Three types of karma with reference to the jivan-mukta.

Three types of karmas are –

1. Sanchit-karma – Collection of all karmas due to past actions and past lives

2. Prarabdha-karma – On-going fruit of past actions and past lives

3. Agami-karma – Future fruit of past actions and past lives

Jivan-mukta’s sanchit-karma

Sanchit-karmas of a jivan-mukta are put to naught the very moment he realize the Self. Swami Chinmayananda gives the example of a prisoner whose ‘file is closed; the very moment he dies – one cannot execute the court order to hang him for the murder he had committed, for simple reason that he is no more there to undergo such a punishment. In the same way the moment the ‘Self-knowledge’ is dawn, individuality, which is the performer of the actions to whom the results should accrue ends. When individuality has ended, the cumulative results of the actions – both the good as well as the bad in the account of the individual are written off.

Jivan-mukta’s Prarabbdha-karma

Prarabbdha-karma, being those that have started yielding results, cannot be prevented and will inevitably affect the Jivan-mukta’s conditioning of body, mind and intellect. No one ‘gyani’ or ‘agyani’ can avoid the prarabbdha-karma.

Hence the statement “prarabbdha bhogena nasyati – Prarabbdha comes to an ends only after experiencing them.

Further explained by Shankaracharya – “That action which was performed before the dawn of knowledge and because of which this body is conjured up is not destroyed by self-knowldege without yielding its fruit…like the arrow shot at an object that is assumed to be a tiger, it does not then stop just because the object turns out to be a cow. It still pierced the object with full force. “

So, a jivan-mukat have to undergo fruit of his prarabbdha-karma. But at the same time the jivan-mukta is utterely unaffected by this prarabbdha-karma because of his firm Self-knowledge.

Jivan-mukta’s Agami-karma

Jivan-mukta’s agami-karmas also ends just like his sanchit kara. Just as the ‘sanchit karma file’ is closed, so too are the agami karmas which are supposed to mature and give their effects in a future birth had jivan-mukta continued to be ignorant of the Self.

On the jivan-mukta’s agami karmas, the law of Karma has something special to state – The jivan-mukta’s meritorious agami karma (punya) accrue to those who have loved and served him while his negative agami-karma (papa) accrue to those who have disrespected and distressed him.