Karma, Reincarnation and Christianity
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Jesus affirmed the law of karma and reincarnation that is taught in the Old Testament. Yet the Christian Church–from the Church Fathers all the way to the present leadership–has not acknowledged the record of Jesus’ teaching on this subject. Rather, the prelates have vehemently denied it!
The denial of karma and reincarnation in Christianity today is a betrayal of the soul of every Christian–and Jew and Moslem. The clergy is not teaching us what Jesus really said and what he really meant.
What’s more, many Christians today who study the scriptures all of their lives fail to see that they teach karma and reincarnation. This is a never-ending source of amazement to me. They don’t see that the law of karma is written in the four Gospels and in the letters of the apostles. And they don’t see that reincarnation is unequivocally established by Jesus’ recorded words.
But the Comforter (who is the Holy Spirit), whom Jesus promised that the Father would send in his name, has indeed come. He is teaching us all things and he is bringing to our remembrance everything Jesus has said to our souls from the beginning about the law of karma and reincarnation. <1> And the clergy cannot deny the witness of the Holy Spirit that is being poured out upon all flesh in these latter days! <2>
It’s not a question of mysteries. It’s not a question of some arcane interpretation of the Bible. I’m talking about the exact words that were spoken by Jesus Christ and his apostles as they gave us God’s law of karma and reincarnation!
In his Sermon on the Mount, Jesus says: “Think not that I am come to destroy the law or the prophets: I am not come to destroy but to fulfill.” <3> So Jesus came to fulfill the law that is written in the Old Testament and the prophets who proclaimed it. And truly it was the law of karma that he came to fulfill.
As I see it, all of the laws of God set forth in the Old and New Testaments as well as in the major world religions are integral to the law of karma. Even the Ten Commandments set forth the righteous will of God, that the people who obey them might be spared a horrendous karma, which they would otherwise make in their ignorance of the law.
The judgments governing the society of Israel and the ordinances that provide the framework for their religious life likewise establish what is and is not acceptable in the sight of I AM THAT I AM under the law of karma. <4> Clearly this law establishes the righteousness or the unrighteousness of a man’s acts, including his thoughts and feelings, his lusts, the desires of his heart and the inclination of his soul.
Jesus says: “For verily I say unto you, Till heaven and earth pass, one jot or one tittle shall in no wise pass from the law till all be fulfilled.” <5> And this jot and tittle that we all must pay–that will not pass from our accounts or our accountability till all of our debts be paid–is the jot and tittle of our karma.
We must remember that the law of karma is the law of the causal relationship between a man’s acts and the universe’s re-action to his acts that returns to his doorstep. This return of positive and negative karma continues daily, hourly and forever until his soul is perfected in Christ and he escapes the rounds of reincarnation, which have their root in the karma of desire.
If you want to be around for another million years, just ignore Jesus’ statement about not one jot or tittle passing from the law. Just ignore what is written in the Bible and let the clergy tell you what you want to hear. If it’s the sop <6> you want, then take the sop. But if it’s the strong meat of the Word, <7> then take the meat of the Word from Jesus’ own mouth.
Because if you want to move on with the universe, if you want to fulfill your reason for being on earth and graduate from this schoolroom of life and transcend the cycles of the stars and arrive at the next station of your evolution in realms of glory, you are going to have to shoulder your karmic responsibilities and pay your debts to life.
Yes, take up your karmic cross, as your Lord told you to do, and follow him. <8> (And follow only those clergy who take up their karmic cross and follow him!) Yes, become his disciple and follow him all the way to Golgotha and beyond to the resurrection and the ascension. And see whether those clergy who deny Jesus’ teaching on karma and reincarnation (expecting him to carry their bag and baggage) are going before you or trailing behind or disappearing altogether!
Yes, pay your debts now and pay them quickly. Pay them to anyone and everyone. Get right with people. Call them up and tell them you love them. Tell them you’re sorry for something you did or said to them ten years ago or thirty years ago. Tell them you want to make things right with them.
Then do something worthwhile for them or with them. Render a service. Bring them a special gift from your heart. How about starting with the greatest gift of all–the joy that is in your heart, which is the joy of the Lord that he has first given you so that you could give it to others. Make peace with people so that when your time comes you can rest in that peace.
Pay as you go and one day, sooner than you think, you will have fulfilled the last jot and tittle of your karma and you will be free. And here is the real mystery: Although you will have balanced your karma and worked the works of him that sent you, <9> although you will have taken full accountability for your actions, yet you will know that you have won your victory by the grace of your Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ. And you will understand that it was because he saved your soul to reincarnate again and again that you did indeed return to finish the work–the work of your karma and the work of your dharma.
No, you never could have done it without him. You did it–the Lord working with you and through you in all those karmic things and soul testings and initiations on the path of your discipleship unto Christ. And the words of Jesus will come to mind: “With man nothing is possible but with God all things are possible,” <10> and the word of the LORD to Zerubbabel: “Not by might, nor by power, but by my Spirit, saith the LORD of hosts.” <11>
And you will say to yourself, “It wasn’t by any might or power of my own but it was by the Spirit of the Lord that I overcame my karma and escaped out of the hand of the seed of the Wicked One: All glory to the Father-Mother God, to the Son and to the Holy Spirit! All glory to the Mighty I AM Presence!”
In Matthew 12, Jesus lectures the scribes and Pharisees. He says: “A good man out of the good treasure of the heart bringeth forth good things [that is, good works, good karma], and an evil man out of the evil treasure bringeth forth evil things [bad works, bad karma].” <12> As the desire of the heart is and as the intent of the soul is, so will the karma, or the acts, be.
Next Jesus sets forth a law that will not be broken. These are not the words of the Old Testament prophets and patriarchs. These are the words of our Lord: “But I say unto you, That every idle word that men shall speak, they shall give account thereof in the day of judgment. For by thy words thou shalt be justified, and by thy words thou shalt be condemned.” <13>
Did Jesus say, “But if you accept me as your Lord and Saviour, I will neutralize this law”? Show me in the New Testament where Jesus says that this statement is neutralized. He never neutralized it. It remains true to this very hour and this very day. And if we are accountable for every idle word that we speak, how much more are we accountable for every act–and the state of mind or mindlessness that precedes the act or the desire that impels it? The law of karma gives us sound reason to control our tongues as well as our uncontrolled thoughts and feelings that propel our tongues.
The Sermon on the Mount is a treasure trove of the law of karma. Jesus states the mathematical precision of the law of karma: “With what judgment ye judge, ye shall be judged. And with what measure ye mete, it shall be measured to you again....Therefore all things whatsoever ye would that men should do to you, do ye even so to them. For this is the law and the prophets.” <14>
The entire sermon recorded in Matthew 5-7 is Jesus’ doctrine on the rewards for righteous and unrighteous conduct–karma. The Sermon on the Mount is a sermon on karma. Go home and burn the midnight oil and read it tonight and read Jesus’ words with a new enlightenment of the Holy Spirit. It is his teaching on the consequences of thoughts, feelings, words and deeds. It’s the greatest lesson on karma, as the law of personal accountability for one’s acts, that you will find anywhere.
At the scene of his arrest, Jesus reiterates the law of karmic retribution. The Gospels record: “One of them which were with Jesus stretched out his hand, and drew his sword, and struck a servant of the high priest’s, and smote off his ear. Then said Jesus unto him, Put up again thy sword into his place; for all they that take the sword shall perish with the sword....And he touched his ear and healed him.” <15>
Jesus may have had compassion on the high priest’s servant but he also had compassion on his disciple. He put that ear back on and healed him so that his disciple would not have the karma of having to have his ear cut off at some future date. Think of that. Not all of us have Jesus with us in the flesh to undo our hasty acts.
In this act Jesus confirms Exodus: “Eye for eye, tooth for tooth, hand for hand, foot for foot, burning for burning, wound for wound, stripe for stripe.” <16> In his Sermon on the Mount he quotes the Mosaic law as the foundation for the teaching that follows:
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| Ye have heard that it hath been said, An eye for an eye, and a tooth for a tooth. But I say unto you, That ye resist not evil but whosoever shall smite thee on thy right cheek, turn to him the other also. And if any man will sue thee at the law and take away thy coat, let him have thy cloak also. And whosoever shall compel thee to go a mile, go with him twain. Give to him that asketh thee, and from him that would borrow of thee turn not thou away. Ye have heard that it hath been said, Thou shalt love thy neighbor and hate thine enemy. But I say unto you, Love your enemies, bless them that curse you, do good to them that hate you, and pray for them which despitefully use you and persecute you, that ye may be the children of your Father which is in heaven. For he maketh his sun to rise on the evil and on the good and sendeth rain on the just and on the unjust. For if ye love them which love you, what reward have ye? Do not even the publicans the same? And if ye salute your brethren only, what do ye more than others? Do not even the publicans so? Be ye therefore perfect, even as your Father which is in heaven is perfect. <17> |
Not only does this portion of the Sermon on the Mount fulfill the mandates of the law of karma as set forth by Moses, it goes far beyond them: it establishes the law of individual Christhood. The standard is love, forgiveness and the perfecting of the soul.
Jesus affirms the law of Moses and then takes us to the next step. He says: The law cannot be broken, but it can be fulfilled through Divine Love. Moreover, since you seek the crown of everlasting life, you must compensate more, not less, for every infraction of the code of the law. And even when you have done no wrong at all, you must give and give again, for your life is not to be merely a story of balancing bad karma; it is to be the history of a soul who has sown much good karma and thereby gained his soul’s self-mastery in Love and union with Christ while bringing generous blessings to all people.
Jesus’ path of sowing and reaping is one of sowing and reaping the Christ principle and the Christ consciousness in order to set the example that can be followed by all. Sealing his doctrine of grace under the aegis of the law of God, Jesus counsels: “Therefore all things whatsoever ye would that men should do to you, do ye even so to them. For this is the law and the prophets.” <18>
The Book of Revelation echoes the theme of Exodus: “He that leadeth into captivity shall go into captivity.” If we enslave anyone to any habit, to any pernicious type of behavior, we shall so be enslaved–whether it be a psychological, physical, mental or spiritual enslavement. “He that killeth with the sword must be killed with the sword. Here is the patience and the faith of the saints.” <19>
Yes, the saints have the patience and the faith both to endure and to balance their karma, but the seed of the Wicked One do not and therefore they mock God and his laws, showing no sign of repentance as they continue to sow the wind and reap the whirlwind <20> unto the day of their final judgment. <21> But the apostle Paul denied the power of their mockery, saying, “Be not deceived, God is not mocked: for whatsoever a man soweth, that shall he also reap.” <22>
Paul is saying that the law of God–the law of cause and effect, the law of karma–cannot be mocked, not by the high and the mighty, not by them of low degree.
In his letter to the Galatians, Paul states the law of karma clearly–drawn from Jesus and drawn from life: “Every man shall bear his own burden.” <23>
But what is our burden? Our burden is, or should be, Light–that is, the true Light of the Inner Christ that lighteth every man that cometh into the world. <24> For Jesus said: “Come unto me, all ye that labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you and learn of me; for I am meek and lowly in heart, and ye shall find rest unto your souls. For my yoke is easy and my burden is Light.” <25>
Jesus entered his final incarnation retaining just enough karma to keep him tethered to this world. (For those who are karma-free do not long remain.) So, he tells us: “My yoke, i.e., the yoke of my karma, is easy; therefore I can help you carry your karmic yoke.”
Jesus’ burden of Light is the “burden of the LORD” spoken of by the prophet Jeremiah. <26> This is the burden of the avatar, the God-man, or God-manifestation, that Jesus was. This burden was also borne in part by the patriarchs and prophets, the disciples and holy men and women of all ages. It is in fact the burden of the Light of God (depicted in the Chart of Your Divine Self as your Causal Body <*>) and the burden of the calling of the LORD (the Mighty I AM Presence) in that Light. This calling is one’s dharma, or one’s duty to fulfill one’s reason for being. <27>
By contrast to Jesus, our karmic yoke is hard, not easy, and the burden of misqualified energy we carry is not “light” but “heavy.” Therefore, Jesus offers us a path of personal discipleship unto our own individual Christhood. In order that we may enter into this relationship with him, our living Guru, he invites us to take upon ourselves his yoke (the yoke of world karma that is shared by all disciples of Jesus Christ on earth) and his burden (which is the Light of his Mighty I AM Presence and Causal Body). In turn, he takes upon himself a portion of our yoke, which is our accountability to the law of our own karma, and a percentage of our burden of karmic weight.
However, it must be clearly understood that Jesus’ “carrying power” does not give us absolution, or remission of sin. On the contrary, Jesus our Lord carries our yoke and our burden until we are strengthened, through the path of discipleship, to the point where we can not only carry them but balance them through the path of sacrifice, surrender to the will of God, selflessness and service.
Thus, the fiat “Every man shall bear his own burden” is true in the beginning of our path, before we have made a commitment to the living Christ, and in the end, after we have been his disciples and are ready through the path of personal Christhood we have walked to take up the cross of our karma and follow him. This is the meaning of the incomparable love of our Guru for us his chelas–our Master for us his disciples.
When Jesus says, “Come unto me, all ye that labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest,” he is also calling to the people to put off the yoke of the rabbinical tradition, the yoke of the Torah, and to exchange it for his own. He calls them to “take my yoke upon you and learn of me,” thus showing that it is the law of the living Christ, the law of the living Guru, to which they must bind themselves in a true path of discipleship. It is to the person of Christ, who embodies the law and therefore makes that law personal, that he calls them.
Jesus is telling them that by contrast to the yoke of the law of the Jewish tradition, his yoke is easy–easy, that is, for those who will forsake all and follow him in the regeneration. <28> His burden is not a burden of the ancient traditions, even though he said he came to fulfill all the law and the prophets. The disciple’s fulfillment of the law and the prophets is become, through the living Guru, the transcendence of the law and the prophets unto the perfect man, <29> who is the Christ, Jesus, even as that same Christ defines the nature of our own perfect man, our True Self.
The yoke of the law is necessary when a people do not have the sense of or the contact with their own personal Christhood as Jesus demonstrated it. Since Jesus Christ is the full incarnation of the Word and of the I AM THAT I AM, he fully embodies the law, which is more than a set of rules, more than man-made doctrine or dogma.
This law is the extension of the Lawgiver: as the rays are to the sun, so is the law to the Lawgiver. They are one. The law incarnate in Jesus Christ is the living flame of Love in action. It is the two-edged sword of Divine Wisdom. But make no mistake: it is also the Power of the swift and sudden judgments of the Lord which descend when the Wisdom and the Love go unheeded.
And this brings us to the wondrous words of Jesus our Lord. He tells us to take his yoke upon ourselves so that we may learn of him not only what he is–the glorious Christ who reigns forever–but also what he is not–a worldly monarch who would enter Jerusalem on Palm Sunday and proclaim himself king. What he wants us to learn about him is that he is meek and lowly in heart and that we shall find rest for our souls in the meekness and lowliness of that heart. <30>
According to Greek scholar W. E. Vine, the scriptural usage of the word meekness, prautes in Greek, has a fuller, deeper significance than in non-scriptural texts. Quoting from Trench’s New Testament Synonyms, he says meekness consists not in a person’s
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| outward behaviour only; nor yet in his relations to his fellowmen; [neither] in his mere natural disposition. Rather it is an inwrought grace of the soul; and the exercises of it are first and chiefly towards God. It is that temper of spirit in which we accept His dealings with us as good, and therefore without disputing or resisting; it is closely linked with the word tapeinophrosune [humility], and follows directly upon it....It is only the humble heart which is also the meek, and which, as such, does not fight against God and more or less struggle and contend with Him. <31> |
Vine further explains:
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| The meaning of prautes is not readily expressed in English, for the terms meekness, mildness, commonly used, suggest weakness and pusillanimity [cowardliness] to a greater or less extent, whereas prautes does nothing of the kind....It must be clearly understood, therefore, that the meekness manifested by the Lord and commended to the believer is the fruit of power. The common assumption is that when a man is meek it is because he cannot help himself; but the Lord was ‘meek’ because he had the infinite resources of God at His command. Described negatively, meekness is the opposite to self-assertiveness and self-interest; it is equanimity of spirit that is neither elated nor cast down, simply because it is not occupied with self at all. <32> (emphasis added) |
The sowing and the reaping of every man is the cyclic yang (the seed) and yin (the ripened fruit)–words and works planted and then gathered, whether into the Causal Body above as perfect plantings or into the astral belt below as imperfect plantings.
Now, here is another mystery. Savor it well. The qualities of meekness and lowliness are at the point of equilibrium between this yang and yin, “neither elated nor cast down” because not preoccupied with self. Jesus is neither sowing nor reaping. He is at the center of Being–his Being and ours. Thus, he carries his yoke, takes ours for a season until we can carry it ourselves, leaves us to carry the yoke of the law of his Christhood and the burden of his Light; and all the while he is centered first in the God in himself and then in the God-flame he is igniting in us. He, the meek and the lowly, the all-powerful one, brings us to the stillness where karma sowing and karma reaping are no longer toil by the sweat of the brow but the simple pleasure of communion with God.
Yes, as Paul says, “Whatsoever a man soweth, that shall he also reap. For he that soweth to his flesh shall of the flesh reap corruption; but he that soweth to the Spirit shall of the Spirit reap life everlasting.” <33> And he concludes: “Let us not be weary in well doing; for in due season we shall reap, if we faint not. As we have therefore opportunity, let us do good unto all men.” <34>
In his writings to the church at Corinth, Paul teaches Christ’s doctrine of the trial by fire. A man’s labor is his karma. And the sacred fire shall try the labor of what sort of vibration it is. If it is worthy, it is made permanent. If it is unworthy, it is consumed by the sacred fire.
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| Every man shall receive his own reward according to his own labor.... Every man’s work shall be made manifest: for the day shall declare it, because it shall be revealed by fire; and the fire shall try every man’s work of what sort it is. If any man’s work abide which he hath built thereupon, he shall receive a reward. If any man’s work shall be burned, he shall suffer loss but he himself shall be saved, yet so as by fire. <35> |
Malachi affirms that the sacred fire of God does try us and that it does purge us:
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| Behold, I will send my messenger, and he shall prepare the way before me. And the Lord, whom ye seek, shall suddenly come to his temple, even the messenger of the covenant, whom ye delight in. Behold, he shall come, saith the Lord of hosts. But who may abide the day of his coming? And who shall stand when he appeareth? For he is like a refiner’s fire and like fullers’ soap. And he shall sit as a refiner and purifier of silver. And he shall purify the sons of Levi and purge them as gold and silver, that they may offer unto the LORD an offering in righteousness. <36> |
Shall we stand and still stand in the day of the Last Judgment when the fire descends to try our work (i.e., our black and white karma and our gray karma), or shall we be so filled with bad karma as the outcropping of our bad will toward God, man and beast that the sacred fire shall consume us and our works from out of the land that God and his Christ and his law vouchsafed to us in the beginning?
These are the possibilities of our reaping and our sowing, our reaping and our sowing that we must ponder at the end of the age.
to be continued
“Karma, Reincarnation and Christianity” is based on a lecture given by Elizabeth Clare Prophet on Friday, October 11, 1991, during the four-day Class of the Golden Cycle held at the New Orleans Airport Hilton.
*. The Causal Body is the body of the I AM Presence called in Buddhist terminology the Dharmakaya.
2. Joel 2:28, 29; Acts 2:17, 18.
3. Matt. 5:17.
4. Exod. 20-23.
5. Matt. 5:18.
8. Matt. 16:24; Mark 8:34; 10:21; Luke 9:23; 14:27.
9. John 9:4.
10.. Matt. 19:26; Mark 10:27; Luke 18:27.
15. Matt. 26:51, 52; Luke 22:51.
16. Exod. 21:24, 25; Lev. 24:20; Deut. 19:21.
32. Vine, An Expository Dictionary of New Testament Words, s.v. “Meek, Meekness.”
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