The Fundamental Motive for the Motion of the Universe is Love

The wise priest knows he now must reap
The fruits of deeds of former births.
For be they many or but few,
Deeds done in covetousness or hate,
Or through infatuation’s power,
Must bear their needful consequence.
Hence not to covetousness, nor hate,
Nor to infatuation’s power
The wise priest yields, but knowledge seeks
And leaves the way to punishment.
    Anguttara Nikaya 3.33 (Buddhism)

If it be that good men and good women are downtrodden, their evil destiny is the inevitable retributive result of sins committed in their past mortal lives. By virtue of their present misfortunes the reacting effects of their past will be thereby worked out, and they will be in a position to attain the Consummation of Incomparable Enlightenment.

    Diamond Sutra 16 (Buddhism)

My father was a merchant in Ujjeni, and I was his only daughter, dear, charming and beloved. Then a wealthy merchant from Saketa sent men to woo me; to him my father gave me as a daughter-in-law…

    I myself adorned my lord like a servant-girl. I myself prepared the rice gruel; I myself washed the bowl; as a mother to her only son, so I looked after my husband. Yet my husband was offended by me, who in this way had shown him devotion, an affectionate servant, with humbled pride, an early riser, not lazy, virtuous. He said to his parents, “I shall not be able to live together with Isidasi in one house… She does me no harm, but to me she is odious. I have had enough; I am leaving her.” Hearing this utterance my father-in-law and mother-in-law asked me, “What offense has been committed by you? Speak confidently how it really was.” “I have not offended at all; I have not harmed; I have not said any evil utterance; what can be done when my husband hates me?” I said. Downcast, overcome by pain, they led me back to my father’s house, saying, “While keeping our son safe, we have lost the goddess of beauty incarnate.”

    Then my father gave me to the household of a second rich man for half the bride price for which the merchant had taken me. In his house too I lived a month, then he too rejected me, although I served him like a slave girl, virtuously. Then my father spoke to one wandering for alms, a tamer of others and self-tamed, “Be my son-in-law; throw down your cloth and pot.” He too, having lived with me for a fortnight, returned me to my father…

    I begged my father, “Evil indeed was the action done by me [the karma leading to my misfortune]; I shall destroy it.” Then my father said, “Attain enlightenment and the foremost doctrine and obtain quenching, which the best of men have realized.” Saluting my parents and relatives, I went forth [as a nun]. In seven days I attained the Three Knowledges.

    I know now my own last seven births; I shall relate to you the actions of which this misfortune is the fruit and result; listen to it attentively. In the city of Erakaccha I was a wealthy goldsmith. Intoxicated by pride in my youth, I had sexual intercourse with another’s wife. Having fallen from there, I was cooked in hell; I cooked for a long time; and rising up from there I entered the womb of a female monkey. A great monkey, leader of the herd, castrated me when I was seven days old; this was the fruit of the action of having seduced another’s wife. I died in the Sindhava forest and entered the womb of a one-eyed, lame she-goat. As a goat I was castrated, worm-eaten, tail-less, unfit, because of having seduced another’s wife. Next I was born of a cow belonging to a cattle-dealer; a lac-red calf. I was castrated after twelve months and drew the plough, pulled the cart, and became blind, tail-less, unfit, because of having seduced another’s wife. Then I was born of a household slave in the street, neither as a woman or a man, because of having seduced another’s wife. In my thirtieth year I died; I was born as a girl in a carter’s family which was poor and much in debt. To satisfy the creditors, I was sold to a caravan leader and dragged off, wailing, from my home. Then in my sixteenth year when I had arrived at marriageable age, his son, Giridasa by name, took me as a wife. But he had another wife, virtuous and possessed of good qualities, who was affectionate towards her husband; with her I stirred up enmity. These [my misfortunes] were fruit of that last action, that men rejected me though I served like a slave girl. Even of that I have now made an end.

    Therigatha 400-447, Isidasi Sutta (Buddhism)

If you have fulfilled a command, do not seek its reward from God straightaway, lest you not be acquitted of sin, but be regarded as wicked because you have not sought to cause your children to inherit anything. For if Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob had sought the reward of the good deeds which they performed, how could the seed of these righteous men [e.g., Israel] have been delivered?

    Exodus Rabbah 44.3 (Judaism)