Sanchita Karma - The Storehouse of Past Actions

In Vedanta, karma is often explained through the imagery of three “accounts”:

• Sanchita — the accumulated karmas of countless past lives.

• Prarabdha — the portion of sancita selected to fructify in this present birth.

• Agami — the new karmas generated in this lifetime that will bear fruit in the future.

Sanchita (from sañcitaḥ, “heaped up, accumulated”) is the vast storehouse of past actions. Each act, thought, and intention leaves a subtle seed (bija) in the causal body. These seeds remain dormant until conditions allow them to manifest as experiences of pleasure or pain in a later lifetime. The accumulated stock is so great that only a small portion can be worked out in any single life.

The scriptures describe sanchita as beginningless, carried forward with the subtle and causal bodies after the death of the physical body. It explains the vast differences between beings at birth: health or illness, privilege or deprivation, are not random but results of accumulated karma. As Swami Paramarthananda explains, these karmas form a kind of karmic “capital,” from which each life’s destiny is drawn.

For the ordinary person (ajnani), sanchita is a store that ensures rebirth, since at death unfructified karmas remain. But for the wise (jnani), Self-knowledge burns away the entire store of sanchita, just as fire reduces a heap of cotton to ashes. Thus the liberated one has no further rebirth: prarabdha continues until the body drops, agami does not accrue, and sanchita is destroyed.

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Root & Meaning

• Sañcita = accumulated, heaped up.

• Sañcita Karma = the total accumulated karmas of past lives stored in the causal body.

Scriptural References

• Bhagavad Gita (4.37): “As fire reduces wood to ashes, so the fire of knowledge burns all karma.” Traditionally interpreted as the destruction of sanchita.

• Brahma Sutras (4.1.13–14): discuss how knowledge eradicates accumulated karma.

• Upanishadic imagery: karmic seeds (bija) stored in the causal body until fructification.

Traditional View

• Sanchita is the sum total of karmic seeds from beginningless time.

• At the start of each birth, a portion becomes prarabdha.

• Remaining karmas stay dormant, awaiting future births.

Vedantic Analysis

• Sanchita explains inequality at birth, the diversity of destinies, and continuity of rebirth.

• It perpetuates samsara until Self-knowledge destroys it.

• Liberation (moksha) is freedom not only from future karmas but from the entire storehouse of the past.

Common Misunderstandings

• That sanchita determines every moment of life: Only prarabdha dictates the current body and major events; sanchita remains in potential.

• That God arbitrarily dispenses results: The law of karma is impersonal, though Vedanta sometimes describes Ishvara as the administrator of karmaphala.

• That even the jnani carries sanchita: Vedanta insists Self-knowledge destroys all accumulated karma, leaving no residue.

Vedantic Resolution

Sanchita karma is the karmic backlog that binds beings to rebirth. Its destruction through knowledge demonstrates the unique power of Self-realization: the discovery that the true Self was never a doer or enjoyer to begin with.