Karma as a vast conditional process

Popular understandings often portray karma as a simple system of moral retribution — good actions bring good results, bad actions bring bad results. But in the Buddha’s teaching, karma operates within a far more intricate and vast web of conditions, shaped by countless variables interacting moment by moment.

Every intentional action plants seeds that may ripen immediately, later in life, or even across lifetimes. But these seeds do not exist in isolation; their ripening depends on the ever-shifting field of supporting conditions. External events, environmental factors, mental states, and countless other influences converge to shape experience. Thus, karma is not fate but dynamic causality, always fluid, always unfolding.

This complexity explains why not all virtuous people experience pleasant circumstances, nor do all harmful people meet immediate misfortune. The present moment reflects not a single cause but an interdependent tapestry of past and present influences — personal, collective, and environmental. The law of karma remains precise, but the field in which it operates is vast beyond calculation.

For the practitioner, understanding karma in this way fosters both responsibility and compassion. We are not imprisoned by our past, nor are we helpless victims of circumstance. Each moment offers fresh opportunities to plant new seeds of wholesome intention while understanding that outcomes unfold according to a vast, interconnected process.

Ultimately, the path of liberation points beyond karma altogether — not by erasing causality, but by ceasing the craving and clinging that generate new karmic momentum, allowing the wheel of conditioned existence to come to rest.

“Volition is karma; with volition one acts, and through actions one creates the world. But through wisdom, one ceases to fabricate, and the world dissolves.”
— Aṅguttara Nikāya 6.63 (expanded)