Comparing & Contrasting: Karma & The Law of Three

Karma tells us that for every action there is a reaction… This always makes me think of Newton’s law of motion that states “for every action there is an equal, but opposite reaction”. But, I digress. Karma pretty much says if you do good things you get good in return. If you do bad things you get bad effects in exchange. This may happen in our current life or in a future life. Of course, rather than just experiencing bad, you must learn from it. Essentially, you will experience bad until you actually learn a lesson from it… even if it takes more than a single lifetime.

The Law of Three is a belief that most Wiccans own. Essentially, if you do good you get more good back. If you do bad things you get multiple instances of bad in return. Like Karma, this will occur until you actually learn something from the experiences. Correllian’s do not take the Law of Three literally. Instead the “Three” is seen as multiple occurrences. Often meaning that if you learned from the first instance of bad, you may have more bad coming just to be sure you get it that it was wrong to do in the first place.

There is no balance beam here. We must learn from these experiences before we can move onto new experiences. If you do something bad, bad things will continue to happen until you finally own it and learn that what you did was bad and that the forces are sure that it will not occur again.

To me, these concepts are nearly the same. Of course, Karma seems to be a balance beam of sorts. An eye-for-an-eye of sorts whilst the Law of Three may give you more than you actually dished out to ensure the lesson is learned. In my opinion, the big difference is that Karma carries into future lives, while the Law of Three seems to stick to the current time of existence. The other difference is that Karma originates in Dharmic religions while the Law of Three is found in Wiccan beliefs.