Question: “How could debt be seen in terms of karma? Obviously if we purchase things on credit we create our own bondage, and this effect is due to the negative karma of unrestrained craving. But could it be more; some recompense for acts committed in a past life?”
Yes and no. Craving is something we have and create in this life, it’s how we might handle it is where our karma might interfere. For instance, we have to purchase things on credit in order to create good credit and be able to have successful future synergistic investments. Our karma kicks in from many different factors; the type of life we have (successful, not successful), the job we have, the amount of desire and crave we have, and the simple understanding of the benefits and consequences of paying and not paying our debt.
Karma isn’t a straight-forward list of “this is what your life is going to be like, this is how rich you’re going to be, this is how greedy you’ll become,” etc. Certain circumstances and situations hinder our understanding of what life should be like, of what we think we need and want, and how we handle them. Some people know the importance to have only a few large purchases on credit (maybe a house mortgage, a car payment or two, and another large purchase – maybe furniture(at sites like https://ivyandwilde.com/) or student loans), and pays them down or off regularly. Other people might see credit as free money; to get all that they can and pay it when they want to, to get some more credit to buy more things. Which of the two do you think has the better karma? The person who understand debt or the person who sees debt and loans with no credit consequences?
Just like our ease of understanding certain subjects, topics, skills, etc. because of our past karma, the same applies to understanding basic life lessons like debt, kindness, logic, etc. Everything we do either creates positive, negative, or neutral karma. Debt is obviously negative, because you owe someone money, and if it’s not paid in this life, then it’ll have to be paid in another life. Killing and stealing are also circumstances that will need to be paid back, whether in this life or the next.
Smile and be well!