This is Travis Smith. Morning. Morning. We've been hearing a lot about, hearing the word evil used a lot lately, and so I thought I would talk a little bit about evil and good. Evil, originally the meaning of evil was something like applied to someone who was uppity.

[01:00]

Not so, it didn't mean, it didn't have such a strong meaning. Someone was, you know, upper class or snotty, snooty, snooty, we would say. That person is evil. That's the old, old days. And then it came to mean bad. And today it means something like wicked. So the meaning keeps changing, but I always thought of evil as being more like wicked. Wicked comes from wicked or witches. Witches, it used to mean ceremonious, but in the Middle Ages they accused witches of burning people ceremonially.

[02:22]

And so it came to mean, wicked mean, can be associated with the witches and wicked. So, and then witches were given a bad name and they were considered evil. Simply because they were not Christian. So evil is like an impulse within each one of us. Everyone has the, all human beings have the ability to be evil or wicked. But I always thought of evil as doing acts which were anti-life or like enjoying the suffering of others, exalting it.

[03:28]

And people who torture are wicked or evil because they attain their enjoyment watching the suffering of others. So to me that's evil. And we all have that propensity within us. We also have many impulses within us. Human beings have many impulses. We have the impulse to love, we have the impulse for eating, for sex, for doing good works, for, you know, all of our both good and evil impulses. Good originally comes from, good is associated with the term God. But it may or may not be derived from that. But it has the meaning of basically gathering together or unifying.

[04:35]

So you could say that the evil impulse is the impulse for divisiveness. And the good impulse is the impulse for unity. So divisiveness is kind of like anti-life. And unity is like pro bringing things together in the light. So evil is like the darkness, good is like the light side. But we use these terms very loosely. And we can apply them to, you know, however we want to use them. But if we say someone is evil, it means that we're all evil.

[05:44]

If we say someone is good, it means that we're all good. Because we all have these propensities. But when we look at someone who we think is evil, it's simply that the evil impulse that is in all of us has dominated some person or some group of people. And there's always some reason for evil to arise. There's some reason for goodness to arise. If someone offends me, I can get angry.

[06:47]

And I would say, you made me angry. But it's not really so. You did something and my response was to be angry. In psychology, we know that that's so. We have various choices as to how we will respond to offense. And being angry is one of them. Being thoughtful is another response. Amazement is another response. Revenge is another response. Trying to understand how something happened, stepping back, is another response. And the response for a Buddhist, strictly speaking, would be to step back and look at the cause of why someone would offend me,

[08:00]

or why I am offended. But, you know, for most people, just reacting to offense is enough to create a reaction. So most of us react rather than responding in a way that we don't get caught. Madness, the meaning of madness is to change, to transform. So what happens when we get mad is that we transform, we change. And there's madness which simply means being mad, and there's madness which means crazy.

[09:03]

So when we transform or change in a crazy way, it's very hard to change back. But when we just get mad, we still have the opportunity to step back and not be caught by it. So as human beings, we're usually caught by our emotions. And we usually get mad, and stay mad, and do things in that moment of madness of which we regret later. So the human race is full of regrets, endless regrets. Why did I do that? I wish I hadn't done that. That's good, but too late.

[10:08]

Matter of fact, everything is too late. People say, how can we turn this thing around? Too late. Too late. But it's never too late at the same time. At one time, we called the Soviet Union the evil empire, if you're old enough to remember. We called the Soviet Union the evil empire. And then when we started fiddling around in the Middle East, the Persians called us the evil empire. And then when somebody offended us on September 11th, we said the evil one.

[11:19]

So who's evil? Who's the evil one? We're all the evil one. Every one of us is evil. If we don't understand that, that's called denial, deep denial. And deep denial keeps us in ignorance, and ignorance leads to our suffering. So, maybe Suzuki Roshi used to say, as human beings, we're half good and half bad. Half good and half bad. You may think, oh, I'm all good, not bad. If we think that, that's ignorance. Someone may think, well, I'm all bad and not good. That's also ignorance.

[12:26]

Each one of us has within us the destructive forces, the ability to destroy and the ability to unify. So, if we look at our own evil, it helps us to understand the evil in other people. If we understand our own aggressiveness, it's easier for us to understand the aggressiveness of our enemies, so to speak. So far, we don't show a lot of understanding. Some people do, but there's not a lot of understanding.

[13:35]

But, you know, what is evil? During the Persian Gulf War, General McCaffrey, our general, massacred thousands of Iraqis who were fleeing. They were en route. They were routed. And according to the rules of war, of which there are such a thing, you let those people go. And they had actually, you know, said, we give up. But he couldn't restrain himself. And he had all those people massacred. You probably saw the pictures of all those vehicles on the road that were totally destroyed, escaping.

[14:37]

Well, this is our evil, because our evil impulse, our wickedness, coming out. How can people not react to that? We don't expect people to react to things like that. We say that this war is happening to us because we're good people. That's true. We are good. We are good people. Really good. It's a great country. But we're also bad people. As well. And we say, those are bad people over there. It's true, they are. But they're also very good people. So, how as a Buddhist do we deal with things like this?

[15:55]

Somebody asked me about this. It's fine to understand, but what do you do? What do you do about this? Well, I think our task is, how do you bring out the best in people rather than bring out the worst? How do you bring out the best in yourself? And how do you bring out the best, encourage the best in other people? The reason that wars happen, the reason that violence happens, is because there's a failure to bring out the best in people. Of course there will always be, you know.

[16:59]

You can argue about some people are inherently evil, and some people are inherently good, and so forth. We can't account for every person. But, nevertheless, when we steal from people, and when we kill them, what kind of response do we expect? So, you know, in the arena, in the human arena, animals are not like this. This is just totally a human thing. In the human arena, there's always conflict. There's conflict with animals, but it's balanced. But in the human arena, there's conflict. And you can't say exactly that the conflicts that people are engaged in are, that those people are necessarily evil.

[18:15]

They may be evil acts. But Hitler was evil because the only, his whole reasoning was to create domination, superiority and domination of the world. That's divisiveness. To unify the world under his domination. That's anti-life. But often, wars are not fought for that purpose. And underneath all of the conflicts, it is the human supply line of armaments.

[19:19]

You know, the drug trade takes in billions and billions of dollars every year. But the armament trade, that's the big one. And it's never discussed. Rarely discussed. But how do you account for someone in the jungle who has 10 cents a month, subsistence, having a Kalashnikov rifle? Somebody has to supply all those arms, and all those bullets, and all those hand grenades, and all those rockets. And keep all this conflict going. People are like matches, tinderboxes, you know, emotionally. All you have to do is get some natural antipathy going, and just light a match, and it'll blow up, and then you just keep supplying the fuel.

[20:32]

That's evil. That's the real evil that's going on in the world. Is people profiting from other people's suffering. And everyone is guilty of doing it. As a matter of fact, we are the biggest arms supplier in the world. And we keep these conflicts going, and we keep profiting by them. You know, Afghanistan, this incident couldn't have been at a better time for profiteering. We've always wanted Afghanistan to cooperate with us to get the pipeline to go through their country, the oil pipeline to go through their country.

[21:49]

So, that's the biggest reason why we're doing this war in Afghanistan. Bin Laden, we haven't proved anything. You know, if you accuse somebody long enough of doing something, everybody will believe it. I don't say he hasn't done anything, or if he didn't do the September 11th, but nobody's proved that. Not only that, but our Secretary of Defense, or offense, has said, we don't want him alive. There's some controversy about exactly what he said now, but that's against the Geneva rules of warfare. You have to allow a person to surrender. That's like, if he's not taken alive, then you don't have to prove that he's guilty, or innocent.

[23:00]

So, I don't know if this is evil, but it's certainly wicked. It's certainly not peaceful. It's not creating peace, it's creating divisiveness. And to create unity through force is fascism. So, the things that we say, since September 11th, everything has changed. It's true, but everything is still the same, at the same time. And, it's always like this. It's always like this, since the beginning of human existence.

[24:09]

So, what do we do? I think, as a Buddhist practitioner, to cultivate peace, so to speak. Peace, also, originally means settled, or stable, stability. To create a stable life, stability in life. I think, as Buddhists, to create some stability, to bring out the best in ourselves,

[25:23]

and to help bring out the best in everybody else, what we consider the best, meaning honesty and compassion, not being exploitive, not benefiting ourselves at the expense of others. And we just have to keep working and fighting for that, the best way we can, using whatever circumstances come up. Creating a harmony and a unity. But, you know, you say, well, the whole world is kind of on fire, which is true,

[26:33]

but to just do something where you are is enough. And we don't realize the far-reaching effect of doing that, of our practice. It has, actually, a far-reaching effect. And not to get caught by anger, not to let the evil impulse dominate or arise, and to recognize it when it does arise. And to look for the Buddha nature in each person.

[27:48]

We may see someone who is bad or evil. I remember, I know that, you know, in primitive Buddhism, or older Buddhism, there was this question, is there a person who does not have Buddha nature? Ichantika. Is there such a thing as an Ichantika, someone who doesn't have Buddha nature? Because that was a question, does everyone have Buddha nature? Or are there some people that are so evil that they don't have Buddha nature? And then this passage in the Nirvana Sutra said, all sentient beings, without exception, have Buddha nature. So again, change that to our Buddha nature. All sentient beings are Buddha nature. So, we have faith that all sentient beings have Buddha nature, or are Buddha nature.

[29:12]

So, how do you find that in each person, no matter who they are or how you think about them? Where is that spark of Buddha nature in each person? How do you, you know, dispel the clouds? How do you blow away the clouds? That cover it over. Don't you have anything to say? I wanted to thank you for your talk. Thank you.

[30:16]

This is related, though not exactly right on what you're talking about, but I know all sorts of people and wonderful, good, mostly good people from here, and then other friends and co-workers who sometimes amaze me by the things they do in their life. But it's not, they're not doing like super duper bad things, like killing people or, I don't know what the categories would be, but sometimes I think, maybe I shouldn't be around this person. You know, like there's this suggestion or guideline for Buddhists, surround yourself with this. So sometimes I think, boy, that's pretty off. Maybe I should just, you know, but on the other hand, there's this other aspect of them where they're warm and giving and, you know, they're in a service kind of job or... Right. So, yeah, so Andrew's saying, you know, like, I know these people, you know, who, on the one hand,

[31:24]

have a wonderful, are wonderful people, and on the other hand, have these qualities, you know, which I'm not sure I should associate with. And... That's very true everywhere you go. And in the scriptures, you know, it says, you should associate with people, like-minded people. And it says, especially when you're a novice, you should associate with like-minded people because it's, you know, when you begin to practice, you should put a fence around you so that you don't get caught, pulled off here and there by, you know, unwholesome folks. And we do tend to, you know,

[32:30]

like people, people who have similar attitudes tend to flock together, birds of a feather. But when you have a mature practice, then you can, it's easier to associate with anybody, all kinds of people. And... If your practice is very strong, then you can actually influence, you have some influence in the world. But, you know, it's like there's never any end to it because, you know, it's kind of endless. But by associating with people who are not necessarily like you, it helps your own development

[33:31]

in meeting this kind of challenge. And, you know, how do I relate to this person? And how can I, you know, relate without being, compromising myself? That's a great koan. Yeah, Catherine? It sort of sounds like you're saying that when we look at somebody and see them acting in ways that offend us or appall us, that we would think of them as different from ourselves. And I think, sometimes the thing that we're most appalled by in the other person is the thing that we are most guilty of ourselves. Sometimes, that's true. And when I think of the dilemma that's presented for students of any religious practice,

[34:32]

when, like an ordained priest in our sangha, or in one's sangha, behaves in a way that you find unbecoming to a priest, that we all have that dilemma of judgment, and we expect better behavior from somebody who is a Buddhist. And the way I've dealt with that in the past is to say that person is whole. Just what you were saying, that they contain good and evil, and that what I'm witnessing is a whole person who's working with their wholeness, and they become a model, not of perfect behavior, but of humanity. And I get to watch them struggle with their shadow and see how they use Buddhism to help them with that. And that becomes my teaching. Not that they have... I would be less helpful if they were always perfect.

[35:35]

I think that's really right on. Because the priest is exposed, you know, and then you expect something, and then you see, you know, various things. And to, you know, observe that person's struggle for work and so forth, that's... We see, you know, ourselves, we see the struggle going on in that person is the same struggle going on in ourselves, and how they handle it, you know. And what that brings up in us, of course I'm a priest too, but when I see other priests, you know, who are behaving as badly as I do, I actually have a lot of sympathy, you know, and compassion, even though I work with...

[36:39]

I have to point out the problems that we have. But I appreciate what you said there. So... Yeah. I was just wondering if the way you were talking sometimes it sounded like you were saying to avoid making distinctions between who's good and who's... or identifying people as good or bad, but then that made me think, well maybe the point is to... there's so much good and evil things, so maybe the point is to focus on actions and not on labeling people as one or the other, but sometimes it sounds like that's not what you're saying. I think that's pretty much what I'm saying is to not label the person but look at the actions, because... Well, it's a little bit tricky, but to look for the... You know, if... A person has the ability

[37:46]

to be evil, and then they also have the ability to not be evil, right? To be good. And they can change from one to the other. It's possible to change. So where's the person? You know? Like, where is the person in all this? You know, somebody was... Uh... Uh... People reform. It means, you know, like, they take one form and then at another point they take another form. And so, which one are you going to relate to? You just relate to the evil that's arisen in this person, or you relate to the good that's arisen in this person. And then we say, well, that's the person, but the person

[38:46]

has... There's no real self there. There's simply transformations. Can I open up... Can I follow up on that question and... open a can of worms? Okay. A can of worms is just to invite then your thoughts about justice. About what? Justice. It's really difficult. I'm having a lot of trouble thinking about it. What is justice? If you separate it off... If you separate off act from actor, then how does one think of that? Right. So...

[39:52]

Strictly speaking, in Buddhism there are acts without an actor. But at the same time the perpetrator of acts there is the perpetrator of acts. And the perpetrator is held accountable. So what we would wish for is transformation. We have a penal code which calls for retribution and revenge. That's what our penal... That's the result of our penal code

[40:57]

is retribution. You get so many years for doing such and such a thing. That's simply revenge. Instead of how can we transform this person from doing harmful acts into someone who does unharmful acts. But we haven't advanced that far yet to rehabilitate people. Our prison system is getting fuller and fuller and fuller. And then our revenge system you know is getting more powerful. And so but we call we call that justice. We call

[41:58]

the revenge system justice. And there's probably some good reason for that. If you stay in jail long enough you'll mend your ways. Doesn't work. So how do we actually work with people to change their minds in some way? But that would take too much effort. Also there's a penal system to support. See, this is another evil of our society is there's a penal system that is needs to be supported. And if there are no criminals all the people all the jail would be out of work. There are private prisons. Privatizing prisons means more graft. Means you have to have more criminals in the prisons

[42:59]

to get more money. I mean this is I don't know if this is relevant to what you said but justice. I find it much easier to get sympathy for Ben Laden than for than for Rumsfeld in general for Middle Eastern people who find there's injustice in US policies and with all the power structure in the US. I would like that to change but I am blocked. I don't think it's more or less. I think it's simply looking at things the way they are. It's not like there's a lot of sympathy for Ben Laden. It's simply that you know using that figure

[43:59]

as an excuse is I think we have to look at each one. Right? I understand that but my feelings tell me that Rumsfeld and Bush are much more evil. I see. Yeah. Yeah. Rumsfeld said he said we will not take prisoners. It did not come out in the US press but it came out in the British press. Yeah. Meaning the US troops are not in a position to take prisoners. Yes, yes. So, yes. I won't say that one is more evil than another but I think that there's we have our evil and someone else has their evil. I don't want to compare evils. I think that's cutting it too fine. But we should just look at our own evil as well as looking

[45:01]

at the evil of others. To me that's my point. And not using our good to cover our evil. Paving over our evil with our asphalt of good. Is there a way to rebuff a violent action? Right. I think there is a time

[46:04]

when you should act in self-defense but then to use an incident to take advantage of an incident to promote your own agenda I don't think that's the same. You know a wind just came up and you heard a bang so the wind could have blown a tree maybe into the window and just crash and come down and hurt me. So then I thought well we wouldn't call it that tree evil. Then I thought what if I have a wind of anger come up and I just rake her jaw What's the difference? Well this is the human because we're

[47:05]

in this human relationship together and that's a human you can't talk to the wind you can talk to the wind because you and the other person are really connected in a different way you can reason with a person but you can't reason with the wind so but you can see it that way if you want to you can see it as this is just something that happened this is just a natural phenomenon phenomenon you know somebody whacked and that's also possible you can take that attitude it's possible to take that attitude and then you can also

[48:06]

say thank you there's a lot of different responses you can have so you don't have to retaliate there are many many different responses you can have retaliating is only one of them I was going to ask something other than but about this question a tree that commits an act of violence unbeknownst to itself can't result on it but if I'm aroused in a passionate irrational anger and I strike someone not at my age

[49:07]

but twenty years ago I can consider what worthy forces that led me to conduct myself in such a way ponder what I might then do about tempering or understanding so that it seems to me is the essential very essential difference between sentient beings and enamorate I think that's yeah because the tree had no intention no intention in the in the branch coming through the window it's simply following following the wind yeah so it's there's a story about that you know

[50:07]

about people in a boat going down this stream and they see another boat coming toward them and they say you know we have the right of way what's that boat doing? and they start yelling at the boat yelling and screaming get out of the way get out of the way and then the boat comes by and there's nobody in the boat I was wondering about all the violence that's happening and how we could connect that with the metaphor of illness health illness illness yes oftentimes when I when I hear about a crime or somebody being convicted I think about somebody being ill or misguided yes and I see this as a as a cry for help do you see

[51:08]

the violence that's happening right now? absolutely it's it's this illness and we should look for the causes we just always look if we keep looking for the causes eventually we will be able to understand how things happen in the world instead of just reacting to them and then there can be some change otherwise there will never be any change I understand well I find that much more helpful than this concept of evil which I have trouble grasping yeah that's right evil seems to be well one it's a [...] concept that

[52:08]

sort of assumes a god of some sort and then it's evil seems to be related to the opposite of god satan or the devil the evil impulse good and bad so it's very religiously oriented in that sense and also socially oriented evil is just determined by a group of people about what they think evil might be I think certain islamic fundamentalists see the United States as being evil and right now people in the United States see certain fundamentalists as evil but it doesn't really lead to a lot of understanding no it stops your mind right there that it stops the investigative

[53:09]

process right there that's the problem with definitions anyway and there's you mentioned general McCaffrey in the Persian Gulf War and as being evil and from some points of view that's true but then if you're in the military and you have this military mentality about winning a war and stopping troops that are retreating because they might add more to the war it might actually cause more death in the long run than I think he has a different point of view and those people have a different point of view about that so I think in Buddhism I mean what I'm driving at is there a concept of evil in Buddhism I mean did the Buddha talk about evil or some

[54:09]

understanding or yes and no you know Darwin talks about good and evil Papias is the evil one you know the evil like the devil but and so that concept I think does arise in Buddhism but strictly speaking at its highest level Buddhism doesn't have that term evil it's like more like delusion so these acts come out of delusion out of misunderstanding yeah and if we look at it in that way instead of looking at it from the point of view of evil this is

[55:10]

delusion this is like not understanding how you create karma not understanding how you create your own misery how you create your own suffering that's exactly right so using those terms you know stops you from stops your investigation because you've landed on something that you can stand on you know and then gives you a place to work from Mark I have some difficulty understanding the use of we in the discussion I understand sort of whose perspective is we all have the same tendencies as everybody else already so anyway we want to judge evil we need to see ourselves and in

[56:10]

that sense we're all we at other times though when I hear the government or certain certain people talking about we and wanting everyone to be identified in that we I say no don't include me in that we which is something going on so that seems real too so I don't understand exactly well I think you do understand but you may not want to be included in that we but you are to say that you know I don't associate myself with people who think this way but nevertheless I'm part of the we even though I may not like it there

[57:13]

goes I think it's time to stop okay so I want to be we but you

[57:29]

@Text_v004
@Score_JJ