This is a very interesting article http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hindu_answers_to_the_problem_of_evil Hindu answers to the problem of evil are different from most answers offered in Western philosophy, partly because the problem of evil within Hindu thought is differently structured than Western traditions, mainly Abrahamic traditions. In the Hindu tradition the problem of evil is phrased as the Problem of Injustice. This problem can be considered in the following manner: God is Omnipotent, Omniscient, and Just. Yet injustice is observed to persist in the world. How is this possible? In the Advaita school of Vedanta, this problem is dealt with in detail by Sankara in his commentary on the Brahma Sutras, 2.1.34-36: Brahma Sutra 2.1.34: "No partiality and cruelty (can be charged against God) because of (His) taking other factors into consideration." Sankara's commentary explains that God cannot be charged with partiality or cruelty (i.e. injustice) on account of his taking the factors of virtuous and vicious actions (Karma) performed by an individual in previous lives. If an individual experiences pleasure or pain in this life, it is due to virtuous or vicious action (Karma) done by that individual in a past life. Brahma Sutra 2.1.35: "If it be argued that it is not possible (to take Karma into consideration in the beginning), since the fruits of work remain still undifferentiated, then we say, no, since the transmigratory state has no beginning." The opponent now argues that there could have been no "previous birth" at the very beginning of creation, before which Karma could not have existed. Sankara replies that it is not so, for the number of creation cycles is beginningless, vide the next verse: Brahma Sutra 2.1.36: "Moreover, this is logical, and (so) it is met with (in the scriptures)." Sankara provides references from the Vedas concerning the beginninglessness of Creation: "The Ordainer created the sun and moon like those of previous cycles" (Rig Veda 10.190.3). This shows the existence of earlier cycles of creation, and hence the number of creation cycles is beginningless. Thus Sankara's resolution to the Problem of Injustice is that the existence of injustice in the world is only apparent, for one merely reaps the results of one's moral actions sown in a past life, which is compatible with the Justness of an Omniscient and Omnipotent God. On the higher level of Existence, however, there is no evil or good, since these are dependent mainly on temporal circumstances. Hence a jnani, one who has realized his true nature, is beyond such dualistic notions.
Hindus are way ahead of the game when it comes to understanding duality. They know its all just energy, but they are fond of attaching faces to it as one dresses up a Christmas tree. But yes, duality does have an end. The path is not exclusive to Hinduism, but they are perhaps the best representation of it in practice. x
Without duality there cannot exist anything for us. No things, no concepts, no phenomenon, no time. I imagine this to be similar to heideggar's distinction between present-at-hand, and ready-to-hand... If we consider something useful to us, we pay attention to it, as a distinct thing seperate from the background, then as we recognize its importance, it becomes a tool which is seperate from all the things that are "not tools", hence the distinction or duality arises within the mind. what are your thoughts on evil as represented in the article? Although it is certainly necessary to punish them, can we really hate even the most evil people in history?- for instance, can you really hate osama bin laden, or hitler with this kind of philosophy as said by shankara (according to the article)?
I was going to say something similar to that ^ when I saw the title of this thread. I feel like to even make a distinction is a kind of limiting thing. However, it seams that as long as we make the distinction between good and evil...that it will effect us. As I understand it, the point of Karma Yoga is that we renounce or offer the fruits of our actions to God...and as long as we try and do this...the distinctions of good and evil fall away. This isn't easy though because it is a restructure of our whole way of thinking as opposed to the ideas society has instilled in us and also our natural instincts in our minds to make distinctions: good and bad, hot and cold, ect. This is, refering back to the article, why we are so quick to ask why a loving God could let bad happen, or why good things happen to bad people. And as I understand it... it is all us. This is that whole thing about Leela... that its a play...we are always free... we bind ourselves in all this mess...and we have to get ourselves out. Where does God fit in? We can offer our mess to God. God can guide us and help us untangle the threads and the knots that we have created. This is how I have come to understand it...I may be very off... As to your other question of how do we not hate evil people? Keeping all previously mentioned in mind....I suppose we can see even these evil people on the same level as ourselves....they have lots of knots to untie, they just haven't gotten to untying them yet. There is a reason that Jesus helped the tax collectors and the prostitutes, because they need the most help untying their knots. Before we can excape good and evil, we have to escape evil and become good, and then escape them both. Its kind of a step ladder I think... So these people they may be still struggling to get on the step ladder...and yes...they do awful things....but who's to say that perhaps in another lifetime we weren't in that same position. As I said before these ideas are really hard to practice....but I feel like if we can talk them out we can contemplate them and try to practice them. Forgive me for my rambling. It is late and I've been reading Swami Vivekananda's Karma Yoga lectures....its most prob. that anything that actual makes sense on this reply, I absorbed from there. Good night all.
I guess thats a good way of putting it. I have to agree with you here, we really cannot hate them because who is to say that we weren't in the same position in a previous birth? Ofcourse, we have to stop terrorists, but for a yogi, it will not stem from personal hatred i guess. I agree, it is very hard to practice.
don't tell me what to do, if i want to forgive your rambling, i will but don't tell me to forgive. i forgive* *not because you told me but because i felt so in my heart
all cultures worldwide have the archetypes in full abundance, even silence there is no best, just personal preferences and so your's is hinduism, cool
I wonder. It seems that the islamic suicide bomber too believes he's serving god by killing unbelievers and moving the world closer to a universal caliphate. I'd say good and evil are purely human categories that only apply to humans. Trouble comes when we start to think god has laid down a permanant objective standard of good and evil and seek to impose it on others.
I don't find it hard not to hate terrorists. It's pretty obvious that to coin a phrase, they're well f****d up. They are really victims as much as those they kill. You have to ask yourself what sort of life such people have, programmed as they are with the dreary and hate filled philosophies of fundamentalism to the point where they're ready to kill themselves for it. A pretty dismal one I'd venture to suggest. No wonder they're so keen to get out of it.
good gawd ye' all, can't i wake up in the morning and not have a deep philosophical conversation without someone invoking "terrorists"??? somehow it gets conveyed that hindu spirituality is superior for its extensive definitions and development of archetype and yet we see the same old cultural presentation of poverty, subjugation of women, intense dogmatic restrictions, coded spirituality that only the "elect" can gain entrance, strict and impenetrable class distinctions hindus may have defined evil more intelligently but just as much caught in its web
Thanks chief cowpie, "Hindus may hae defined evil more intelligently" These hindus are self realized or near the end of their path to enlightenment. "But just as much caught in its web" These hindus are caught in Maya, Which the intelligent hindus have realized as the cause of their suffering and have discarded it.
I know, it is quite sad indeed. Hate is very uncomfortable both to the one who is hating, and the one who is being hated. Sometimes we all forget that.
Technically folks, what we are dealing with here is the pseudo experience of life that is the finite mind's actual realm of unconsciousness vs the Sahasrara Cakra or Advaita consciousness of sat-cit-ananda, the awakened being, considering that these beings are the ones that are the original authors of the Tantras and Upanishads and Sutras, such as Patanjali, and far earlier men. Follow me here please. Contrary to what we think, the ego experience of life, of reality, is unconscious. Now we as western minded men, psychologists and the like, consider the sleep state and similar mental states as the unconscious. Not so with the Yogic Tantra tradition, and I speak not only from an historical philosophical stance but from one with a fully functioning Kundalini Devi. From this perspective, the ego mind with its base center of desire, functions as the Deity "Kali", and needs to be viewed as a mass field of this aspect of the Devi. In other words, all of our desire centered consciousnesses of finite selves constitute the Deity Kali. Krsna says in the Gita, "I am Kali, and I have come to engage all souls". Well, this does not mean that He is going to sweep down out of the sky and kill us as the Deity Kali. What He means instead is that as God He is us, entities with our finite consciousnesses being centered in the ego state, that are on an automatic trajectory to self termination. So Krsna is saying that by being us as the evolved result of consciousness becoming the unconsciousness of ego self, we must suffer and die as the Deity of expiration, Kali. Technically, there is no evil, as there is no entity to perform or experience it. Because we as the mass ego consciousnesses that constitute Kali don't really exist as our individual selves. We are instead a living metaphor for the divine transitional flux of pure Sattvic consciousness, sat-cit-ananda, the mind of Siva, that is moving though the mutiplistic semblance of biolgical reality, the clothing of the Devi that it has taken upon itself, back to its union with its own being. As an individual person, and I've been one as you all have been, has suffering and pain. We have lacking and longings, and a physical beings can experience horrible misery. But it is really God as Kali that is undergoing these things, and these things are shed by us individually at death, until another birth occurs again remanifesting the remnants of what we were. Then it begins again. But, when you awaken the Kundalini and get Her in the higher Cakras, the movie drama just related above is exposed to you for what it is, just the little drama of you're ego unconscious, that is working karmically back towards its real living experience of its original consciousness of the divine self, Lord Siva. Then you realize that there was never evil or suffering to begin with, because those experiences only applied to you when you thought you were you as ego. Look at a typical picture of Kali. She is standing on Lord Siva, who is asleep. Well when you awaken the Kundalini, you are actually arousing Kali out of Her nightmarish dream, and in effect awakening Her aspect as the Kundalini, who is dreaming Kali to begin with, thus allowing Lord Siva to become the predominant consciousness of the self, your original "divine self consciousness", as opposed to the dreaming Kundalini in Her dormant aspect, the dream of Kali, what essentially is the dream of the ego self of evil, depravity, suffering and death. Now when you become one with the mind of Siva, duality ends, as does good/bad, suffering and pleasure, unconsciousness/consciousness. Then, there is only the living experience of sat-cit-ananda, pure being, pure consciousness, and the pure bliss of living in heaven on earth, total Samadhi. I have put this into the macro aspect because in essence that is how divine reality functions. We are all part of one big biological unit, with consciousness moving through us as unconsciousness, the dreaming Kundalini as Kali, being driven and projected by the pure consciousness of God. Namaste, Yogin Bhairava Atmabhoda Sarasvati
this particular verse "i am kala" kala is time, krishna draws to the connection between god and time.
That is correct, but time and Kali are synonymous my friend, the only difference is that the "I' on the end of the word makes it feminine. Time is one aspect of the living Deity of Kali, which has the consuming capacity resulting in our demise as long as we are finite consciousness centered, in ego in other words. Our minds are in time, and will accordingly expire in it as Kali. When the finite projected consciousness of ego has been sublimated into Sahasrara, the divine self consciousness has replaced the ego consciousness, hence that entity is not subject to the expirational demise of time. They are then immortal and outside of what we call the duality of Good and Evil. The overall point here is that the suffering imposed by what is viewed as "evil" only applies to those who are in their karma of the ego mind, and under the jurisdiction of Kali, what is technically the experience of being "unconscious". This goes for Islamists, alien from Zeta Reticuli, anyone. The pranic processes that are responsible for the experience of finite selfhood can be effectively reversed, the goal of Yoga Tantra and the entire theme underlying the whole idea of Yogic enlightenment, what is actually consciousness. Hinduism, its philosophies, views of the transcendental, and Deific pantheon, came from the higher spiritual awarenesses attributed to the sages who bear witness to the efficacy of the Yogic proficiency. I can personally attest to these realities as fact, from having subjected my own finite consciousness to the rigors of said disciplines, and have documented these issues in print. But, all this is moving beyond the scope of the issue, which is ultimately that being subjected to the pain and misery of evil, the "awake" state of unconsciousness, can be transcended while alive and embodied upon achieving yogic enlightenment, Samadhi, or moving into actual "consciousness, 'divine consciousness'". Basically its about transcending ones Karma. If done as a mass species, it could be heaven on earth.
Well that is a huge difference from modern western thought which maintains 'God' is Omnipotent, Omniscient and Benevolent. All though having said that the ancient Abrahamic tradition (Judaism) seems to explain that 'God' is mainly Jealous. I find this confusing, that we could be charged with something in our past lives, yet we are supposdly all one (for lack of a better word) 'thing' and that 'thing' is 'God'. It seems to suggest that the ego is able to survive death. If the ego is able to survive death, then the ego is able to potentially continue on undisturbed. Then if the Ego choose 'vicious' actions continually, then the ego will be punished continually. This would leave us with a perpetual state of 'Evil' (or vicious action) and suffering. If this state is eternal then it is an eternally 'Evil' part of 'God'.
You are right, Hindu concept of God is very different from Abrahamic religions. In hinduism, God is not like human beings. Although all these human feelings have their origin in God, He is aloof to it. He transcends the three modes of material nature, namely the modes of goodness, passion and ignorance. This may look like it is suggesting that if you were evil before, you will be evil now and forever, but this is not so, - you have only read part of the entire argument. According to the Hindu thought, one can always come out of his vicious cycle by overcoming his past propensities through self effort. Sage Vashista in the scripture "Yoga Vashista" explains that one's self effort in the present helps him go against his propensities (good or evil) or helps him go along with his propensities. The choice however is in the hands of the individual. For instance, if a person was a cold blooded killer in his past life, he may still have the propensity toward violence in this life, however he can overcome it if he is fed in non-violent teachings. Karma is not just past lives affecting present life. Karma is a phenomenon seen in immediately in this life as well. For instance, If a person is a smoker, he/she will have the propensity to smoke , this ofcourse also means that with enough self effort on part of the smoker, he/she can stop smoking. So you see, karma is not some punishment, it is simply a propensity left in the individual stemming forth from his actions. God is also neither evil nor good. Shankara is saying that when one realizes God as the being in his inner regions of himself, He sees everything with equal vision.
Exactly. Karma is technically defined as "action', the action of the prana of the mind, which if acted out reqiures more action. Always remember this" The ego or finite self does not exist as we experience it, and niether does our Karma. There is no "we", so there is no one there to be charged with anything good or bad. You see prabhu-jis, we don't have karma, "we are karma". Karma is not something you have, it is something you are. Our entire experience of finite selfhood is the mental state known as "pravritti karma", the outward moving fluctuation of pranic vrittis. What you have instead is an evolutionary transition of pure divine consciousness moving through our embodied situations, living out the various desire stratagems, "karmas", until we turn within to face our real divine nature and self. Then your finite selfhood experience is in nivritti karma, or the nullification of the outward karmic flux of the mental finite self. If nivritti is continued, which by the way is a meditative state, sat-cit-ananda is attained. The immanent absolute consciousness of God, which is omnipotent, and omniscient, is the actual consciousness that is manifesting this entire melodrama we see as finite reality. The goal of embodied existence is to become one with our source "projector" consciousness, the mind of God. Then the illusion of finite selfhood, and with it karma and death are transcended. Namaste, Yogin Bhairava Atmabhoda Sarasvati
