Sadhana Panchakam, Instruction 37

Translation and Commentary by Jayaram V

5.5 Dissolve the Prakkarma

Prakkarma refers to the unripened and accumulated karma of all the past lives of a being. It is cumulative fruit of desire-ridden actions which has not yet ripened or produced consequences. It is the unsettled debt of your past lives which you have yet to repay and which follows you like a shadow into your current life. You cannot get rid of it without paying dues. In each life, a part of it bears fruit and the rest of it is carried forward to the next life along with the karma which has accumulated in this life. To achieve liberation, you have to dissolve prakkarma in all its aspects and erase all past life impressions (samskaras), dominant desires and natural proclivities.

However, it is not easy to wipe out your prakkarma without dissolving your ego and overcoming desires and attachment. You have to renounce the desires and intentions in your thinking and actions and arrest the formation of further karma. Some past karmas which are associated with mortal sins persist even after prolonged self-transformation and purification and require divine intervention or extra effort. Their consequences have to be endured with patience and indifference or by seeking divine help. This is true even in case of liberated people. Liberation does not mean you are totally free from the consequences of your past actions. You may still have to repay some past debts as the last vestiges of your past.

In three ways you can exhaust past karma, self-knowledge, sacrificial actions, and renunciation. As long as the triple gunas are active, they keep producing karma, and a part of it keeps accumulating and as prakkarma to be carried forward. Householders have an opportunity to neutralize some of their prakkarma by performing their obligatory duties and accumulating meritorious (punya) karma through sacrifices, charitable activities, righteous actions to uphold dharma, offerings to gods and ancestors, prayers, penances and rituals, domestic worship, righteous conduct, recitation of scriptures, teaching spiritual knowledge, selfless service, serving saints and spiritual masters, and so on.

As long as the gunas are active and the mind and body are filled with impurities, one cannot resolve the past karma or stop it from bearing fruit. By renouncing the desires his actions through the practice of karma-sannyasa yoga, a yogi ensures that the further accumulation of prakkarma is arrested, while whatever prakkarma that has already accumulated is dissolved and neutralized by the predominance of sattva. The continued practice of the yoga paves the way for liberation or for a better birth in next life. In the latter case, he may find ideal conditions to pursue liberation and start from where he left in the previous life.

One of the best ways to resolve prakkarma is through renunciation. When a yogi abides in the self and cultivates oneness with it, realizing the illusory nature of the world, his past karmas begin to dissolve and lose their potency to bear fruit. In a way, by renouncing the world, the yogi renounces his past karmas also or at least he develops the resolve to withstand suffering which may arise from them when they bear fruit. When he realizes that the world is unreal or an illusion, his karmas also become a part of that illusion and cease to have any impact upon him. Thus, the realization that “I am Brahman” is by far the most effective way to deal with not only prakkarma but also other types of karma.

Our scriptures suggest that even self-realized yogis (jivanmuktas) who are liberated in their bodies but have not yet left their bodies are still subject to prakkarma. It is because, the body itself is a product of past and present karmas, and its predominant nature and behavior arise from them. The Bhagavadgita proclaims that life or existence itself is a fruit of karma only (janma-karma-phala-pradam). It is why people often find it difficult to overcome chronic ailments and habitual thoughts and actions, while self-realized yogis may end up suffering from incurable diseases or serious difficulties.

It is safe to assume that as long as the body is alive, it is subject to both past and present karmas irrespective of whether it is inhabited by a pure being or an impure being. However, the situation is different in respect of enlightened people. Although their minds and bodies are subject to past and present karmas, they are unaffected by them due to their detachment and self-abiding nature. It is not the case with ordinary people. When they leave the body without resolving their impurities, their prakkarma follows them as a part of their casual bodies (karana sariram) and becomes the seed for their next lives.

Even after liberation, the past and present karmas associated with the body of a yogi remain active until he departs from here. However, since he abides in the self and remains unattached to his body, name and form, and since he is already liberated from the cycle of births and deaths, his karma does not bind him although he engages in actions to keep his body alive or to help others. Upon his death all his karma turns into ashes as his body is consumed by fire. Thus, self-realization and self-absorption are important to resolve all accumulated karmas, whether they belong to this life or the previous ones.

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