Thoughtlessness, a root of evil

My God, I read the following in a column by Welmoed Vlieger*. She draws Arendt's vision from the last book by Hannah Arendt "The Life of the Mind". "The roots of evil are not a bad will or a moral depravity but thoughtlessness." She saw this not only in totalitarian regimes but also in Western culture where individualism ignores the other. 

Would You like to comment on this?

My son, there is much to be said about the causes of evil, and certainly that there is not one cause or right of evil to exist but there are many. Still, Hannah Arendt has a point. For bad will or moral depravity are clear and understandable causes of evil. But thoughtlessness is a hidden and veiled cause for a lot of unconscious and malicious behaviour and therefore for a lot of evil and a lot of suffering.

What is thoughtlessness else than that a person does not think about something or does something casual or without paying attention. And certainly then man does not pay attention to the consequences of his actions, for himself and for others. And isn't indifference a twin brother of thoughtlessness?

Thoughtlessness means that a man is without thoughts, is not reasonable, does not listen to his conscience, does not look after his fellow man, does not listen to his inner voice, is not interested in the suffering that results from this. 

But above all, thoughtlessness is a root of evil because God is excluded and the devil can go about his business. For your thinking thank you to God, your suffering to the exclusion of God.

So beware of thoughtlessness.

Hannah Arendt and Welmoed Vlieger are blessed. 

 

My blessings to you all

No 507

 

*Trouw 1^st of June 2021

Is almost everyone capable of becoming a criminal?

My God, may I ask You. I read an article about the essay "The banality of evil" by Hannah Ahrendt. In it, she describes that the greatest criminals in history were actually ordinary people, and by means of a bureaucratic system and by reasonless thinking, gradually became criminals. She came up with this after the trial of Adolf Eichmann. Would You like to comment on this?

Life is not that simple. Hannah Ahrendt is also quite maligned for her philosophical ideas, but not entirely justified.

Not nearly everyone is capable of becoming a criminal in the situation that Adolf Eichmann was in. And he knew that himself, see the sadness in his eyes from later photos *. Along the way, he knew very well what he had done. And that he was not a victim of his situation but that he had systematically suppressed his conscience.

It is true that often circumstances make a person a criminal.

It is true that often the spirit of the age makes someone a criminal.
It is true that consistently not thinking and overthinking make someone a criminal.
It is true that consistently suppressing the signals of the conscience and the heart make one a criminal.
So much more or less the tendency of Hannah Ahrendt's story.

But something else is more crucial and more important and more the cause of someone slipping into a criminal or an angel.

And that is the place of the ego or God in the inner self.
Who sits on the throne of the inner self in man? Or who occasionally sits on the throne of the inner self in man?. Or who is occasionally invited to take a seat on the throne of the inner self?

Is that the ego or is that God?

If only a single moment would sigh man in all his crime and derailment "my God, my God why have You forsaken me?" and the change will take place, the derailment will stop and the crime will brought to a halt.

And Adolf Eichmann did not, not once in his criminal derailment, and when he got the tendency to conscience he suppressed it and once he got signals he did not listen to the signals grimly. And then you get what we know of Adolf Eichmann's criminal life, of evil incarnate.
In the spiritual world, Adolf Eichmann is still correcting what he has done in his earthly life.

But now I come to My point where Hannah Ahrendt is mistaken.

Adolf Eichmann also once refused to really listen to God in his inner self.

Adolf Eichmann also once refused to allow God to enter his inner throne.
Adolf Eichmann also refused to act once on the signals of his conscience and heart.
And that is not banal.

What Adolf Eichmann did was to listen systematically and consistently to the monkey of God rather than to God. He consistently listened to the devil instead of to God. He consistently listened to evil rather than to the good. And it does not matter that the devil or evil had taken the form of Adolf Hitler.

And after his trial and during his prison years and after his death, Adolf Eichmann has been busy with nothing but this one, with this one question, burdened with terrible all-consuming feelings of regret "why did I listen to the devil and not to God?"

And finally, most people are incapable of permanent and consistently criminal derailment simply because they always once upon a time listen to their conscience or let God one single moment on the throne of the inner self, consciously or unconsciously.

My blessings to you all

 
* Check a photo taken in his cell in 1961 (15 years after the war)

No 478