GoodДобро

In the world of outward nature, in plants, in animals, there is neither good nor evil; nor is there any such thing in the living, unthinking human body. The line that divides good from evil begins in the soul of man, with his capacity to be conscious and to understand. In the soul of man, from his early years, an unceasing struggle with evil goes on. And there, and only there, in his own soul, is the struggle with evil both proper to man and fruitful. The struggle with evil outside this domain is neither proper to man nor fruitful. This is the very thing that Christ’s commandment of nonresistance to evil by violence says. The commandment of nonresistance to evil by evil defines precisely and clearly the place for the struggle with evil. That place is within oneself.

For every rational man, the bounds of violence are limited to his own body, his own flesh, because the work and the nourishment of the soul consist in this violence of the spirit over the flesh. Another man, another’s flesh, has its own master of the same kind, and violence directed at it has no rational justification; it is needless. The teaching of nonresistance to evil has precisely this aim — the aim of making plain the needlessness of violence directed at another.

Who will undertake to assert that man cannot, of himself and by his own will, manage himself within himself, that he cannot understand and do all that is required of him for the life of the world in which he lives? To assert this is to deny the freedom of life given to man by God, the freedom to save himself or to destroy himself; it is to deny one’s own rational being — to assert this is to deny man. Man’s will may reach beyond the bounds of his being, but who will venture to assert that it is needed there? Who will venture to assert that the life of the world could suffer harm from his, man’s, personal noninterference? To assert this is to speak of the insufficiency of God’s will; it is to deny God. The evil of the world consists precisely in this: that people extend their will beyond the bounds of their being, that is, put their own will in the place of God’s will. This sacrilege is laid bare by the commandment of nonresistance to evil.

Success justifies the deed: whoever won is right; right lies in victory. Such is the carnal, animal, pagan conception of truth — a notion by which the word “truth” is only an empty sound. “What is truth? Just you wait, they’ll hang you, you and your truth!” said Pilate. But Christ sees truth, and sees it at the opposite end: the vanquished is right. If you personally, in a struggle with a man, have won by force, then know that it is certainly you who are wrong, that truth is not on your side. Truth is in the vanquished, God is in the vanquished, the vanquished embodies in himself the notion of God’s dominion — the first and fundamental notion of a rational being. Such is man’s position on earth, and the only way out of this position, at first sight a sad one, is not to resist evil, not to struggle with man, to acknowledge oneself vanquished forever in advance, to be forever vanquished by God — a way that is lit and exalted by true religion, the understanding of the life of man.

Nonresistance, by removing the struggle, sets free the likelihood and the possibility of calm; it frees the field for another, spiritual interaction, in which there are now other forces and other interests. And the calling of man on earth, as the Gospel shows it in the temptation of Jesus by the devil and in the conversation with Nicodemus, consists precisely in setting free and exalting above all, in the world of people, man’s divine capacity to be conscious and to understand — in setting free and exalting this rational consciousness, this son of man, this son of God in man. Not to resist means to awaken, to resurrect the son of God, to resurrect Christ; to resist is to oppress him, to crucify him. Man is a rational being. The good of a rational being lies in the triumph and dominion of reason. And for the triumph and dominion of reason, what is needed first of all is the calming of the passions of the flesh. And as in the life of one man, so in the social life of peoples, the dominion of reason can never be established on the ground of passions, pride, judgment, power, violence. The commandment of nonresistance to evil brings this axiom of wisdom to fulfillment in life.

Understanding and consciousness have been implanted by God in the souls of all people, and the Gospel urges us to value this above all. “Whoever says to his brother ‘raca’ is liable to judgment, and whoever says ‘fool’ is liable to the fire of Gehenna.” Only human souls find unity and love in consciousness and understanding; in the outward world, every being loves itself more than all the rest of the world. The commandment of nonresistance to evil, by defining the place for the struggle with evil, does away with the question of the eternal contradiction between the outward world of discord and enmity and the spiritual world of unity and love, and joins them into one kingdom of God, as Jesus said of it in inspired words to Nathanael: “From now on the line between heaven and earth is abolished, and the powers of heaven will serve man just as the powers of earth serve him” (John 1:51).