Question: What is the origin of evil?

Swamiji: In the beginning there was no evil. God did not create evil—it was man’s contribution. Evil is equal to selfish, self-centered actions. The moment you feel that you are only a separate individual functioning in the world for your own happiness, any activity you perform will be poisoned by selfishness.

All the great religions of the world-all of them-declare that there is a greater intelligence that created the world. But none of them have any answer when you ask: “If God is perfect and beautiful and he created the world, where did evil come from?” No religion in the world has a convincing answer. They would say it is the Devil’s work, as though there are two forces in the Infinite: one is a good and the other is bad. In such crucial points Adi Shankaracharya’s contribution in logical analysis has been most satisfactory. Even today the most scientific of men find it convincing.

His theory is that creation is only a projection of the mind. The Infinite ever remains one—the eternal Existence “is” as it always has been, is and will be. Although the changing phenomenal universe is only a projection of the mind, it appears to the mind that this world of plurality is real. The convincing arguments by which Adi Shankaracharya induces the seeker to reject the names, shapes and forms in the search for the subjective essence and reality are spectacular. Anyone with an ounce of intelligence who follows Shankara’s logical method cannot help but be convinced.

Adi Shankaracharya was extremely practical; he gives a relative reality to this world. Using the ocean as a model, he points out that its waters include the constantly changing waves that rise and fall against each other and crash on to the shore. Yet beneath the moving waves abides the pure water from which the waves rise, which supports the waves, and into which the waves disappear. The changing surface and the changeless depths are all intrinsically one essence.

In wisdom alone can this oneness be recognized. It can not be comprehended by our sense organs. We can only observe the waves on the surface of the ocean. However, when we contemplate the fundamental substratum of the ocean, we come to realize that it is only water itself that lends existence to the multiplicity of waves, their thunderous roaring, and the froth and foam produced by their clashing. They are all only expressions of the very dynamism of the silent columns of waters that constitute the depth of the ocean.

Q: You have said in class that sin is nothing but agitation in the mind. If I kill somebody and it does not leave any turbulence in my mind, does it means that I have not sinned?

S: If I kill a person I am branded a murderer; I am arrested and punished. But if a doctor kills a person during surgery, he is not arrested. Why? In the case of the doctor, the killing was attended by the motive to save a life. The action born of the desire to serve another does not leave any agitation in the doctor’s mind.

If you kill someone, it will be out of some self-centered motive; the fellow was wanting your girl, or disturbing your peace, or destroying your property. The motive makes the difference.

In fact, sin is the measure of the angle of deviation between the desires of the mind and the intellect’s best judgment. The intellect chooses what is right and points out what is wrong. But if the mind is not synchronized in agreement with the intellect and follows its own inclinations towards the purely pleasurable, then the actions that follow will be the complete opposite of the intellect’s advice.

Q: Knowing what is good, why does man go on and do the opposite?

S: There are two separate distinct paths in life: shreyas [good] and preyas [pleasant]. Man is confronted with the choice of pursuing one of these paths at every single moment of his life.
The path of the pleasant, as the name suggests, pleases, fascinates and entices us. It caters to our sensual nature, and, therefore, produces immediate pleasures. Ultimately, these trifling satisfactions will putrefy into ripples of disappointments and sorrows.

In striking contrast, shreyas is detested by the mind in the beginning. Even so, since it is based on sound religious precepts and injunctions, it leads to greater happiness and a genuine sense of fulfillment. We are mature people who have tasted life, and know the path that leads to a fuller happiness. We must live these convictions.

Q: So if sin is the deviation between the desire of the mind and the conviction of the intellect, then desire must be the culprit. How do we get rid of it?

S: Desire. . . The wavering of the mind, expressing as an uncontrollable impatience to gain something is called “desire.” This desire is the very devil in us that compels us to compromise with our own values and tempts us to perpetrate sins. The greater the desire, the stronger the power of the pull toward the sinful and the low. Whenever the mind’s instinctive cravings are not synchronized with the intellect’s discriminating ability, there will be turmoil and sorrow. So desire enshrouds our wisdom.

Q: So you could say that the path of the good is the realm of the intellect, and the path of the pleasant is of the mind?

S: Yes, you would be correct. So how can a true integration between the mind and intellect be brought about? Only by surrendering this ego, with its sense of ME and MY wants, to a higher goal or ideal maintained by the intellect. This merger and harmonious integration is called yoga. Only when the mind and intellect join together in accord does peace prevail, only then does man become fit for the contemplative flight, which transcends both these mental instruments.

Q: What about those times, when in spite of one’s intellectual convictions, one just cannot control oneself. We are just bound and determined to do something that we know will cause sorrow, but seemingly cannot help ourselves?

S: You take the attitude that it is just an experience to teach the mind its lesson; you stand back observing as an uninvolved witness. Afterwards, when the mind starts its whimpering over its pains and disappointments, you just tell it that you gave it what it wanted—now it can just suffer. You have no sympathy for it whatsoever! You are the observer of the drama.

Q: You say that God is within us, so every action whether it is bad or good is done by God. Why then are we punished?

S: We are punished because we are not performing the action with the full realization that the Lord is acting through us. God can only do divine actions. Divine actions can have no bad reactions, which you call punishments.

Bad actions are done when the actor is motivated by likes and dislikes, selfishness, lust and greed, which are attitudes that develop as a result of ignorance of the fact that the Lord resides within each of us. When you act as a separate egoistic entity, you are punished. When you surrender to the Lord in you, and thus allow the Lord to act, there is no punishment. Kill this little “I” and live, see, think and act as the great “I”. All actions preformed by such a perfected agent of action can only be divine actions.

Also, your question contains a contradiction. You say that every action—good or bad—is performed by the God in you, and in the very same breath you wonder why you are punished? If God is the doer, why not accept that God is the one who is punished? Shouldn’t the one who performs the bad actions be the one who is punished? In self-surrender, when the ego is completely eliminated, there is neither an independent actor nor sufferer in you. Then only is your proposition that God is the doer true. This conclusion can be verified by your experience, when in self-surrender, you have completely eliminated the ego.