Originally Posted by Kenneth
Nope, not if that concept is to be referred to as karma. Let me try to give an example. Take for instance the Tsunami which cost hundreds of thousands of lives in southeast Asia a few years ago. Were all those people killed and injured just victims of their own 'bad karma'? No, of course not! That was a phenomena which had nothing to do with karma. However, how the survivors reacted to that catastrophe had very much to do with karma. Did they do their best to help others in need? Did they turn to burglary or somehow try to take advantage of the situation at the costs of others? That's karma, their intentional (re-)actions based upon that specific (physical) situation. The karma produced in that situation, the karma produced as a reaction to that and to that and to that and so on and so forth, whether good or bad, will contiunue to affect the lives of those inhabitants for generations to come. It's not cause and effect in a physical sense, but there's nothing mystical or esoteric about it either, neither does it require the concept of reincarnation to be understood.
Gassho
Ken