Speaker 1: Brought to you by the reinvented two thousand twelve camera.
Speaker 1: It's ready. Are you welcome to Stuff you Should Know
Speaker 1: from House Stuff Works dot Com? Hey, and welcome to
Speaker 1: the podcast. I'm Josh Clark with me as always is
Speaker 1: Charles W. Chuck Bryant, and that makes this stuff you
Speaker 1: should know right, Yes, yeah, the podcast. Have you noticed
Speaker 1: this carbonated beverage that I'm drinking. It's just like carbonated water. Yeah,
Speaker 1: the one that that rhymes with the boy. Um. I've
Speaker 1: noticed that I've gotten probably burp year in podcasts since
Speaker 1: I started drinking that. Yeah, that stuff is you know,
Speaker 1: it's dizzy. I'm a fan. You can taste the CEO too,
Speaker 1: Remember we talked about in the Taste episode. Oh, I
Speaker 1: don't drink the plane one that much here at work
Speaker 1: because when you drink, well, I drink the green tea
Speaker 1: here at work iced, but I drink the lime flavored
Speaker 1: at home. So you pay for that self? Yeah, wow,
Speaker 1: Discovery Channel pays for it. What well, it's you know
Speaker 1: who pays my bills? Oh? Gotcha? Yeah, but that's an
Speaker 1: exchange for work. Yeah. They don't send me like a
Speaker 1: stipend for the boy. They just send you the line
Speaker 1: soda you are we done with that one? Yes, it
Speaker 1: seems like we should be. Yes, Chuck Josh, I'm sure
Speaker 1: you've heard the word karma bandied about a lot lately.
Speaker 1: Oh man, Uh, you could probably find a pretty recent
Speaker 1: spike in use on the internets in association with a
Speaker 1: person's name. That would be Casey Anthony. Oh yeah, yeah,
Speaker 1: Casey Anthony, the alleged killer of her daughter Kaylee, who
Speaker 1: has let off, who is um found not guilty acquitted.
Speaker 1: I guess you'd say, yeah, she's found guilty of something
Speaker 1: else though today right, she was found guilty for counts
Speaker 1: of lying to the police. Yeah. I didn't follow this
Speaker 1: case set closely. Actually I didn't either, But I mean
Speaker 1: like people were crazy over it. I saw, and uh,
Speaker 1: I get the impression that most of people, well, don't
Speaker 1: think that that justice was done necessarily. That's the impression
Speaker 1: I get. So people have gone to their go to
Speaker 1: recourse when you have no other recourse, and they are
Speaker 1: giving it over to karma, the law of the universe. Yes,
Speaker 1: karma will get you. That karma is gonna come around
Speaker 1: and get Casey Anthony one day. Yeah, I say that
Speaker 1: same thing. So it's a very new ag approach to karma,
Speaker 1: like karma is gonna get you for wronging me, right,
Speaker 1: or I did a good deed, so karma is gonna
Speaker 1: smile on me, right, And that you can't really approach
Speaker 1: karma from a true viewpoint as far as the viewpoint
Speaker 1: of the people who created this concept are concerned without
Speaker 1: the positive and the negative. And for the most part,
Speaker 1: karma is actually very negative. It's something you want to
Speaker 1: escape from. And if something bad happens to you, or
Speaker 1: you are born disfigured or whatever, it's because you did
Speaker 1: something in your past life. Westerners kind of find this distasteful, right,
Speaker 1: so we've abandoned it largely and taken this new ag
Speaker 1: approached karma. Let's talk about all forms of karma. It's
Speaker 1: like mick karma in the Western world. It's exactly right.
Speaker 1: That's a really great way to pick You should coin
Speaker 1: that um chuck. Before we get started, I want to say,
Speaker 1: if you had a problem with acupuncture, our acupuncture podcast,
Speaker 1: our reincarnation podcast, our voodoo podcast, any podcast where we
Speaker 1: showed um respect to other people's beliefs that are weird
Speaker 1: or just you know, unlike yours, and you had a
Speaker 1: real problem with it. Skip this one. We want you
Speaker 1: to continue to like us. We respect your opinions, and
Speaker 1: we don't want to bristle you. So just go ahead
Speaker 1: and skip this one to go to the next one.
Speaker 1: There's like three d and fifty other ones. Just listen
Speaker 1: to us. Okay, listen to the Muppets one. That's a good,
Speaker 1: good advice. No dissenters on that one. So let's give
Speaker 1: everybody a second. Okay, But you know, we're works. We
Speaker 1: explain how stuff works. That's what we do. Yeah, and
Speaker 1: it's not up to us to assault um millennia of
Speaker 1: beliefs that billions of people across the world hold. So
Speaker 1: that's not what we're here for. We're here to explain it.
Speaker 1: Like you said, So speaking from the eastern point of view,
Speaker 1: we'll get to the western view and how we got
Speaker 1: that later, how it got on. My name is Earl exactly. Yeah,
Speaker 1: that's what the basis of the show is, right, So, um, yeah,
Speaker 1: because he gets hit by a car. If you're winning
Speaker 1: a lottery, uh no, he just won the lottery and
Speaker 1: gets hit by a car and it gives him pause.
Speaker 1: I don't remember the car part. I just knew he
Speaker 1: won the lottery, but he was a bad guy and
Speaker 1: getting hit by the car made him think, I don't
Speaker 1: remember that, and I think there was like a song
Speaker 1: or something like karma, Like karma was on his mind
Speaker 1: and he gets hit by a car and like that
Speaker 1: was the sign from the universe that must have been
Speaker 1: in the pilot episode. I don't know if I saw that.
Speaker 1: So Eastern Eastern philosophy, and we're talking four main um
Speaker 1: organized religions that believe in karma. That would be jaane
Speaker 1: is Um, Sikhism, Jainism, yeah, John, yeah, joinis Um, Uh Sikhism, Hinduism,
Speaker 1: and Buddhism. Right. Yes, the word karma itself. We like
Speaker 1: to point out the roots sometimes of these words. It
Speaker 1: stands script uh karman k r m A N, which
Speaker 1: means act. Just kind of makes a lot of sense, right.
Speaker 1: There's also a polly word, and polly is the original
Speaker 1: language used for Buddhist text. I believe um it's kama
Speaker 1: k A M m A and it means action, so
Speaker 1: virtually the same thing. Yeah, Well, it all makes sense
Speaker 1: because karma is all about You're the acts that you commit,
Speaker 1: good or bad, coming back to bite you or elevate you.
Speaker 1: Mostly to bite you. So where should we Where should
Speaker 1: we start out here with I guess Hinduism we should.
Speaker 1: We should also say, like the concept of karma is
Speaker 1: similar in a lot of ways, but among these four
Speaker 1: there's a lot of really interesting differences. Yes, if you
Speaker 1: do remember our Reincarnation podcast, you remember us talking about
Speaker 1: sam Sara, and that is the eternal cycle of birth
Speaker 1: and rebirth that Hindus believe that humans go through. And
Speaker 1: you're tied to that cycle through karma. Yes, until you
Speaker 1: shed all your karma, as far as Hindus believe, you
Speaker 1: will never achieve moksha, which is basically salvation. You're freed
Speaker 1: from the cycle of rebirth. You don't have to waste
Speaker 1: any time on earth any longer. Right, But here's where
Speaker 1: I get confused. For some reason, this one confused me,
Speaker 1: maybe because they're also similar but slightly different. I thought,
Speaker 1: in Hinduism, does the karma reset after each rebirth? No,
Speaker 1: it clings, it clings to the soul. Okay, So with
Speaker 1: with Hindus, the soul survives transmutation. Okay, With Buddhists, karma
Speaker 1: is well, we'll talk about it later, but yes, with Hindus,
Speaker 1: it's it. Your soul goes from body to body and
Speaker 1: the karma's attached to it. Yeah, okay, So moksha that
Speaker 1: you said is the goal of salvation and that's the
Speaker 1: ultimate goal. And this is one of those things in
Speaker 1: Eastern religion a lot of Westerners can't even comprehend. It
Speaker 1: can only be achieved after it is no longer desired.
Speaker 1: It doesn't like it blows my mind. I know, that's
Speaker 1: like sound of one hand clapping. Well, and that's why
Speaker 1: they think ponder that for their lifetime, because it's hard
Speaker 1: to wrap your head around it, right, And I wonder
Speaker 1: the like, the best way to not want that is
Speaker 1: to really enjoy your life on earth. But then moksha
Speaker 1: is a bad thing, so I don't think it necessarily
Speaker 1: happens like that. I think you're just kind of like whatever.
Speaker 1: So for Hindu's good karma is you generally get good
Speaker 1: karma if you uh perform the duties of your social
Speaker 1: uh status, your cast, and if you perform those well,
Speaker 1: then in your next life you will be born into
Speaker 1: the next highest or maybe you'll skip a couple. Right,
Speaker 1: But you have to, like you said, fulfill your duties, right, Yeah,
Speaker 1: you have to be a good priest or good laborer
Speaker 1: um or a good leader or whatever. Um. And the
Speaker 1: one of the I guess aspects of Hindu karma is
Speaker 1: that it's a universal law that's independent of God or
Speaker 1: any of their gods. They have a pantheon obviously, um.
Speaker 1: But none of their gods can mess with karma. It's
Speaker 1: it's its own thing. So a god can't be like, Oh,
Speaker 1: I'm gonna smack you down with some karma because you
Speaker 1: irked me so bad. They can't do it, right, And
Speaker 1: I don't know. I didn't I didn't notice whether or
Speaker 1: not the gods are subject to karma. But um, I
Speaker 1: would assume probably because it's a it's a natural law,
Speaker 1: but they're subject to it as well. Possibly humans definitely are,
Speaker 1: and gods can't mess with it. Right, that makes sense. Yeah,
Speaker 1: you're explaining this to me Buddhism. Well, hold on, there's
Speaker 1: three Let me just say, there's three types of karma
Speaker 1: in Hindu The stuff you do here in this life
Speaker 1: does not affect this life. It's goes in store for
Speaker 1: the next life or another life down the down the way, right,
Speaker 1: So you have three kinds of karma. You have parada,
Speaker 1: which is karma that you've experienced during your present life.
Speaker 1: But it's from a past life, yes, but you're it's
Speaker 1: you're going through right now. You're you're born with a
Speaker 1: club foot. You did something in another life. This is
Speaker 1: the idea behind karma. Um. There's sancta, which is the
Speaker 1: store of karma that you have coming in future lives.
Speaker 1: But it's not come to fruition. As they say. You
Speaker 1: got a safe deposit box chock full of whatever your
Speaker 1: deeds are, right, but you hope that through good actions
Speaker 1: in this life you can cut down on that store
Speaker 1: necessarily um, and then the the present um karma that
Speaker 1: you're sewing that's going to come to fruition will be
Speaker 1: added to that store is called agaman. That's like the
Speaker 1: stuff you're doing now, does that go into the storage
Speaker 1: when you die? I don't know, Okay, I shouldn't have
Speaker 1: that's that then it's all right, okay, But that's that's
Speaker 1: Hindu karma alright. Buddhist karma believes They believe that the
Speaker 1: soul accumulates karma and that it carries over to the
Speaker 1: next life. Right, it makes this very cool, But there's
Speaker 1: no soul in Buddhism. It's your karma. That that links
Speaker 1: one life to the next, right right. They don't believe
Speaker 1: in a soul like we think of a soul, no
Speaker 1: here in the West. But the karma that you generate,
Speaker 1: that you have when you die makes it to your
Speaker 1: next life and becomes I think that just the coolest
Speaker 1: three words ever. Nirvana. No, that's one word, the cool nirvana. No,
Speaker 1: it's too okay. Germ of consciousness, yes, yes, I think
Speaker 1: that's really awesome, Like that's informs what you do in
Speaker 1: this life. Yeah, the vignana, I believe it's what they
Speaker 1: call it. But it's not your soul transmigrating from one
Speaker 1: life to the next, reincarnation, but it is a form
Speaker 1: of reincarnation, yes, And the soul consists of the five
Speaker 1: skandas uh sensation, body sensations, perceptions, impulses, and consciousness. But
Speaker 1: that's not the same as the germ of consciousness right right, Okay, yeah,
Speaker 1: all of them, all of the karma combined becomes the
Speaker 1: germ of consciousness in the next life. Right in. Buddhists
Speaker 1: like Hindus want to break the cycle of sam Sara
Speaker 1: to ultimately reach Nirvana via the Middle Way or the
Speaker 1: eight full Path, which we already talked about in reincarnation
Speaker 1: as well. Right, See is this confusing to me? Like?
Speaker 1: Am I weird? Because it's confusing? Not really? I mean
Speaker 1: if you think about it, you can, really you can
Speaker 1: break all of these beliefs down to this. You your
Speaker 1: actions have consequences, Yeah, I get that part. And good
Speaker 1: deeds will get you closer to not having these sticky
Speaker 1: consequences from past lives any longer. At the very least,
Speaker 1: you won't generate new stuff. And in most of these beliefs,
Speaker 1: you can eventually shed all this or get rid of
Speaker 1: it through either just time, good deeds, or the intervention
Speaker 1: of God, depending on what your religion is. Right, Because
Speaker 1: it's the same in Seekhis m they also want to
Speaker 1: The whole goal is to exit the chain of reincarnation
Speaker 1: once again. Right. Basically everybody thinks earth is just terrible, right,
Speaker 1: so um, the the Buddhists, um, well, Buddha himself came
Speaker 1: up with some pretty good thoughts on karma. He had
Speaker 1: this famous quote saying we are the heirs of our
Speaker 1: own actions, right. Um, But he was really big on
Speaker 1: contradicting the idea that everything from our past lives informed
Speaker 1: everything in our current lives and therefore we weren't. Um,
Speaker 1: there's no such thing as free. Well, right, that's a
Speaker 1: big sticky part of karma is that, depending on how
Speaker 1: you look at it, where it's just completely fatalist right
Speaker 1: to where there's nothing we could do any differently. This
Speaker 1: is gonna happen to us anyway. So there's no reason
Speaker 1: to stop being a pervert or a thief in this life.
Speaker 1: And the way that that's um kind of uh, I
Speaker 1: guess contradicted is um. That was one of his teachings
Speaker 1: he said, He said pervert um, which stuck out to me.
Speaker 1: I know the Buddhists, the Buddha knew what pervertstory um.
Speaker 1: But uh, the way you get around that is to say, no,
Speaker 1: stuff you're doing now you can control, and if it's bad,
Speaker 1: it's gonna come back to bite you in your bottom
Speaker 1: in the next life. And that was Buddha. Yeah, the
Speaker 1: bite you in the bottom thing, that was I I
Speaker 1: paraphrased him. Are we on daginism? Did I just kind
Speaker 1: of briefly go overseeks? So should we cover that in
Speaker 1: more detail? Um? Well, hold, let me tell you two
Speaker 1: more things about Buddhis I found interesting. One is um
Speaker 1: the paca is the result of karma, so karma's action,
Speaker 1: but paca is the result. So it's like, um, the
Speaker 1: karma is to vapaca's seed is to fruit. Is an
Speaker 1: analogy I've seen nice, right, um, and then asana is
Speaker 1: a type of karma, a good karma. You would hope
Speaker 1: it'd be good. It's the karma, an act of karma
Speaker 1: that you um commit on your deathbed. Right, so maybe
Speaker 1: you will all of your money, your possessions to like
Speaker 1: a local orphanage or something. They Buddhists give great import
Speaker 1: to um asana because it's so close to the beginning
Speaker 1: of the next life that it's just it's more potent,
Speaker 1: I believe. And does that outweigh even the bad deeds
Speaker 1: that you've done, Like no, can you store you know? No?
Speaker 1: But it would be like if you're compared maybe a
Speaker 1: bad thing you did in your six to a good
Speaker 1: thing you did on your deathbed, if the the asana
Speaker 1: is gonna just be, it would be bigger in scale.
Speaker 1: I guess that's the impression I have. Again, I'm not
Speaker 1: Buddhist or Hindu or giant or seek so this is
Speaker 1: all just outside research. I'm I'm I'm a strong member
Speaker 1: of the Church of Josh. Okay, yeah, I am too.
Speaker 1: That's weird of Josh. Wow my first member. Oh you've
Speaker 1: got more than one of my friend. Uh So I
Speaker 1: mentioned Sikhis and briefly, do you have anything else on that? Yeah?
Speaker 1: I thought the Siek's got kind of a short shift shrift, shrift,
Speaker 1: shrift in this article a little bit. Um, there's you know,
Speaker 1: plenty of stuff out there. Um, there's actually a very
Speaker 1: venerable scholar, Dr Gobin seeing Mansukhanika. He's a he's a
Speaker 1: learned Sikh scholar. So Dr Mansukhani took on the same
Speaker 1: idea that the your acts in a previous life are
Speaker 1: having an effect on your current life, and that fatalistic
Speaker 1: view of like, well, there's interesting is free will? Then
Speaker 1: he took that on and said, no, there is such
Speaker 1: a thing as fate and it is very strong. So
Speaker 1: fate will look at like a river, right, but man
Speaker 1: can still make waves in this In this river, your
Speaker 1: actions are like a wave or like a whirlpool. So
Speaker 1: it's within this flowing river of fate, but you're still
Speaker 1: having a consequence through your actions. Do good things. And
Speaker 1: Eddie was one of the ones that used. Yeah, so
Speaker 1: so do good things, do good acts, and you will
Speaker 1: gain favor with God. Um. The that's not unique to
Speaker 1: seek is um, I think Um. The Hindus believe that God. No,
Speaker 1: the Hindus believe God can't have anything to do with it.
Speaker 1: That the gods can't. The Sikhs say, no, God can
Speaker 1: create or destroy karma. And so if you find favor
Speaker 1: with God through good acts or through prayer or whatever,
Speaker 1: um you will there will be an effect of a
Speaker 1: loss of karmic debt. Boy, they did get the short drift.
Speaker 1: They totally did, and there their Their view of karma
Speaker 1: is that it's the accumulation of effects of past deeds
Speaker 1: on your character, and the character is tied to the
Speaker 1: soul and so therefore the character survives death. Wow, so
Speaker 1: you're you're you wake up in the next life with
Speaker 1: the same character character that was assembled by your previous life.
Speaker 1: All right, I like that one. Plus, they had the
Speaker 1: cool turbans uh jiinism is where we get a little
Speaker 1: star wars e with the whole thing. This sort of
Speaker 1: reminded me of the Midichlorians how they explained the force
Speaker 1: in which one it was. It was one of the
Speaker 1: newer ones. You know, they explained the forces middy clorians
Speaker 1: in the cells, and everyone was kind of like really, yeah,
Speaker 1: like you had to explain that. Yeah. Anyway, Giantism actually
Speaker 1: believes that karma is a an actual atomic substance with
Speaker 1: actual particles that attach itself to the jiva or your soul.
Speaker 1: And as long as your soul is burdened by karma
Speaker 1: once again, you were trapped in that cycle of birth,
Speaker 1: death and rebirth. But they believe it's a physical thing. Yeah,
Speaker 1: like a particular matter. It can't be sensed or measured
Speaker 1: in your words, um, and I took that well, the
Speaker 1: vibrations of your words, your thoughts, and your deeds, they
Speaker 1: collect it, right, They attract karma, these particular matters UM.
Speaker 1: And Jainists UM have classified like I think, something like
Speaker 1: a hundred and fifty eight sub types. So there's eight
Speaker 1: types of karma, two main types physical, physical, and psychic. Uh,
Speaker 1: there's eight types and a hundred and fifty eight subtypes.
Speaker 1: And they do it to like a remarkable degree. So
Speaker 1: like if you, um look at the number four subtype
Speaker 1: of the body shape, Nam, you're a hunchback if you
Speaker 1: have that kind of karma. Yeah, so like they have
Speaker 1: it down to like that granular level. But the one
Speaker 1: that what it reminded me of is epigenetics. House what
Speaker 1: what do you mean? Well, they're they're saying, like karma,
Speaker 1: this particulate matter is attracted to the soul and it
Speaker 1: affects its function, but it doesn't change the nature of
Speaker 1: the soul in just the same way that like these
Speaker 1: proteins are attached to your genes and they affect its expression,
Speaker 1: but they don't change the gene. They just change its
Speaker 1: function how it functions. That weird, And they've been talking
Speaker 1: about this for a whole Well, and Ginuts believed that
Speaker 1: the bad deeds are more likely to stick so in
Speaker 1: their life like sort of like you know, Hindu and Buddhist,
Speaker 1: they live very meagerly, don't like seek out the material things.
Speaker 1: Um obviously live a sober life and don't harm other
Speaker 1: living things. Yeah, I think they're the ones that have
Speaker 1: There's a sect of Jains that have little brooms giants.
Speaker 1: They have little brooms and they like dust off before
Speaker 1: they sit down because they don't want to accidentally kill anything.
Speaker 1: YEA interesting. Yeah, I've been letting moths out like crazy. Dude,
Speaker 1: We're under attack. Really, yeah, you should, um turn out
Speaker 1: your lights. Yeah. Uh so, now can we move on
Speaker 1: to karma in the West, this interesting perversion, not a
Speaker 1: perversion just here in the West. It's become a truth, yeah,
Speaker 1: half truth of Mick Karma. It's become just a buzz word, um,
Speaker 1: meaning you know how to how to increase your luck
Speaker 1: basically by doing good things, right, like tipping. Yeah, like karma,
Speaker 1: a karma jar is a tip jar. Yeah, yeah, that's
Speaker 1: kind of awful little bit. Well, have you ever wished
Speaker 1: bad karma on someone? For real? Like thought that or
Speaker 1: said that, you mean, like schaden fraud? No, I actually
Speaker 1: said like, man, you've got some bad karma coming. You're
Speaker 1: wait for that? Oh yeah yeah yeah. I used to extensively,
Speaker 1: Like really, that was my thing. It's just so easy.
Speaker 1: You just relinquished power, like, oh well, I don't have
Speaker 1: to do anything because carm is going to come back
Speaker 1: or the universe is going to come back and get you. Well,
Speaker 1: in a way, though, it's kind of good because it
Speaker 1: means that you're not obsessed with revenge. So yeah, it
Speaker 1: is very good in that sense. Yeah. I had a
Speaker 1: lady in l A that sold us a treadmill. I
Speaker 1: used treadmill that Her name was Joan, and that's all
Speaker 1: I'll give you. But we remember the first and last name.
Speaker 1: We still say it a yeah, was it Joan Crawford. Um,
Speaker 1: but she sold us this. She wasn't famous. She sold
Speaker 1: us a treadmill that um clearly did not work. When
Speaker 1: we got at home, like you know, I ran out
Speaker 1: under place. It was like, hey, this is cool. It
Speaker 1: turns out after like six or eight minutes the thing
Speaker 1: overheats and stop ops and it was just like that.
Speaker 1: And we called her back and we're like, hey, you know,
Speaker 1: we were just at your house for five minutes ago
Speaker 1: and we bought this treadmill and it's not working. Overheats
Speaker 1: and stops and you know, you knew this, and like
Speaker 1: we'd like her two back or whatever. We'd like to
Speaker 1: bring it back. And she said, I'm not a store,
Speaker 1: That's what she said. And we were like really, like,
Speaker 1: you know, you kind of known this thing didn't work,
Speaker 1: like we just you know, you sell someone else or whatever.
Speaker 1: Just we just want to make this right real quick.
Speaker 1: We'll be back over there in thirty minutes. And she
Speaker 1: was like no, She's like sorry, I'm not a store.
Speaker 1: I don't accept returns, and I wanted to take the
Speaker 1: treadmill and get some friends and go throw it to
Speaker 1: you said this big bay window, throw it through her
Speaker 1: window in the middle of the night. And Emily said,
Speaker 1: I couldn't do that, And she just said, it's probably good.
Speaker 1: Karma will get her one day. It's it's a good way.
Speaker 1: It's a way to go. At the very least. You
Speaker 1: can serve a lot of energy that you can use elsewhere.
Speaker 1: I'm more productive things than the treadmill. Yeah. And plus
Speaker 1: I'm mean, like accelerating or hastening karma by like burning
Speaker 1: someone's house down, will get you in trouble. Some people
Speaker 1: think that that generates bad karma for you weirdos. Uh So,
Speaker 1: in the West, it's obviously become well, you called it
Speaker 1: a new age. It is very new age. And what's
Speaker 1: interesting is we can trace it back to pretty much
Speaker 1: one person who introduced the idea, the concept of karma
Speaker 1: to the West, Helena Blovotsky. Yeah, Madame Bolovotsky, Madame Bosky. Yeah.
Speaker 1: She was. She was a she was a Russian. She
Speaker 1: was very well traveled, she was very well read. She
Speaker 1: was also um something of a huckster during the era
Speaker 1: in the UM the Northeastern United States, where you could
Speaker 1: basically say, hey, I'm a medium. Look at this um
Speaker 1: cheesecloth that I'm pulling out of my throat. It's it's spirit.
Speaker 1: Did she do that? She made a tea cup and
Speaker 1: tea saucer up here early on and just performed a
Speaker 1: few tricks, and they were like all sorts of um
Speaker 1: spirits or depths that she worked with UM that we're
Speaker 1: basically gave all these grand pronouncements and lessons that like
Speaker 1: she issued to her cult of followers UM. But she
Speaker 1: was very charismatic too. She was incredibly intelligent and very charming,
Speaker 1: but she was also something of a fraud. But this
Speaker 1: lady basically came up with this idea that she she
Speaker 1: was coming down with this divine wisdom that was handed
Speaker 1: down to her. Theosophy. Yeah, she founded the Theosophical Society,
Speaker 1: and I thought it was interesting as she was a huckster.
Speaker 1: She co founded it with Henry Steele Allcott, who was
Speaker 1: an attorney and a journalist. So you're going to hook
Speaker 1: up with something in a in a huckstery way, you're
Speaker 1: really ce o a if you have an attorney on
Speaker 1: one side, and then you can get depressed by the
Speaker 1: fact that he's a journalist. So I don't know if
Speaker 1: this woman was if she bought her own hype. She
Speaker 1: from what I understand, I just read an entry on
Speaker 1: her in the Skeptics Dictionary. Um. But the from what
Speaker 1: I understand, she's she seemed fairly um committed. She was
Speaker 1: finally run out of like the Um, the organization that
Speaker 1: the theosofts. Yeah, like in five or six. Don't they
Speaker 1: still exist today, Yeah, because they accused her of trickery
Speaker 1: or something like that. But um, by the time this happened,
Speaker 1: they were in India. So like, she seemed very committed
Speaker 1: to the idea of you know, this Hindu teachings. But
Speaker 1: basically her idea was too that all all of this
Speaker 1: occult um scripture of like Zoroaster, and it's just just
Speaker 1: in the n Gnostic texts, all that Um could all
Speaker 1: be reconciled with like um the idea of Atlantis and
Speaker 1: this where these supreme beings lived and there's astral projections
Speaker 1: and all of this, all the stuff that we take
Speaker 1: for granted today came from this lady in this era.
Speaker 1: And one of the things that she introduced was the
Speaker 1: concept of karma, right, and it was to prepare us
Speaker 1: for what she called the Aquarian Age, which was the
Speaker 1: ultimate enlightenment or time of brotherhood. I guess a k
Speaker 1: a the nineteen fifties right, well was she was? It
Speaker 1: sort of like akin to the Rapture? Is that now?
Speaker 1: I think it was just a change in consciousness among
Speaker 1: a humanity as a whole. It's like the sixties. You know,
Speaker 1: it's the coming of the Age of Aquarius. Yeah, what
Speaker 1: was that from hair? Yeah, so there you go. Age
Speaker 1: of Aquarius meant everybody was on acid. That's right. John
Speaker 1: Lennon Instant Karma is Gonna Get You number three hit.
Speaker 1: I didn't know it was that big of a hit.
Speaker 1: I've never heard it before. Oh, yes, you had. I
Speaker 1: have not shot I'm not kidding. And we All shine on.
Speaker 1: You've never heard that chorus? Oh, I didn't know that
Speaker 1: it was the name of the song. Well, yeah, Instant
Speaker 1: Karma's Gonna Get You, And then the chorus was and
Speaker 1: we All shine On. I had no idea that was
Speaker 1: the song. It's also a Nike commercial. Yeah, that's where
Speaker 1: I've heard it. Yeah, of which my name is a Royal,
Speaker 1: which we've already covered. Eventually it became fodder for television
Speaker 1: mustachioed guys who was also a scientologist. Who Jason Lee
Speaker 1: isn't ye? Man, have you seen that Memphis Beach Show. No,
Speaker 1: he's on that. He stars in it, and apparently when
Speaker 1: he has a rough day work in the homicide beat,
Speaker 1: he goes out at night and like plays the blues.
Speaker 1: I saw him in a Granddaddy show in l A, Yeah,
Speaker 1: and thought, oh, man, I love Jason Lee. Did they
Speaker 1: play that one song? Did they have a hit Granddaddy? Yeah? Yeah,
Speaker 1: I was in twenty eight days later when they're in
Speaker 1: the Girls. Oh yeah, yeah, yeah, they played that song. Yeah,
Speaker 1: it's a good one. I never heard any other Granddaddy songs,
Speaker 1: but that's a good song. They can't top that one now,
Speaker 1: actually I think they have. Well I'll have to go listen.
Speaker 1: Um what else you got, Chuck? I got nothing, man,
Speaker 1: This one just the followed me for some reason. I apologize,
Speaker 1: you do great, thank you. So I guess the lesson
Speaker 1: here is, um, anytime you about karma and you sure
Speaker 1: tipping somebody an extra dollar is a good idea. But
Speaker 1: don't forget the other aspect of karma where if there's
Speaker 1: something bad has happened to you or somebody who's born
Speaker 1: disfigured or just dismembered somewhere somewhere in life, or just
Speaker 1: where it was killed or abused, people believe that that's
Speaker 1: karma too. So do you believe in karma in the
Speaker 1: very loosest sense of like if you do good things,
Speaker 1: like good things will return your way. I don't even know.
Speaker 1: To be honest, I think you should do good things
Speaker 1: because that's the right thing to do. But you know
Speaker 1: what I do, But I don't believe it's any kind
Speaker 1: of natural law or cosmic force. I believe it's more
Speaker 1: like doing good deeds brings out a level of consciousness
Speaker 1: where you're attuned to goodness, so you notice that in
Speaker 1: other people in life more so you open up that
Speaker 1: door very much. So, yes, whereas like if you judge
Speaker 1: other people, you are you become consumed with the idea
Speaker 1: of being judged, and that like dwell down there where
Speaker 1: did I agree with you there? That's what I think
Speaker 1: it is. I think I agree with you completely Church
Speaker 1: and Josh exactly. Well. If you want to read more
Speaker 1: about how karma works, type in karma with a k
Speaker 1: don't be dumb with a k uh in the handy
Speaker 1: search bar at how stuff works dot com and that
Speaker 1: will bring up that article written by Saradwiti of stuff
Speaker 1: you missed in History Glass that is right, and Chuck,
Speaker 1: I said, uh, search bar and they're somewhere. So Listener Mail,
Speaker 1: Listener Mail. We asked for calls from people in the
Speaker 1: First Murderer podcast who might be related to John Billington
Speaker 1: and lo and behold we have one. Yeah. And also
Speaker 1: can we mention what dorcas means? Yeah, what does it mean?
Speaker 1: It means gazelle in great And we heard from quite
Speaker 1: a few people who have family members named Dorcas. Yeah,
Speaker 1: grandmothers usually Dorcas, Dorcas Minorcas. Yeah, all right. Uh, this
Speaker 1: is from Wren in Elburne, Illinois. Hey, Josh and Chuck
Speaker 1: and Jerry. You said you wanted to hear from people
Speaker 1: who related to John Billington. Well, here I am my aunt.
Speaker 1: Researched our family history a few years ago, put it
Speaker 1: all together in a book and gave it to the
Speaker 1: family members for Christmas. It's a great gift. When I
Speaker 1: first got it, the billing Things Billington's story was for sure,
Speaker 1: the most intriguing the girls from Stuff you missed in
Speaker 1: History class at a podcast about it a couple of
Speaker 1: years ago as well, and I love that edition and
Speaker 1: played it for my dad, who thought it was cool. Um.
Speaker 1: I have played it for almost everyone I know, saying
Speaker 1: at the end of the episode, and that's my family
Speaker 1: in a nutshell. I'm one of those people who was
Speaker 1: super excited to say I'm related to the first murderer
Speaker 1: in the New World, and also love to tell the
Speaker 1: story about his son almost blowing up the Mayflower. I
Speaker 1: told my sister when she was pregnant that if she
Speaker 1: was having a girl, she shouldn't name the baby Dorcas Dorcas.
Speaker 1: She didn't find it amusing and had a son anyway
Speaker 1: and named Dorcas just dork. I think this mail merchant
Speaker 1: d O r C. Anyway. I just want to express
Speaker 1: my excitement for the episode. I really love all the episodes.
Speaker 1: Keep it up. Ran from Elburn, Illinois. Nice well, thanks
Speaker 1: a lot, RN Billington, I don't think that was Yeah,
Speaker 1: if you've got a good deed that you did to
Speaker 1: somebody that you would consider good karma, right, do you
Speaker 1: think you deserve a little good karma for it. Let's
Speaker 1: have a karma off, or how about this and have
Speaker 1: evidence of that return, like you did a good deed
Speaker 1: and you won the lottery, like the good one. That's
Speaker 1: a good one. Um, well, we're holding a little mini contests.
Speaker 1: Whoever has the best one in our opinion will make
Speaker 1: it to listener mail. That's right. But it's not a
Speaker 1: real contest. It's unsanctioned. That's right. I didn't even use
Speaker 1: the word contest just now, did I know? There's no prize,
Speaker 1: no nothing. It's a karma off. Anyway. If you want
Speaker 1: to let us know about that, you can tweet it
Speaker 1: to us at s y s K podcast. You can
Speaker 1: also go on to our Facebook, Facebook dot com slash
Speaker 1: stuff you Should Know, or you can send it old
Speaker 1: fashioned email at stuff Podcast at how Stuff works dot com.
Speaker 1: Be sure to check out our new video podcast, Stuff
Speaker 1: from the Future. Join how Stuff Work staff as we
Speaker 1: explore them as promising and perplexing possibilities of tomorrow. Brought
Speaker 1: to you by the reinvented two thousand twelve camera. It's ready,
Speaker 1: are you