08 October 2019

Good and Evil

In the Western religions, the Garden of Eden story is often used to illustrate humankind’s rejection of God, or as a cautionary tale designed to induce children and other humans to obediently follow rules. 
To me, it works better as a metaphor for the spiritual and moral evolution of humankind. When Adam and Eve eat from the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil, it represents our unique ability to divide things into good and bad. Other animals don’t generally make such a distinction.  They do what they do, without calling them good or evil acts. 
That is the sense in which humans are poised between the animals and the angels; that is our blessing and our curse. For with such awareness comes the obligation to maximise the good and minimise the evil. That is our job as humans. 
The Jewish holiday of Yom Kippur, the Day of Atonement, which starts tonight at sunset, reminds us that we can always choose good, and that such a choice, made despite an awareness of our flaws, can transform the world. 
In Hindu mythology, Dussehra reminds us of this. Good can indeed triumph over evil. With our feet on the earth, and our eyes on the gods and angels and demons, we are reminded that even with all our flaws, all the times we fall short, good can and will ultimately triumph over the forces of evil. Or as Martin Luther King Jr, the great disciple of Mahatma Gandhi, once said, “The arc of the moral universe is long, but it bends toward justice”. Or as it says in the Jewish book of ethics Pirkei Avot, “You are not obligated to complete the work but neither are you free to abandon it.”
I apologise to all I have wronged this year. I will try to be better. In the Buddhist (bodhisatva) sense, I will try to be as balanced as I can be, so that I can respond to each situation with Love, and so I can forgive myself when I fall short. 

Happy Dussehra and G’mar Chatimah Tovah to all. 

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