Theos-Talk Archives (November 1993 Message tl00025)

There are two main types or classes of karma:  personal or
individual karma, and group or collective karma. The first,
personal karma, is relatively well known. There seems to be some
confusion about the second. In a sense, there is a difference
between group karma and collective karma.

According to HPB, de Purucker, and others, groups have their own
karma. By "groups" I mean organizations or recognized sets of
people. HPB stated that the TS has its own karma. Every
organization does. Modern leaders in Administration talk about
the birth and death cycle of organizations and define
organizations as open complex dynamic systems much like living
systems. Every family, city, state, and country has its own
karma. Each race and sex has its own. Every kingdom, including
humanity, has its own karma. Here we can see a hint of what
group karma is about - relationships.

A friend of mine once went on a business trip to a foreign
country by airplane. When he mission was over, he needed to
return quickly. When he boarded the filled plane, it just didn't
feel right to him. He told me that a wave of fear hit him. He
left the plane, making up an excuse. After he calmed down, he
took the very next flight. Upon returning, he discovered that
the first plane had crashed, killing everyone on board. Somehow
he had been warned, and had avoided the certain death that
awaited him on the first plane.

The above actual story is an example of collective karma. The
"group" was the mixture of people on the plane at the time. In a
sense, group karma is a subset of collective karma which, by
definition, is any karma linking more than one person.
Collective karma comes about through the psychic and spiritual
linkages that exist between people. We are in communication with
countless other living beings at all times, but these are usually
unconscious to the personality. Everyone on the doomed airplane
unconsciously agreed to go down, for one reason or anoher
(presumably each had theier own personaly reason). My friend
unconsciously picked up on this thought and decided that he did
not want to participate. Freud stated that everyone has a life
wish and a death wish, and in a sense, I think that he was right.
When our unconscious desire for death becomes strong, we may
unconsciously seek out others who share the same wish.

                                  Jerry S.