Jasnoor ji,
According to Sikhism, which actions, deeds, thoughts, etc., would be considered to have positive and negative effects on karma? What are some actions which would be rewarded and what are some actions which would weigh negatively on a person's karma.
Jasnoor
You ask about it from a Sikh perspective, but because there is much misunderstanding about the concept everywhere including amongst Buddhists, I’d expect the same with Sikhs. At best some people have only a vague and global idea about karma, which in my opinion is never good enough.
So here is a more analytical statement bout the subject as I understand it, from a Buddhist perspective:
One must begin by asking first of all, what is Karma, is it a mental or a physical reality?
Ans: It must be a mental reality.
Q: What kind of mental and which one exactly?
Ans: Volition, a mental factor accompanying each instance of consciousness.
Q: Are all consciousness therefore instances of Karma performing that particular function?
Ans: No, only those which are of the nature of “cause”. Volition which accompanies instances of consciousness that are “resultants”, these are not of the nature of cause and therefore are not karma, but simply, resultants.
Q: What distinguishes the consciousness which are cause from that which are result and what are the examples?
Ans: Causes are states that are ‘active’ while those that are results are ‘passive’. The former are conditioned either by ignorance, greed or aversion on one hand, or non-greed, non- hatred and non-delusion on the other. The latter are without any such roots. Examples of this are the experience through the five senses such as seeing, hearing, tasting etc. Those that are active include states following immediately upon these passive / rootless experiences such that we then like, dislike and are ignorant about the real nature of the experience, or else we may have understanding (non-delusion) about it. Other examples of these active states with well-formed concepts of other beings as object are on one hand, anger, attachment, jealousy, miserliness, pride and on the other hand, kindness, compassion, generosity, moral restraint etc.
Q: Are there degrees of karma?
Ans: Yes, and they manifest and are expressed through three different doorways namely, body, speech and mind.
Q: Do all instances of karma produce results?
Ans: No, only those which have completed courses of action. These are on one hand the 10 unwholesome ones:
Quoted from the Buddhist dictionary:
<<3 bodily actions: killing, stealing, unlawful sexual intercourse;
4 verbal actions: lying, slandering, rude speech, foolish babble;
3 mental actions: covetousness, ill-will, evil views.
And on the other hand the 10 wholesome ones:
3 bodily actions: avoidance of killing, stealing, unlawful sexual intercourse;
4 verbal actions: avoidance of lying, slandering, rude speech, foolish babble; i.e. true, conciliatory, mild, and wise speech;
3 mental actions: unselfishness, good-will, right views.>>
Q: Why are those which do not accompany the ten wholesome and unwholesome courses of action also considered karma?
Ans: Because they accumulate as tendency, for example, greed accumulates and so would kindness.
Although most instances of attachment does not cause anyone else any harm, such as when one simply likes something, go about trying to get it and finally enjoying it, this kind of self-centered activity can however grow in intensity such that later on, harm to oneself as well as to others will be done when the conditions are right.
Q: Aside from giving result in the form of the experience through the five senses, does karma also produce other results?
Ans: Yes, they give rise to some physical realities as well and these include the corresponding material base upon which the five sense experience arises, namely seeing must have the eye-sense and hearing, the ear-base, besides all other consciousness apart from those which arise through the five senses, must do so at what is termed the heart-base. Furthermore, birth and death are also results of karma and so are the instances of life-continuum arising throughout life.
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In conclusion, karma and its results are in truth about impersonal elements. And I hope that you will be able to see by now that so far, you have wrongly conceived of it and that your questions were in fact wrong. There is no such thing as “effects on karma”, but rather that there is karma, and there is its results. And also the idea of reward and punishment should never come into the picture since this factors in an agent apart from the actual mechanism itself and is therefore misleading.
Jasnoor ji, this is likely more than what you asked for, most of which will in fact go over your head. I do not expect you to understand right away. But I do believe that it is important that such things are clear in anyone’s mind when they make reference to the concept of Karma, else misunderstanding will arise. So please do not at least dismiss it and seek instead some simplistic answer which imo, can have very negative consequences.
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