ONLY MERITS AND VIRTUES HAVE THE POWER TO OFFSET KARMIC OBSTACLES
Master Jun Hong Lu; There are only two ways karmic obstacles are transformed – either they are offset or break out in the form of foreign spirits. While the latter can be an effect of one’s ‘transformed’ karmic obstacles, it can also be due to external factors. This begs the question: If karmic obstacle is the ‘effect’ that takes place in the law of cause and effect, shouldn’t it be something that cannot be wiped out? How is it possible for the retributive effects to be offset then?
How is it that spiritual cultivation, making prayers to Bodhisattva and performing recitation are able to offset karmic obstacles?
Karmic obstacles are the undesirable effects that have crystallised as per the law of cause and effect. At the same time, they are the fruit you reap from the seeds of action you sowed. In that sense, other than a set of positive karma, there is absolutely no other power that is capable of transforming them. This set of positive karma, in this context, is one’s merits and virtues. Hence, merits and virtues have the power to offset karmic obstacles.
Source: Master Jun Hong Lu’s Buddhism In Plain Terms, Volume 1 Chapter 8