Quote:
Originally Posted by The Rev
Self defense is a tricky issue. Causing harm is bad in all cases, but I generally tend to think that allowing someone to come to harm without taking action is bad as well. With self defense, it's a matter of deciding the lesser of two evils.
The Rev |
I don't know about that, by killing something that, left unchecked, would kill you, are you not technically forcing that which will kill you from the path of adharma and back to the path of dharma? And in this way, having caused that which will kill you to NOT kill you, have you not done a good deed? A good deed in somebody else's interest to boot! +brownie points
as for the OP, my interpretation of this is that, operating under the assumption that cells/bacteria do not themselves have souls, their actions do not fall into the categories of dharma or adharma. Instead, they are engineered specifically to accomplish a task/set of tasks, having little or no choice in what they do and no conscience. I would then conclude they can have no impact on a person's "karmic tally chart", though if you believe in karma you're probably aware that it is largely irrelevant.
Karma is something bigger than "what goes around comes around", there's a deeper lesson to be learned from it.