รับผลกรรมแทนกันไม่ได้ เพราะบาปเป็นของใครก็ของคนนั้น เจ้ากรรมนายเวรไม่ยินยอมให้แลกเปลี่ยน แต่ความปรารถนาดีที่บริสุทธิ์ใจนั้นเองที่จะส่งผลดีกลับมาหาผู้อธิษฐานKarmic results cannot be transferred — demerit belongs to whoever created it, and one's karmic creditor won't allow a trade. But the pure, self-sacrificing intention behind such a vow itself brings good results back to the one who made it.
Someone asked: as a child watching a parent suffer illness, if I make a vow asking for the illness my mother or father carries to come to me instead — a full trade — and I keep making that vow again and again, could it actually happen? And what effect would it have?
It's not possible. If it were, the world would already look very different. Every parent who watches their child suffer an accident or a serious illness would, if trading were possible, wish to take on everything in their child's place. If that were really how it worked, the child would already be free of the illness — no need for the ICU, no risk of death at all. But life doesn't work that way. Demerit belongs to whoever created it; that person alone must receive it — no one else can take it on. One's won't allow it either, because the karmic creditor is the demerit that follows a person, guiding them into wrong action — it's specifically that person who is barred from escaping it. We can only store up the cause and find our own way to work it out for that specific person; others have nothing to do with it, no matter how good their intentions.
The unwholesome within a given person aims specifically to harm that person; likewise, within that same person aims specifically to bring them benefit. This is the role each side plays. Whatever anyone asks for, they won't consent to a trade, because there's no mechanism that allows an exchange like this. Everything in this world operates through its own mechanism — like the gears of a clock that turn the hour and minute hands according to their own workings; there's no mechanism that stretches or extends a result simply because we ask for it.
But what actually happens is this: the beautiful state of mind behind such a vow — the good intention willing to sacrifice for another — is itself a wholesome mind-state, and a wholesome result arises for the one who made the vow, not a harmful one. The wholesome side will protect and watch over the person who holds that beautiful intention.