“After Daskalos returned to his armchair and was getting ready to continue our discussion I asked him whether the affliction of that man was due to karmic debts.

“ ‘All illnesses are due to Karma,’ Daskalos replied. ‘It is either the result of your own debts or the debts of others you love.’

“ ‘I can understand paying for one’s own Karma but what does it mean paying the Karma of someone you love?’ I asked.

“ ‘What do you think Christ meant,’ Daskalos said, ‘when he urged us to bear one another’s burdens?’

“ ‘Karma,’ Daskalos explained, ‘has to be paid off in one way or another. This is the universal law of balance. So when we love someone, we may assist him in paying part of his debt. But this,’ he said, ‘is possible only after that person has received his ‘lesson’ and therefore it would not be necessary to pay his debt in full. When most of the Karma has been paid off someone else can assume the remaining burden and relieve the subject from the pain. When we are willing to do that,’ Daskalos continued, ‘the Logos will assume nine-tenths of the remaining debt and we would actually assume only one-tenth. Thus the final debt that will have to be paid would be much less and the necessary pain would be considerably reduced. These are not arbitrary percentages,’ Daskalos insisted, ‘but part of the nature of things.”