I’m a pretty good guy, at least I tend to think so. I’m smart. I’m funny. I am even sexy if you’re into that sort of thing. I have spent my life always trying to do the right thing versus just giving in and not caring about doing the wrong things. At this point in my life, it is important for me to be kind more than anything else. I am determined to rise above, to reach for the pinnacle of enlightenment and drive away my demons. After all these years and those demons sure are stubborn buggers. No matter how I try to place myself above it all, I am constantly drawn into the shadows that just won’t go away. At times it can feel like a schism, a duality that has become my life. I want so much to be good but a part of me never can be. This dichotomy tends to piss me off. No matter how I strive to be better, my internal dialogue and impulses never fail to stir the pot that is me. I tend to be weak, especially when it comes to temptation. I tend to be easily influenced, regardless of anything spiritual or transcending I may have experienced. I may not follow one central religion but I am still a believer (even though I imagine there is really nothing to believe in). Many are the secrets we all carry with us. I have no exemption. I try to get through life just like everyone else. I try to stay away from the shadows. I am constantly keeping a watch. I tend to fail almost every time. I’m a nice guy but sometimes you can tell I have a heart of darkness. I am bound to surrender, I cannot help myself. No medication can chase the devil away. I am unrighteous and faulty to the core. I do not wish to ever go there again. I am definitely not a man of purity but I would very much like to be. All shadows bear regret. Voices cry out in the night. There exists within me an animal, a creature so base it can avoid definition. I am yet to be torn in two by it but it seems to have stretched me, quite often to the limit. No matter how I struggle, no matter how I try, I fall prey almost every time. I am certain that we all do, we all have to keep a watch on our shadows.
“Inside each of us, there is the seed of both good and evil. It’s a constant struggle as to which one will win. And one cannot exist without the other.”
(Eric Burdon, English singer-songwriter)
I must admit that I find it difficult to believe in the literal idea of evil, particularly in the Abrahamic traditions. Personifying the devil is as stupid as personifying God but way more dangerous. It’s the ultimate in crowd control. To imagine that such a creature exists is to imagine a God who would do such a thing. I’m not sure that we need some “evil” being tempting us and damning us by our own hand. We do well enough on our own, thank you very much. After all, evil is a relative thing. It has no absolute existence outside of itself. It does not function as a separate entity, it does not manifest all on its own. It is only an appearance. Just as darkness is only a lack of light, so too evil is only a lack of goodness, or at least what we think is good. We measure within our cultural and personal interpretations. It is our exposure to such ideas that shapes what we will end up believing in the long run. I have never once, in all my years, witnessed evil in any form. I have never seen a demon. I have never seen the devil. Not one voice ever asked me to do something. No words from a song ever influenced me to sin. I have, on one occasion, been exposed to something I couldn’t explain. I think I made it up in my mind, to be honest. I was only 16 years old but it remains with me as the only time I ever thought there might be something to this whole evil concept. I was walking home from choir practice like I did every Thursday night. I headed through the downtown core of Strathroy and cut over to a side street, hoping to avoid any complications one might procure along the way. I cut through the Catholic school grounds and followed Head Street down towards the fire department. I was singing some silly song to myself, walking in streetlight’s safety. I remember I was carefree and, most certainly, was not looking for any trouble. Suddenly, the street went black. There were lights way up in front of me and lights far behind me but I was enveloped by shadow. I could feel it approaching. I started to tingle, my senses keen and aware. At first, I though someone might be playing with me, out there somewhere and I could feel the energy. I was dead wrong. The fear grew greater within me. I felt this heavy frightening presence all about me. It scared the living shit out of me and I have never forgotten. I still get goose bumps, it was that effective. I started to run to the light. I didn’t stop, I didn’t turn, I just kept going until I felt it no more. I have never been sure what it was but I know my reaction was conditioned. My response to run ingrained in me. Still, it was a nasty experience, and has only clouded my judgment of all things supernatural. For me, there has to be another account not yet available. There has to be something other than what they have told me. There has to be something I am missing.
“Evil is unspectacular and always human,
and shares our bed and eats at our own table.”
(W. H. Auden, English-American poet)
Most of us have done things we wish we had not. Whether we are ashamed, embarrassed or even contrite, there are moments in our lives we wish we had done differently. Not all of us feel that way. Some people could give a rat’s ass about fixing the past, let alone changing the way things are. Each of us comes from a different place in our thinking. Our experiences, whether for good or bad, have shaped us and set us on our course. People do awful things all the time. More often than not, they do those things to other people. In this modern world, half the sins that were unacceptable 25 years ago have become regular fare. Hubris is a lifestyle. People don’t even think about concepts like good and evil, let alone recognize them. This generation is as lost as the one Jesus preached within. Only a few seem to care about anyone, or anything, but themselves. Call it haughtiness or unrighteousness, or even ungodliness, but this void in realism is rampant, or at least it appears to be. I talked to a young man just a few weeks ago who actually believes that Santa Claus is simply Jesus but very old. He believes that the Bible has told him so. Seemingly, the dismissal and denial of things like morality, ethics and discernment have only added to a rapidly growing problem. The Christians would have me believe that the youth of today serve a devil rather than a saviour. Even if they don’t consciously serve it, they are minions all the same. An entire generation is nothing but the pawn of Satan. Ignorance isn’t the worst evil, but perhaps training a generation to be so could very well make it. I have to wonder if God above empowered a creature that could control and manipulate thousands of people. Are not laziness, hopelessness and ambivalence the very things we have taught our children to embrace? There just seems to be little consequence when we can just blame our apathy on a scary red fellow with a stupid fork tail and some horns to boot. Evil takes away the responsibility. When you have an outside force shaping your actions, it is easier to blame than to perform your duty or meet your obligations. In the end, the devil did not make you do it.
“The only thing necessary for the triumph of evil is for good men to do nothing.”
(Edmund Burke, Anglo-Irish statesman)
What one person may assume is evil, another may claim as good. We seem to pick and choose what we demonize and we change it from one day to another. Again, good and evil are relative concepts. A fundamentalist Christian may condemn and persecute homosexuals, thinking they have been instructed to do so. Scripture can serve our own purposes. An Islamic Iman may discard one truth for another, using the Qur’an to justify his feelings and biases against women. Our way is always the right way. We do not view such destructive and limiting behaviour as something dark and forbidding because God said it or commanded us to do so. The truth is, the Abrahamic scriptures of Judaism, Christianity and Islam can themselves be viewed as something quite evil. More people have been killed, in the name of Yahweh, Jesus and Mohammed, then any other factor throughout history. Most of those deaths were easily justified in the eyes of those men and their God. Who needs a devil when 5000 years of religion can take care of all that for us? It’s like Satan is merely God is disguise, giving men and women every reason to run from one deity to the safe arms of another. Evil is an optimal wingman. It boosts itself up in order to deflect then guide others to some heavenly place. The technique works very well on unsuspecting sinners. It’s like engaging an ugly girlfriend so your buddy can score with some hot chick. It all just seems like smoke and mirrors. I do not believe I have ever met anyone I would necessarily call evil. If the devil is in the details, I have yet to be educated. When I was a boy, twin girls from across the street were drowned in their bathtub by a mother driven insane. She had to be. The abuse laid upon her by her husband did not serve the neighbourhood nor their judgments. She must have been evil to do such a thing. The devil must have taken possession and drawn out her demons. Everyone was convinced that she had a heart of darkness, it was the only way to explain such a senseless act. Perhaps it was not so senseless. We can’t really understand a person until we walk around in their shoes (Atticus Finch aside). I think it is safe to assume that when the mother then killed herself, something far beyond the devil was at work here. Imagine the pain and fear one must have to end not only the lives of their children, but then their own. Was it fire and brimstone at play or mental illness and spiritual abandon? I don’t think that woman really saw the act as evil, rather, desperate and apparently her only option.
“It is a man’s own mind, not his enemy or foe, that lures him to evil ways.”
(Siddhartha Gautama, the Buddha)
My mother loved to explain her view of heaven to me. I was an adult but somehow those times with her made me feel like I was still but a boy. She thought outside the box even if it was anthropomorphic. Heaven was all beauty and such but getting past the pearly gates was a judicial matter. God is the judge, the devil is the prosecution and Jesus in our defence. Every time Satan brought evidence against us, Jesus would pop up and yell “covered by my blood.” It was a simple but profound theory. For her, evil had no power, no matter what it tried to do. God was always forgiving and evil was but a pawn in the way that fish bait is. It serves this purpose but otherwise it’s just guts. Historical figures like Adolf Hitler and Joseph Stalin interned the weak and vulnerable to promote their own effort. These men are viewed as evil and beyond the mercy of any God they may have held in standing. Serial killers like Jeffery Dahmer and Bruce McArthur have secured for themselves a place in the pit of eternal torment. In a modern sense, they epitomize the very idea of evil. I have to wonder why these souls are much more lost than the rest of us. Scripturally, all sin is equal in God’s eyes. The price of sin (all sin) is death (Romans 6:23, NIV). God doesn’t separate and categorize our failings. He offers life, in this case through Christ Jesus. I have to wonder if evil is not simply a reflection in the mirror dimly. I do not mean to imply that the aforementioned sinners do not meet some fate we cannot understand but that is really not up to us. Mortals punish in our own way and so will God. I do not wish to seem sympathetic in my presentation but there is a huge difference between doing something wrong and doing something evil. People use scripture as a weapon all the time but that doesn’t make anyone a pawn of the devil. Concentration camps and xenophobia are senseless but they both exist, even after all we have learned. Clearly, there is a line where one goes from sinner to savage. I have a mental illness but somehow I have avoided eating anyone I know. There is a bull’s eye in there somewhere. At some point, what we call evil manifests. With the murder of 6 million Jews, it just goes without saying. Then again, murdering your own children can be viewed in the same measure. Evil is as evil does.
“One must be cunning and wicked in this world.”
(War and Peace, Leo Tolstoy 1867)
I do not believe that I have ever done something evil. Yes, I sin just like everyone else but my intent is always goodhearted. I wish to do no harm. I have known people who have done the most terrible things. Homosapiens are not the most friendly tribe on the planet. I’m not sure we ever could be. Our consciousness has a mandate. We must subjectify in order that we may understand. This does not mean that we didn’t do something wrong but wrong to whom? Pygmies practice incest without all the commentary. They do not consider it wrong, let alone evil. It’s all in the presentation. They do not know they are doing something sinful, which is exactly why they do it. Ontario , Canada Toronto Ontario
“The virtuous man contents himself with dreaming that which the wicked man does in actual life.” (The Interpretation of Dreams, Sigmund Freud 1899)
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https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/toronto/eilzabeth-wettlaufer-confession-1.4142647
