You know who I hate?

Nobody.

I mean that. There's not a soul on this planet I hate. Not even the really evil ones. Probably because I don't really believe in evil.

I mean that, too: I don't believe in evil. Not as a force, certainly not with a "d" put in front of it to personalize it.

Notwithstanding the whole question of God, which I really don't want to get into insofar as I only have the one lifetime to write, I have a few fundamental problems with a devil-figure. First, a devil is a nice handy device for the abdication of personal responsibility: in other words, "the devil made me do it." Granted, a person of any real faith is unlikely to blame His Infernal Majesty for her every least peccadillo, but still, the temptation, you might say, is there. That is the devil's function, after all, at least if you're alive. The living he tempts; the dead he torments. Eternally.

And here I find I must bring God into the picture anyway. I've railed before against the Christian concept of a God Who judges. Any God that claims to love unconditionally, and yet places conditions on Its love, is not a God but a deeply unfunny joke, and should be treated as such. And if the violation of the conditions placed on Its "unconditional" love results in your being handed over for eternal torment--well, then there is both evil and a devil after all...and that God is both.

Judgment is not a divine trait, but a profoundly human one. Most of us are incapable of truly unconditional love: we invent conditions for our beloved to meet, and then are sad and angry when those conditions go unmet. Those of you who feel you do not do this, imagine how you would react if your life partner were to betray you in some way. That your partner has not--would not, you're certain--does not eliminate the condition you've placed on your love. The most common condition, of course, is simple: if you want me to continue loving you, you may not love another.

This is not an indictment. We're all trying to live the best we can, and most of us have convinced ourselves that there must needs be certain requirements, certain boundaries, else we'll go mad. It certainly seems like a reasonable assumption to make. And yet it's right there in the Christ story as an example: here's a guy who was betrayed, tortured and killed...and who refused--out loud, no less--to blame his betrayers, torturers and killers. That's unconditional, I'd say.

There are those who believe that Yeshua bar Yosef of Nazareth never actually existed. Don't count me among their number. I would suggest, however, that parts of his story have been mythologized, and almost all  of his story is widely misunderstood. That latter is easy to prove given how people today on completely opposite sides of any issue believe Jesus would side with them. Then again, perhaps that only illustrates the disturbing tendency we have to turn "What Would Jesus Do?" into "What Would I Do If I Were Jesus?"

At any rate, I do not and can not accept a God that allows a devil to exist.

As for evil? I'd suggest that's a judgement, and not one that tends to help matters overmuch.

Evil a judgement? Are you insane? Are you seriously suggesting there's something wrong with ME for calling a child rapist evil?


No, I'm not. But child rapists make a case for the raping of children all the time. That's because they're mentally ill. In some cases they're also physically and culturally ill...the benighted tribesmen in Uganda have been told over and over again that having sex with a virgin will cure their AIDS. There aren't many virgins left, and there is a whole lot of AIDS to cure. Ergo, child-rape.

I'd humbly suggest that everything we call 'evil' is perpetrated by someone who is not a monster, not a villain, but simply sick. That sickness may be a passing state--we've all knowingly done something bad, almost always out of a misguided, narrow, self-centered perspective--or it may be something akin to one's natural state. In the latter case, the 'evil' is the result of one of two things: either a culturally reinforced illness (example: the Taliban's treatment of women)...or an actual mental defect called sociopathy.

The latter case is, so far as I know, incurable as of yet, and so it's necessary to separate the sociopaths and psychopaths from the rest of us, for our (and their) safety. The former, much more common case...well, what do you do with someone who is sick? Do you punish them for being sick? That seems  silly to me. You heal them, as best you can. How do you heal "evil"? Education is helpful. A giant dose of empathy, repeated as necessary, will go a long, long way. The Bible puts it more simply: Love thine enemies.


Why would you want to love your enemies? Enlightened self-interest,  That is to say, the surest way to perpetuate "evil" is to treat every "evildoer" you meet like pond scum....