Comment by Forrest Curo on 5th mo. 22, 2012 at 12:32pm

Getting interesting... [For the record, I want to cop to being a typical human (Yawn!) such as Paul presupposed, capable of enjoying "lust" towards a wider range of people than it would be good of me to indulge. Needing a woman around (one particular woman, these last thirty years) to be truly my full self, but not able to say what's best for anyone else in that regard.]

I believe I have observed the basis of "malice" within myself, in the innocent pursuit of playing strategy games. Without the challenge of striving for a winning advantage-- no game. Maintaining a winning advantage == playing well, feeling secure. (Doing this too consistently--for me-- feeling like a bully, being relieved when some (predictable) mistake restores the balance.)

On this hypothesis: "a malicious, sadistic person" would be someone with an insatiable need for more security than the world can provide (at least, not by such means or with such an attitude.) Lack of compassion would help, refusal to see "That's me" when that seems inconvenient.

"Evil" in the Bible seems to mean "acts which do harm." Not necessarily by means we would recognize: "Destroyers of the Earth" in Revelation may have meant, to the writer, something along the lines of "people who violate the Covenant and thereby bring a curse on The Land of Israel." Cluelessness of various sorts would probably strike their sense of justice as a mitigating factor, ie Jonah: "And should I not pity Nineveh, that great city, with 50,000 people not knowing which hand to wipe with, and also many cattle?" But when the Assyrians move non-Jewish settlers into their conquered area of Israel, lions start killing them because they haven't learned how to worship the local god aka God.

I wasn't just saying (though it's probably true) than closer attunement to God will help us understand other people better.

I meant it should help us understand ourselves, and what is right for us, in a way that pulls us away from doing wrong.

Comment by James C Schultz on 5th mo. 22, 2012 at 5:35pm

I think some forms of arrogance fit my definition.  I would compare it to the legal difference between negligence and gross negligence where someone's conduct so disregards the welfare of others as to be criminal.  When someone acts contemptuously towards others they have a mindset of I don't care what you think this is what I want to do and I am going to do it.  I believe they get a certain satisfaction/pleasure from being able to do what they want to do - an expression that comes to mind is "Let the Devil be damned"  I think that is similar to what you might be referring to as "militant ignorance".  It's a heart condition that makes it evil.  The complete lack of empathy for what is happening to someone else.  While I would say that evil is when you enjoy the misfortune of others I couldn't deny that causing such misfortune through arrogance is much different.

Comment by Forrest Curo on 5th mo. 22, 2012 at 8:10pm

There's the question of whether this "arrogance" is "an evil choice"--

or instead, the  unsatisfactory result of a psychological force that does serve a constructive function in its proper context-- A person needing to shut out unwarranted outside interference, in the process of developing some independent integrity.

If that development gets derailed, while the reflexive shutting-others-out continues, the conduct that results can look (and be!) very bad indeed.

That sort of conduct may well need to be fended off, interfered with, etc, for our collective self-protection. Thinking of it (and the person doing it) as "evil" is another matter, probably not the best approach to changing it.

Comment by James C Schultz on 5th mo. 23, 2012 at 8:49am

I think that evil has to involve a "heart" condition such as contempt for others either individually or collectively.

Comment by Bill Samuel on 5th mo. 23, 2012 at 10:55am

To get to commenting on the substance of the post (curiously most of the comments don't seem to be about the post), I appreciate the points made about the Quaker view of the Bible. I think the traditional Quaker view of scripture should be highlighted more among Friends (and perhaps is not because so many have deviated from it in either the evangelical or liberal direction) because it provides a Third Way that gives the Bible special importance without putting it on an improper pedestal.

I do question whether Bennett should have stated as a fact, "We don't have any books written by anyone who knew Jesus himself directly." There are two objections to that.

The first is that we don't have the evidence to determine definitively who wrote the books of the New Testament, and closely related to that, when.  Beyond that, many scholars suggest sources for the gospels (such as "Q") for which we do not have texts but which must have been earlier than the form in which we presently have them. Some NT books seem Biblically attributed to persons who knew Jesus when he physically walked on the earth.  Scholars may hypothesize that most or all of these were actually written down by others, but that is not something they know. It is an unprovable hypothesis.

Secondly, how is Jesus Christ known directly? Friends traditionally have held Christ can be known directly by all of us, and does not require being present with his physical manifestation. Certainly the apostle Paul believed that, and wrote that he knew Jesus Christ directly. And virtually all scholars agree Paul wrote parts of the N.T.

Comment by Forrest Curo on 5th mo. 23, 2012 at 11:39am

"Like a Russian magician

I used to hide my heart in a tree..."

[and the reader can probably work out his own versions from here.]

Both of my parents were good people; both had lost parents when very young... and then (whether I was really that sick, or the one aspect of mothering my mother had learned well was anxiety) I spent considerable times in hospitals as a baby and in my early childhood.

Years later, I read how this kind of upbringing messes people up. And it isn't theory, because I know what I've done to my education, career, and relationships... and how little I knew to do to  have changed these in any way. I still wake up dreaming that it's the last day of school and I not only haven't been to class, I don't remember what classes I have or where they meet or when the final is scheduled. Analogous stuff with love relationships until I was captured by the right woman some thirty years ago, after some very hard learning. And it isn't that grace, dumbluck, and good friends can't turn such things around; or that someone can't be very happy while everything goes screwy and his parents learn to hate him and there are just too many people he'd still be asking for forgiveness if it wouldn't just make him more of a pain.

Gabor Mate: "The low achievers may believe they would gain self-esteem if their ADD impairments could be eliminated and they could perform better in society's eyes; the high achievers could tell them otherwise." Having been in both positions, I know very well what he's talking about... He quotes a typical patient's diary, noting "the deep dissatisfaction with the self it reveals... Characteristically, what this man did not think to write was I want to learn to accept myself."

The surface of "arrogance" may look different, but it isn't. Someone who rigidly closes himself off from people (or his surroundings in general) may not actually be in pain, but it's learning by pain that makes 'unlearning' malfunctional ways so intractably unlikely.

Isn't this everybody, more or less? Mate again: "There is a popular discomfort with any condition of the mind perceived as 'abnormal'. But what if illness is not a separate category, if there is no line of distinction between  the 'healthy' and the 'nonhealthy,' if the 'abnormality' is just a greater concentration in an individual of disturbed brain processes found in everyone?"

Why does one person react one way, another person another...? a whole mess of complex factors. We know (and probably knew well enough back when Clinton was destroying AFDC) that yanking parents away from their children at an early age-- or stressing them out, disrupting the relationship-- or having both parents chronically too busy-- or leaving a child parked under a tv's eye, or dragged dizzyingly from activity to activity through the day-- all interfere destructively with people's development. And yet, out of suspicion that some 'undeserving' person might be happy, not paying enough dues or singing enough blues-- These are the kinds of unbringing we've been forcing children into for a generation or so, maybe longer.

It's a delicate process; and when it misfires, it isn't always obvious what went wrong how. Neither could we have let Hitler off the hook, just because his upbringing (truly!) was a nightmare. But we know all sorts of ways to make life wretched for everyone, and we should stop, cut one another slack-- & have some compassion for the self that keeps lousing up & embarrassing us (in whatever way that may be.)

I continue to say: This is very likely what made Jesus so effectively healing, that he could forgive because he could recognize.

Comment by Olivia on 5th mo. 23, 2012 at 10:30pm

I think I hear James' clear focus that "evil has to involve a 'heart' condition"    and Forrest's point (possibly?) that we have all sinned and fallen short of the glory of God and need this combination of accountability and compassion -- possibly what is meant by the comment that Jesus could "recognize."     Does this get at the nature of what you are saying, Forrest?

     I like James' sense about the heart condition.  Surely evil must be a heart condition, whatever else it is, because the RIGHT heart condition (in probably all healing traditions) has the power to overcome all evil and all sickness. 

I like Forrest's call that we should cut one another some slack and recognize that there are reasons we turn out the way we do....     I think that this is fully compatible with recognizing evil in some general sense as being a heart condition. 

Listen, Are we feeling that our ability to determine if God has reach and authority through all things (including the Bible, but lots of other stuff and all beings as well) hinges on what sense we make of evil?

Comment by Forrest Curo on 5th mo. 23, 2012 at 11:28pm

Yeah, it really isn't easy to say this, and Olivia's efforts to clarify help show me what I haven't succeeded in saying.

There is no "evil" in the sense that I think James is talking about-- because that "heart condition" it would require isn't our real nature.

Who people are at times, what people do at times-- can get truly ugly. That heart can look as bad as a five-year old screaming "I want to kill you!" (And isn't it good that young children are small, and usually unarmed!) James & I are quite in agreement about what this kind of thought/feeling/action looks like! In disagreement about what it means.

"The reach of God." I think of it as all God's work, including "what goes wrong."An obstacle, a challenge-- even a long walk in the wrong direction-- is only a temporary delay in God's intention.

What Jesus was "recognizing" was that "the sinners" were himself.

He could also recognize that "the Righteous" were himself. But it was impossible to get them to see it!

Comment by James C Schultz on 5th mo. 25, 2012 at 7:33pm

While we have the capacity for good, there is no question we have the capacity for evil.  Jesus warned his Apostles several times not to harden their hearts.  Provers 4:23 tells us to watch over our hearts with all diligence for from it flows the rivers of life.  In Jer_17:9 we read:

  The heart is deceitful above all things, and desperately wicked: who can know it?

and Psa 51 reads  To the chief Musician, A Psalm of David, when Nathan the prophet came unto him, after he had gone in to Bathsheba. Have mercy upon me, O God, according to thy lovingkindness: according unto the multitude of thy tender mercies blot out my transgressions.

  Wash me throughly from mine iniquity, and cleanse me from my sin.

  For I acknowledge my transgressions: and my sin is ever before me.

  Against thee, thee only, have I sinned, and done this evil in thy sight: that thou mightest be justified when thou speakest, and be clear when thou judgest.

  Behold, I was shapen in iniquity; and in sin did my mother conceive me.

  Behold, thou desirest truth in the inward parts: and in the hidden part thou shalt make me to know wisdom.

  Purge me with hyssop, and I shall be clean: wash me, and I shall be whiter than snow.

  Make me to hear joy and gladness; that the bones which thou hast broken may rejoice.

  Hide thy face from my sins, and blot out all mine iniquities.

  Create in me a clean heart, O God; and renew a right spirit within me.

  Cast me not away from thy presence; and take not thy holy spirit from me.

  Restore unto me the joy of thy salvation; and uphold me with thy free spirit.

Then will I teach transgressors thy ways; and sinners shall be converted unto thee.

  Deliver me from bloodguiltiness, O God, thou God of my salvation: and my tongue shall sing aloud of thy righteousness.

  O Lord, open thou my lips; and my mouth shall shew forth thy praise.

  For thou desirest not sacrifice; else would I give it: thou delightest not in burnt offering.

  The sacrifices of God are a broken spirit: a broken and a contrite heart, O God, thou wilt not despise.

  Do good in thy good pleasure unto Zion: build thou the walls of Jerusalem.

  Then shalt thou be pleased with the sacrifices of righteousness, with burnt offering and whole burnt offering: then shall they offer bullocks upon thine altar.

Comment by Olivia on 5th mo. 26, 2012 at 12:47pm

Thank you for this passage, James.

Forrest, I don't disagree with your sense that evil is not in our "true nature" but that does not mean that it doesn't exist.

I'd like to say something really odd on this general topic of evil and what seems to be raised.   I have experienced evil leaving me.  I'll spare you a description of this but will just say that it was unmistakable.   This, as part of a progression of healing of emotional, spiritual AND physical conditions involving environmental toxins.  Probably a lot of stuff.

What I feel needs saying about that is that it was then clear to me (but never until then) that the evil could not be seen until it was no longer in control.  As soon as it is being "cast out" or has already left, suddenly a person may sense with absolute clarity that it had been there in the first place.  But before that the person is just (among other things, more positive things) anxious, damaged, angry, violent, ashamed, or whatever the case may be in an individual life.  When the evil still has some pull, the person it has pull with can never be sure it is actually there.  It is only seen clearly when it is no longer in control.

Many, many good people struggle with fears and angers and judgements of others....I do not judge them or these mundane forms of darkness and lack of faith that assault us in little and big ways.  Not at all.   But it is important (when possible) to recognize that we are influenced.  Putting it in more of a New Age language may also be enlightening for some.  What energy are we resonating with?   Recognize that there is a choice and that it holds spiritual power more than we realize at the time.   

What do we give credence to?   What do we harbor, unaware?  Where do we allow darkness to continue?     An evangelical Christian singer from Texas Keith Green (now dead) once put it this way in a song sung from the persepctive of Satan (Satan being his theology, not mine).  He says:

     "You know, it's getting very simple now 'cause no one believes in me anymore."

I still feel that everything is God's.   It's just not always in its pure form already.  It has potential to be much more freed than it is right now, much more in service to the Light.  It's important to work for that freedom of our own souls over these powers of darkness.  And for that reason I think it's important to know that darkness exists, by whatever name.  This does not mean judge one's self and feel ashamed of one's self.  In fact something of the opposite....  Looking at other people in terms of Evil is a very judgmental, fearful and dark stance.  But refusing to consider evil in ones self is also a fearful and dark stance since it gives more spiritual power, unintentionally, to that which is "behind the curtain."

To attempt to tie this back in to the themes raised by Doug's original post (including how to take the Bible and how to approach homosexuality as a concept, and gay people among us and within us):

- judgement doesn't help ANYTHING (judgement of others, of self, of latent tendencies within one's self, etc),

- same for fear of the self and of others,

- same for shame, being ashamed of things about ones self and thus hiding them away from self, others and God,

- same for belief in an external final authority (the way some read the Bible) rather than Christ within your own soul and your own experience.

But my thought is that while it's no good at all for yourself or the world for you, Forrest, to judge 5 year olds who scream out their murderous wishes...   It's important to listen to them with love and encourage them to let out all that is within them and not oppress it...  While simultaneously helping them to heal their anger and willfulness, finding ways to release it.   I would hope that one day when they are 30 or 50 or 100 they become conscious of their own Spirit and what it wills into being, because then they can dismiss whatever is not serving God.  Only then.

     I hope this makes some bit of sense.

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