Introduction

The law of cause and effect is the most fundamental and important teaching in Buddhism. Everything the Buddha taught, from how to live as a decent person to how to become a saint, rests on it.

No one invented this law. It is a natural principle of the universe. The Buddha, the greatest of all the sages, discovered and fully understood how it works through his penetrating insight and extraordinary wisdom, and he saw it more clearly than any other sage in history. The whole of Buddhist teaching, in all its depth and excellence, is built on the law of karmic cause and effect.

Without a firm grasp of this law, we will certainly misunderstand Buddhism, be liable to slip into superstition, and fail to bring its noble teachings into our own lives. So whoever comes to the Dharma, whether to understand it, to look into it or to commit to practice, has to begin by understanding the law of karmic cause and effect correctly.

It is an objective rule of the universe, and it is perfectly fair. Everything that happens, in the universe, in the world, in a single person's life, has a cause. Nothing appears by chance. What we do now bears fruit later, in this life or in another.

That is why we need to understand it: so that we can guard and control every action, every word and even every thought in daily life, and so that all beings learn to sow good causes for the lives to come.

May all beings understand the law of cause and effect, live by this natural law of the universe, and follow the Buddhist path together to its completion.