to rants page.
As I described elsewhere, I have only fairly recently come to grips with the idea that 'evil' exists in any meaningful way. That has, naturally, got me thinking about Good and Evil in general.
It is far more natural for me to believe in 'Good' than in 'Evil'. That may just mean that I've lived a sheltered life, I don't know. But, while it seems to me that selfishness and cruelty exist in human society, I don't see them in nature, certainly not on any large scale. Beauty, however, exists on the largest scale it is possible for us to observe, and, to me, there is an intuitive connection between Beauty and Good.
While everyone sort of knows what 'Good' and 'Evil' mean, we are all walking around with different ideas of what they are. I will start my discussion with some idea of what they are not.
Having at least begun work on personal definitions, I will continue with my observations.
It has long been a pet peeve of mine that the media (movies and books both) often portrays Evil as being more interesting and more important to their own plot than Good. In part, this is a matter of current fashion (the antiheroic genre), but there is an element of laziness as well. The authors/directors know that watching something really nasty will get the audience's adreneline pumping, and get them engaged in the conflict. This works fine, in moderation, but I find it hard to maintain interest in a storyline when I don't want either side to triumph. I find that I need someone to root for as well as against. This is much easier to accomplish in books than it is in movies (just another reason why books are better).
Unfortunately, I see the same sort of thing when I try to understand how 'Good' and 'Evil' are traditionally viewed, I have a feeling that a deep(er) understanding, reached by philosophers and theologians, has been 'dummed down', and then codified - which has then fed into the 'Evil is More Interesting' problem.
Which leads to my clumsy attempt to reflect on understandings developed and passed on by traditions I have never belonged to. Please bear with me while I indulge in...
references: 7 Deadly Sins website, The Catholic Encyclopedia
My dictionary, like my father, tells me that the word 'vice' means 'in place of' or 'replacing'. The idea is that a vice will fill a vacuum left by the absence of a given virtue. I've always heard of the virtues/vices as follows:
| humility | kindness | abstinence | chastity | patience | liberality | diligence |
| pride | envy | gluttony | lust | anger | greed | sloth |
This scheme apparently comes from the Psychomachia, an epic poem written by Prudentius in 410 AD. Frankly, I find it just as easy to see the 'virtues' as filling the void left by the absence of 'vices' as the other way around.
However, there are also the Four Cardinal Virtues, prudence, temperance, courage and justice (from Classical Greek writings, adopted by the early Christian Church) and the Theological Virtues, As defined by St. Paul Combining these two gives the seven heavenly virtues:
St.Augustine says that "Virtue is a good habit consonant with our nature."
I think that the scheme of contrary virtues is, well, stupid, and I think it has done a lot of harm to the public consciousness (but more on that later). The Seven Heavenly Virtues can be seen as examples of Good (although we could debate individual Virtues), but hardly define good. St. Augustine's definition also requires that we know what 'Good' is. I'm not going to discount either way of looking at things, but neither will I adopt them.
Buddhism doesn't really concern itself with 'good' and 'evil' - to be a Buddhist one would, by necessity, give up the ability to perceive evil, but, it seems to me that there is much 'Good' in the 8-fold path (Or is it just an absence of evil? Have I made the same mistake that bothers me so much in the media portrayal of Good and Evil?).
| Realm | Result of | ||
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | the heavens (gods) | pride | |
| 2 | the world of the asuras (demigods) | jealousy | |
| 3 | the human world | desire | |
| 4 | animal existence | ignorance | |
| 5 | the hungry ghost world | greed | |
| 6 | the hells. | anger |
(Note how close we are to the 7 deadly sins here - but the aim is to escape from them altogether, not to quest for their opposites. Interesting.)
(VERY similar to the Christian concept of virtue here, but without the carrot and stick thing going - the pain that one escapes by following the precepts is pain in this life. Again, interesting. Note that not killing living things includes not eating meat.)
Interested, still asking questions, but possibly a different set than I did before (which is, naturally, a good thing.).
All living things -
Therefore, according to my thoughts earlier, eating, sex, and death are neither Good nor Evil. Gluttony and Lust are the Christian sins of excessive desire - although, to listen to some, any sexual desire is excessive. Buddhist thought is that eating is fine, as long as it doesn't require taking the life of other living things (?!) - I gather this refers to animals, rather than plant life (although Jainism apparently frowns on killing plants too???), and sex is fine as long as it is for the pleasure of both parties, and doesn't involve pain.
I can certainly see the point in moderation in all things, and avoiding excessive desire in order to find tranquility. Losing sight of that 'center' was clearly part of the problem for the one person I can identify as 'Evil'. But I think it would not, in and of itself, be enough to be 'good'.
Beauty - again, there is a connection between Beauty and Good, but it is not, in and of itself, Good. I am certain Evil can appear Beautiful for a time. But being in a mind set that can perceive the beauty inherent in the world around us, being open to the possibility of joyfullness, being tranquil, all of these things, it seems to me, can help, rather than hinder, the discovery of the Good.
I'll write more as it comes to me. Again, more questions than answers, but that's why it's called 'seeking', right?