Daily Meditation: Monday, October 4, 2004

Evil - relative to the perception we have of it

10/04/2004

What is evil for some can be harmless or even good for others. Since some people live in the fire without being burned, fire is not something evil for them. Snake venom is deadly for human beings, while on certain animals it has no effect. Put still more simply, some people cannot tolerate the air (they catch cold) or the light (it irritates their eyes), and yet there is nothing better than air and light. It can be said, then, that anything human beings consider to be evil is not necessarily so. It may be disturbing and threatening to them at the time, because they are still weak or ill. What they express about it thus reflects only their personal conceptions and their ability to resist; it is a very relative judgement. Others, like the initiates, come to a different conclusion: because they have learned to make use of evil, they see it as something good.