What Is Evil?

[Jafar]

Everyone thinks that Evil is not ME or US but THEM.

More often it also goes by this logic:
"WE are GOOD people but because THEY did evil thing to ME / US, thus WE did the same thing to THEM"
"But WE are not evil, WE are good, we did those deed because THEY start it first".

In short; everyone (seems to be) do not want to be "Evil".
But what's the true criteria to be "Evil"?
And most importantly why people perform "Evil" deed?

A psychologist try to explore that issue, and this is his presentation.
The Psychology of Evil.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1uCaAGx_dPY

[muslims]

Many are not evil but weak or stupid...

and...

?Stupidity is the same as evil if you judge by the results.?

and...

         Indeed, the worst of living creatures
         in the sight of Allah
         are the deaf
         and dumb
         who do not use reason
         (8:22)

therefore, many are worst than evil because they are stupid ..

and they are stupid because they are trying to outsmart Allah

refused to follow simple commands

just like what Iblees did; ie. he knows better than Allah and refused to prostrate to Adam

   Smart and brilliant people can never know reality and Allah. Because they are too smart.

[Indelwyn]

I feel evil and stupid are like apples and oranges.

EX: Stupid is the women who does not leave an abusive husband (this is the view of most, although there are other issues as to why she may or may not leave, just using it as an example)

Evil is the man who feels it is okay to beat her.

Evil to me is one who gains pleasure from the pain of another. At some point in life we have all been evil. Some more than others.  I don't understand evil, how a man could beat a child till it dies, a person just going into a store and killing someone, or torturing one due to belief systems, that cause no harm to others. They seem to get a sense of joy and gratification to see another hurt. Perhaps they are hurting. Although I don't see this as an excuse to hurt another. They are mentally ill. Perhaps they are prone to evil entities feeding off their energy, but lack spiritual protection or the ability to fight those impulses. I took a class on demonology, it roughly spoke on the evil energies, it was pretty interesting. I would study more on exorcisms and demonology but it scares the crap out of me 

Always thought provoking Jafar

[good logic]

Peace Jafar.

This is both very easy and very difficult.

Try and escape from "Evil",when you recognise it.

How do you recognise " evil" ,that is a difficult part?

Escape to " God", that is also very difficult.

"Evil" keeps pulling you back. Everyday you have to try harder than the day before.

" Evil" never lets you be " In Peace".

Peace to you.

[Jafar]

Peace Jafar.

This is both very easy and very difficult.

Try and escape from "Evil",when you recognise it.

How do you recognise " evil" ,that is a difficult part?

Escape to " God", that is also very difficult.

"Evil" keeps pulling you back. Everyday you have to try harder than the day before.

" Evil" never lets you be " In Peace".

Peace to you.

The difficult part is to recognize "evil" within ME/US.
While it is easy to recognize "evil" within YOU/THEM.

Example:
Can you easily recognize evil if it exist within "your favorite book" or "your favorite religion" or "your favorite nation/government"?
Most probably you will not.

Please see his lecture above, one among the key driver for human to do evil deed has something to do with "system" and "authority". Once an "Evil Deed" received a legitimacy from the 'authority' (Holy Book, Government, Superior, Religion, Family, Society) most human will be happily perform the "Evil Deed" without any remorse. (and sometimes they're proud of it)

Those who do "Good" (Hero) are those who "dare to be different", "Disobey/Resist the authority" for the sake of following his conscience. And according to an experiment described in his lecture, those kind of people are minority within current human population.

If anyone try to find "evil" it's better to look harder within "themselves".

Salam / Peace

[good logic]

Peace Jafar.

That is precisely why" EVIL" is so difficult to recognise?Because it is your " other"  self."Disguised as Good".

When I drive and cause an accident it is someone else s fault. I am a " Good " driver.

There is always an excuse for my " bad" behaviour. I am justified, others are at fault.

I criticise others, they are "evil", they make mistakes.  If I make a mistake, I have a "good" reason... an so on...

"Evil" is others... never me!

Peace to you.

[drfazl]

Peace

The Evil started with the governments all over the world by the politicians, for the politicians and of the politicians, voted to power by the slave populations of the world. This is because they denounced their only King is God of the worlds, Allah.

[Jafar]

Peace Jafar.

That is precisely why" EVIL" is so difficult to recognise?Because it is your " other"  self."Disguised as Good".

When I drive and cause an accident it is someone else s fault. I am a " Good " driver.

There is always an excuse for my " bad" behaviour. I am justified, others are at fault.

I criticise others, they are "evil", they make mistakes.  If I make a mistake, I have a "good" reason... an so on...

"Evil" is others... never me!

Peace to you.

Definitely it's related to "ego", big ego resulted in arrogance, and arrogance is evil.
The "ME" case is easier to resolve than the "WE" case.
The "WE" case have more destructive aspect than the "ME" case,
And how the "WE" case can easily influence the "ME" case.
Social evil is a greater evil than personal evil.

Thus if we want to 'amend evil', it's better to take the 'top-down' approach.

The first most important thing now is to have a kind of 'awareness' on "What Evil Is" and "How it Developed".

As the experiment in the lecture describes most often it was started with system. (Religion, Authority, Government etc..)
Because the general human population is very weak in reaction to authority.

The majority of them will just blindly follow authority even when the authority tell them to do evil while they do know and aware that it is evil. Only a handful of them will have the guts to question the authority, fewer of them will have the guts to reject/resist the authority and only very few of them (the experiment cited <2%) will go all the way to 'fighting the evil'.

In case of oppression, the system will make efforts to justify "Evil Deed" and it will create a propaganda for it by first 'dehumanizing' the target group. This pattern is being repeated over and over and over by many culture/religion/government throughout human centuries. Kufr, Juden, Pagan, Witches, Goyim, Negro, Foreigner, The West (the list are exhaustive) are some of the labeling of this 'dehumanization'.

The way to 'fight' this is by raising another propaganda of "personal heroism" WHERE a hero are those who:
- Acted when other people stay silent
- Brave enough to question the authority and took risk
- Realize when other people are blinded

As thus we can increase from the <2% attitude found in human today and hopefully to become >50%.

And "critical thinking" ability is very important for a person to have to make this a reality, this will definitely be at odd with "religion" which mandates "follow with no question asked" a.k.a "dogmatic" approach.

Salam / Peace