Defining Good And Evil

There are good people everywhere, but how do we define good? Pope Sixtus IV loved Tomas de Torquemada (arguably the most evil man that has ever lived)! Good and evil seem entwined with society’s expectations. Behavior can be considered good by some, bad by others, and volumes are written on this subject by philosophers and the religious regarding whether good and evil exists as an entity. Since good and evil seem to change in the context of various cultures, religions, and circumstances, how do we get to the root of good and evil? Wouldn’t we have to look beyond social and religious morays?

Sometimes good and evil set each other up. When good people think of ways to do nice things for other people, and when situations arise enabling them to carry out their missions, lust can arise in the form of an impulsive desire to do good. This is no different from any other dependency or addiction. Likewise, doing a good thing for somebody, or even having an insight during deep prayer, can invite arrogance, smugness and conceit. Also, meditation or contemplative prayer can lead to incredible calm states, which in turn can lead to a clinging to the experience.

Desire, good or bad, leads to other things; this could be called cause and effect, and cause and effect can be intentional or unintentional. If we believe something stands behind our actions, a “doer” of things, a “self,” then the actions become intentional — we imagine ourselves being a good person or whatever. If the actions are unintentional, then we do only what needs to be done.

If we unintentionally do something, (not by accident, but just do it spontaneously because action is called for), that’s much different from intentionally doing it. Unintentional actions usually don’t involve good and evil, whereas intentional ones can. I believe that these intentional “self” and unintentional “no-self” aspects of action are clues to fundamental good and evil, or perhaps a better word for good and evil might be, “what is.” But without some actual experience of deep, contemplative prayer or meditation, this “no self” thing is a difficult concept to understand.

Intention, or self, might be described as a taxi driver. The driver is “intention,” and his taxicab, or his brain, is the slave to that intention. The driver (intention) tells the taxicab (brain) where to go, and in turn the taxi follows the driver’s instructions. Where, however, does the intention come from? Is it an ineffable soul force that precipitates action, is it karma? The genesis of that intention and force is an interesting debate among the religions.

All intention, or plotting, be it for “good or evil,” can be seen to be a result of cause and effect, or karma. In turn, cause and effect could be seen as the mother of all action, and when action results in an illusion of a self performing it, that is; an entity standing behind the action itself, this, I believe, is the true ground of evil — the illusion of a separate self, standing apart from “God.” Overcoming self is a common theme in almost all religions.

If you and I agree to something and one of us accidentally violates our agreement, there is no evil performed, no intention, no self. However if I plot to deceive you, then there is evil and there is a self involved, as well as intention.

So the response usually is, “but how can wanting to help people, such as perhaps wanting the world to meditate and pray, which is an intention, be a bad thing?

Wanting the world to conform to ideas or some religious structure would be an evil thing. That would be the epitome of evil. But merely seeing how we imprison ourselves, and seeing that the world is on fire is merely seeing, and not evil at all. If one sees this without intention, without any expectations or desire for results, and out of compassion makes that vision known with no thought of building a religious structure of any kind, allowing people to decide for themselves what will truly free them — is this "intention," or is this an unintentional action that is as natural as breathing?

Christ and the Buddha made their insights known. They didn’t build a church or a religion — followers did that. Had the followers instead actually searched for truth in their hearts as their spiritual guides did, being paupers and “non-religious,” and seeing things as they were (that the Truth is a moving target and can’t be harnessed into religious doctrines), perhaps we would have a world of prophets now instead of a world torn apart by beliefs.

The question is, how can we begin to become aware and act out of that awareness, rather than acting out of our past habit patterns? This, I believe, is a crucial point to consider. n