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My understanding is that prarabdha karma affects the current janma, and the current janma's positive and negative karma cumulatively gets added to that prarabdha and the cycle continues ad infinitum, unless one breaks the cycle by attaining Moksha.
So what is even the necessity for starting such a karmic loop? Why couldn't all beings have the default state of Moksha when they began?
So what is even the necessity for starting such a karmic loop?
According to the Brahma Sutras, karma is beginningless; the Jivas who are trapped in samsara have always been in it.
Ramanujacharya has stated in his commentary on the Brahma Sutras:
Although the individual souls and their deeds form an eternal stream, without a beginning, yet non-distinction of them 'is reasonable' (i.e. may reasonably be asserted) in so far as, previous to creation, the substance of the souls abides in a very subtle condition, destitute of names and forms, and thus incapable of being designated as something apart from Brahman, although in reality then also they constitute Brahman's body only. If it were not admitted (that the distinctions in the new creation are due to karman), it would moreover follow that souls are requited for what they have not done, and not requited for what they have done. The fact of the souls being without a beginning is observed, viz., to be stated in Scripture,'The intelligent one is not born and dies not' (Ka. Up. I, 2, 18); so also the fact of the flow of creation going on from all eternity, 'As the creator formed sun and moon formerly.'
So, one cannot attribute cruelty to Brahman, since creation is based on the Jiva's karma, which is beginngless.
Why couldn't all beings have the default state of Moksha when they began?
There are 3 categories of souls according to Ramanujacharya's doctrine:
1) Nitya suris, or those who are eternally liberated
2) Muktatmas, or those who were once in samsara, but are now liberated
3) Baddhatmas, or those who are currently in samsara, and will be liberated
So, the only souls who have the default state of moksha are the nitya suris.
In Rig Veda I.164.20 and in 3.1.1 of Mundaka Upanishad (page 51), there was a mention about 2 birds perching on a branch of a tree.
दवा सुपर्णा सयुजा सखाया समानं वर्क्षं परि षस्वजाते | तयोरन्यः पिप्पलं सवाद्वत्त्यनश्नन्नन्यो अभि चाकशीति ||
Two Birds with fair wings, knit with bonds of friendship, in the same sheltering tree have found a refuge. One of the twain eats the sweet Fig-tree's fruitage; the other eating not regardeth only.
The first bird represents a Jiva, or individual self, or soul. She has a female nature, being a shakti, an energy of God. When the jiva becomes distracted by the fruits (signifying sensual pleasure), she momentarily forgets her lord and lover and tries to enjoy the fruit independently of him. This separating forgetfulness is maha-maya, or enthrallment, spiritual death, and constitutes the fall of the jiva into the world of material birth, death, disease and old age.
The second bird is the Atma, an aspect of God who accompanies every living being in the heart while she remains in the material world. He is the support of all beings and is beyond sensual pleasure.
According to scriptures, the God will be witness to all actions of the Jiva or soul, whether it indulges in sensual pleasures or spiritual pursuits, but does not give help unasked for.
So it is the Jiva or soul that indulges in sensual pleasures or materialistic tendencies and start accumulating karma.
According to the realised souls, everyone is divine, the only difference being the realised one knows it and ignorant one does not know.
