscience (Buddhism)". I hope to get to this, but again it may really take a while for me to get to it. I also plan to make further changes to the article on Karma. Best regards, ] (]) 00:54, 17 September 2014 (UTC)

	::FYI, I have started a research page for Omniscience here: ]. If anyone comes across good sources for this term, please add the source to the research page (preferably with the relevant quote). Regards, ] (]) 19:25, 5 October 2014 (UTC)

	::: Thanks Dorje, that's great! Just spotted your reply. ] (]) 10:43, 21 October 2014 (UTC)

	:::: Also had a chance today to look at your Omniscience research page. Lots of good stuff there. And just to upvote your suggestion of a separate article on Omniscience (Buddhism) - I'll look forward to reading it. ] (]) 14:54, 22 October 2014 (UTC)

	==Western Bias in main Karma article==		==Western Bias in main Karma article==
Line 173:		Line 34:
	] (])		] (])

	== ~~Popular~~ ~~Buddhism~~ ==		== Too much ==

	This article contains the same mass of popular notions as does/did the article on the four truths. Not "action", but "intention" is central to the Buddhist notion of karma. The emphasis on "action" is the Jain/Hindu understanding. ] -] 06:27, 16 November 2014 (UTC)

	: Have no idea what you are saying here - Karma involves both action and intention. Doesn't make sense to make either central surely?

	: To take a simple example. If you stop someone from murdering someone, forcefully, or by misdirection, or hiding their intended victim etc - then they don't experience the negative effects of completing their action, even though they may still have the intention, at least temporarily, to carry it out. The Buddha did this, for instance, when he stopped Angulimala from killing his own mother by presenting himself as a target instead. So that's an example from the Sutras where preventing the action was of great importance. How can you deny this element of the Buddhist teachings?

	: But on the other side, then obviously an action is coloured by the intention. E.g. whether you make a gift out of pure generosity, or do it in order to entrap someone.

	: To be clear, I'm not an editor of the article. I'm just someone who has found it useful, and am sad that you have deleted so much of it, to accord with your own concepts about what Karma means in Buddhism.

	: And now say something that seems to me to make no sense at all in your talk page comment. And as someone who has just deleted a lot of work by other editors whose editing I respect and who say things that make a lot of sense.

	: No citation given. This brief comment explains your reason for removing more than half the article? ] (]) 04:39, 25 November 2014 (UTC)

	== Clean-up ==

	I'm sorry for the effort which was invested in collcting all those quotes - but it was really ''unreadable'', and not encyclopedic. ] -] 22:12, 16 November 2014 (UTC)

	: I'd like to protest strongly - not as someone involved in writing this article - but as someone who has used it for reference.

	: You've removed so much valuable material. It was an excellent article before your recent edits. Others said the same on this talk page. So sad to see such a good article destroyed in this way.

	: To take just one example, this section summarizes some of the most frequent misunderstandings of the Buddhist teachings on Karma and clears them up. Current version doesn't address these points at all as far as I can see.

	: It was also well written. And the quotes well chosen. I didn't find it at all unreadable.

	: What particularly were your reasons for removing the section, just to take one example? And - wouldn't it have been appropriate to discuss it on the talk page first before making such extensive changes?

	: You might have found general agreement with your proposed changes, but you might not, and that's why we have talk pages, so we can discuss changes first, especially ones likely to be controversial such as deleting half the content of an article with many citations.

	: If - to take an example - any of the citations were inadequate - well you add "more citations needed" tags, not delete the whole section. And explain the issue on the talk page and give the original authors the opportunity to find more citations to back up what they wrote. You don't just delete whole sections if you think they are insufficiently supported by citations.

	: This is exactly the kind of conduct that leads so many good editors to leave Misplaced Pages. There are many good Eastern scholars, Buddhist and Hindu, but there seem to be hardly any of them contributing here in Misplaced Pages.

	: My only contribution as you can check in the history was to fix one broken link. So am not at all personally involved as an editor.

	: But as a reader, I won't be able to use it any more in it's current form. As Buddhist editors especially tend to be non confrontational - I wouldn't be surprised if a few of them just stop editing wikipedia as a result. Which would be a great shame, in my view anyway - they did an excellent job of editing this article. Summarized a complex and difficult subject in clear, concise language, and well organized. I have backed up the last good version of the article to my user space ] for reference as the current version is no good to me.

	: Why, why, why didn't you engage with the existing editors first, and ask them to back up what they did with more citations? Or challenge them on whatever the particular issues you have here on the talk page first? ] (]) 04:06, 25 November 2014 (UTC)

	::Robert, my reasons are clear: too many primary sources, too many quotes. ''More'' citations is definitely not the solution. This issue extends over several articles, and I've commented on it before, as have others. To take one example:
	:::''"In Buddhist philosophy, karmic results are not considered to be a "judgement" imposed by a God or other all-powerful being, but rather the results of a natural process."''
	::"In Buddhist philosophy" - that's an incredible generalisation! ''Which'' Buddhist philosophy, which school, which author? To add a couple of quotes does not help here; you can't just throw 2,500 years of Buddhist history together under such a general notice.
	::The reason that scholars don't contribute to Misplaced Pages is exactly for this abundancy of popular notions, and a lack of reference to scholarly sources. ] -] 06:01, 25 November 2014 (UTC)

			{{yo\|ZuluPapa5}} I think that is becoming too much. The article is on Karma in Buddhism, not on Karma in Nyingma. Maybe you can move it to a better-suited article(s)? Best regards, ] -] 04:29, 9 January 2016 (UTC)
	:::: But you can with Buddhism, because they are the teachings of a single teacher, unlike Hinduism. And what's more, he taught extensively for several decades. And the very extensive ] which is now well over 2000 years old is accepted by all the schools of Buddhism. That's why general statements like that are possible about Buddhism.

			:Ha ha ha, I sensed this was coming. Maybe wikipedia should have these individual Nyingma sections put into a combined summary, and drop the direct lama attributions here? I could draft a combined paragraphs and drop the lama attributions. Alternatively, ] could be an article following the ] and ] example. I have about 3 or 4 other Vajrayana Nyingma Buddhism references to add. What I am seeing is that causality literature originates with karma and as technologies advance the so do the human experience metaphors. Feedback appreciated. ] (]) 17:07, 10 January 2016 (UTC)
	:::: And the citations you deleted were scholarly, fulfilled all the requirements of wikipedia for notable secondary sources.

			: BTW, I just found an essene of the issue source, I believe it's pointing to sutra. Not to go against your concerns; but, plan to add it in to the top. ] (]) 17:47, 10 January 2016 (UTC)
	:::: That particular short section you deleted has by , , ] (one of the few Tibetan lamas to have studied teachings in all four of the Tibetan schools), ], and the very famous Sri Lankan Scholar ]. I'm sure many more could be added also. Why not ask for more citations if those five weren't enough for you? It just shows an astonishing ignorance of Buddhism to delete something like that without discussion. ] (]) 15:55, 25 November 2014 (UTC)

			== External links modified ==
	:::: '''] for instance, author of one of those five citations, is, internationally, surely the most famous Sri Lankan scholar''', who became the first bikkhu to hold a chair in a Western Institution, in 1964, when he became the Professor of History and Religions at Northwestern University. He is also the author of ] - one of the most famous books in modern Buddhism, considered by many to be the best exposition of Therevadhan Buddhism. Just about every educated Buddhist - if they haven't read his book - at least surely has heard of him. How can anyone consider themselves qualified to make major changes to articles on Buddhism if they haven't heard of him?

			Hello fellow Wikipedians,
	:::: It was one of the most scholarly and highly cited articles I have ever seen in Misplaced Pages.

			I have just added archive links to {{plural:2\|one external link\|2 external links}} on ]. Please take a moment to review . You may add {{tlx\|cbignore}} after the link to keep me from modifying it, if I keep adding bad data, but formatting bugs should be reported instead. Alternatively, you can add {{tlx\|nobots\|deny{{=}}InternetArchiveBot}} to keep me off the page altogether, but should be used as a last resort. I made the following changes:
	:::: Or do you have to write from the perspective of Western Theology before you can be cited in Misplaced Pages articles on Buddhism?
			*Attempted to fix sourcing for http://www.buddhanet.net/cmdsg/kamma6.htm
			*Attempted to fix sourcing for http://www.surajamrita.com/yoga/hidden/box3/ABHIDHARMAHRDAYA.pdf

			When you have finished reviewing my changes, please set the ''checked'' parameter below to '''true''' or '''failed''' to let others know (documentation at {{tlx\|Sourcecheck}}).
	:::: '''And - when you have a question about sources - you need to add a "citation needed" template - or ask questions on the talk page first'''. If everyone went around deleting everything in wikipedia that they didn't know themselves and with citations to sources they hadn't read and didn't recognize, there would be nothing left here. ] (]) 15:59, 25 November 2014 (UTC)

			{{sourcecheck\|checked=false}}
	== Transfer of merit ==

	~~I've moved (~~.~~..) "Transfer of merit" to ].~~ ] -] 11:43, 17 ~~November~~ ~~2014~~ (UTC)		Cheers.—]<small><sub style="margin-left:-14.9ex;color:green;font-family:Comic Sans MS">]:Online</sub></small> 10:39, 31 March 2016 (UTC)

	== Summary of clean-up ==

			==Nichiren's view of karma==
	compared to

			I would like to add Nichiren's view of karma to the list. There are many millions of Nichiren followers.] (]) 21:44, 9 April 2018 (UTC)
	* Lead: shortened, to give a ''short'' summary
	* "Meaning of karma": "specific level"-defintion merged into "Buddhist understanding of karma"
	* "Centrality to Buddhist thought": selective reading; see "Development of the concept#Early Buddhism", which makes clear that "karma" may not have been so central to early Buddhism. Also: ''"all of one's actions will have a corresponding result"''; the notion of ''intention'' is missing here, which gives a wrong impression. It's kind of ]
	* "Karmic action and result (Karmphala)": ''karmaphala'' is an obscure term; the list with expressions is overdone
	* "Interdependent origination": mere mentioning is enough; it's now mentioned in "Rebirth and intention"
	* "Whatever we do has a result": one line, long quote
	* "Multiple causes and conditions": idem, plus primary sources
	* "Seed and fruit": Harvey is moved to "Rebirth and intention"
	* "Positive and negative actions": primary sources, interpretations, generalisations (''"From the Buddhist point of view"'')
	* "Overcoming habitual tendencies": primary sources, long quotations
	* "Right view (understanding action and result)": primary sources, long quotations
	* "Rebirth": ""Rebirth and intention""; rest are primary sources and long quotations
	* "Characteristics": essay-like; long quotations; generalisations
	* "Twelve Nidanas ": part of "Rebirth and intention"
	* "Three types of misunderstanding": ]
	* "Buddha's realization of": part of "Development of the concept"
	* "Within the Buddhist discourses": too long; primary sources; unsourced parts
	* "Within Buddhist traditions": retained, though shortened: specific information, instead of the previous generalisations
	* "Dedication of merit and rejoicing": moved to ]
	* "Modern interpretations and controversies": too long; shortened
	* "Contemporary glosses": ]
	* "Etymology": moved upward; standard to place this at the start
	Best regards, ] -] 09:43, 25 November 2014 (UTC)

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Western Bias in main Karma article

An RfC seems an obvious way ahead but the editor who feels strongly that the article should remain as it is has shown no interest in a RfC.

The issue is that the article has a Karma#Discussion section which is based on an article by a Western philosopher Whitely Kaufman, called "Karma, Rebirth and the problem of evil" presented to the "Revisioning Karma" conference.

It presents many conclusions Kaufman made about Karma, and presents them in objective "encyclopaedic tone" as issues with all such ideas not just in Western adaptations of the ideas but in the original Hindu and Buddhist ideas of karma. Also it is presented before the sections on Karma in Hinduism, Buddhism etc - so at that point in the article the reader hasn't yet been exposed to the original ideas.

There is no evidence as far as I can see that her arguments have been accepted as even of interest by Eastern scholars. Those involved in the debate as far as I can see are Western theologians and philosophers. At any rate, no Eastern scholars as far as I can see in the papers submitted to the conference on "Revisioning Karma".

For details, see Talk:Karma#Western bias of the Discussion Section - summary of the issues

As you'll see there also, Dorje presented a suggestion for re-ordering the page that was supported by myself also and one other editor but it came to nothing Talk:Karma#Problem_with_recent_section_reordering

I don't know what to do next, I know sometimes on Misplaced Pages there is nothing you can do in cases like this, just drawing your attention to this. Suggestions welcome!

Robert Walker (talk)

Too much

@ZuluPapa5: I think that this is becoming too much. The article is on Karma in Buddhism, not on Karma in Nyingma. Maybe you can move it to a better-suited article(s)? Best regards, Joshua Jonathan -Let's talk! 04:29, 9 January 2016 (UTC)

Ha ha ha, I sensed this was coming. Maybe wikipedia should have these individual Nyingma sections put into a combined summary, and drop the direct lama attributions here? I could draft a combined paragraphs and drop the lama attributions. Alternatively, Karma in Vajrayana Nyingma Buddhism could be an article following the Karma and Karma in Buddhism example. I have about 3 or 4 other Vajrayana Nyingma Buddhism references to add. What I am seeing is that causality literature originates with karma and as technologies advance the so do the human experience metaphors. Feedback appreciated. Zulu Papa 5 * (talk) 17:07, 10 January 2016 (UTC)

BTW, I just found an essene of the issue source, I believe it's pointing to sutra. Not to go against your concerns; but, plan to add it in to the top. Zulu Papa 5 * (talk) 17:47, 10 January 2016 (UTC)

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Cheers.—_{Talk to my owner:Online} 10:39, 31 March 2016 (UTC)

Nichiren's view of karma

I would like to add Nichiren's view of karma to the list. There are many millions of Nichiren followers.Ltdan43 (talk) 21:44, 9 April 2018 (UTC)

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