Hi vajra,
members,
All well I hope.
On the subject of evil:
Although this was written almost 100 years ago, it impresses me as one of, if not the most cogent and authentic discussions for the contemporary mind on the subject of the origins of evil I have ever come across and why I recommend it here. I say 'discussion' because the author routinely posits and then addresses as part of his exposition, many of the common arguments that are usually brought forth in this vein. In addition to his apparently prodigious insight, this makes it a remarkably thorough treatment of the subject, long held as among the most difficult and perplexing for human seekers and intellectual scholars.
Even though a relatively difficult read, imo much can be gained, so patience and a measured perserverance is recommended in approaching it - at least that is what I found to greatly assist my own attempts.
I have linked to the table of contents (the entire book's text is available online), so interested people can have access to many other subject areas commonly queried and explored by seekers, hopefully toward the satisfactory resolution of such questions, and/or practical implimentation if they feel the material has merit for their individual spiritual practice.
Peace and Light,
u
"The Life Divine" by Sri Aurobindohttp://sriaurobindoashram.info/Content.aspx?ContentURL=_StaticContent/SriAurobin... scroll down to the very bottom - end of Book 2, Part 1, and link to:
Chapter XIV - The Origin and Remedy of Falsehood, Error, EvilExcerpt - first and last paragraphs of Chapter XIV
Quote: IF Ignorance is in its nature a self-limiting knowledge oblivious of the integral self-awareness and confined to an exclusive concentration in a single field or upon a concealing surface of cosmic movement, what, in this view, are we to make of the problem which most poignantly preoccupies the mind of man when it is turned on the mystery of his own existence and of cosmic existence, the problem of evil? A limited knowledge supported by a secret All-Wisdom as an instrument for working out within the necessary limitations a restricted world-order may be admitted as an intelligible process of the universal Consciousness and Energy; but the necessity of falsehood and error, the necessity of wrong and evil or their utility in the workings of the omnipresent Divine Reality is less easily admissible. And yet if that Reality is what we have supposed it to be, there must be some necessity for the appearance of these contrary phenomena, some significance, some function that they had to serve in the economy of the universe. For in the complete and inalienable self-knowledge of the Brahman which is necessarily all-knowledge, since all this that is is the Brahman, such phenomena cannot have come in as a chance, an intervening accident, an involuntary forgetfulness or confusion of the Consciousness-Force of the All-Wise in the cosmos or an ugly contretemps for which the indwelling Spirit was not prepared and of which it is the prisoner erring in a labyrinth with the utmost difficulty of escape. Nor can it be an inexplicable mystery of being, original and eternal, of which the divine All-Teacher is incapable of giving an account to himself or to us. There must be behind it a significance of the All-Wisdom itself, a power of the All-Consciousness which permits and uses it for some indispensable function in the present workings of our self-experience and world-experience. This aspect of existence needs now to be examined more directly and determined in its origins and the limits of its reality and its place in Nature.
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But the last division to be removed is the scission between this Nature and the Supernature which is the Self-Power of the Divine Existence. Even before the dynamic Knowledge-Ignorance is removed, while it still remains as an inadequate instrumentation of the spirit, the supreme Shakti or Supernature can work through us and we can be aware of her workings; but it is then by a modification of her light and power so that it can be received and assimilated by the inferior nature of the mind, life and body. But this is not enough; there is needed an entire remoulding of what we are into a way and power of the divine Supernature. The integration of our being cannot be complete unless there is this transformation of the dynamic action; there must be an uplifting and change of the whole mode of Nature itself and not only some illumination and transmutation of the inner ways of the being. An eternal Truth-Consciousness must possess us and sublimate all our natural modes into its own modes of being, knowledge and action; a spontaneous truth-awareness, truth-will, truth-feeling, truth-movement, truth-action can then become the integral law of our nature.
- Sri Aurobindo