Here's a question from Prashant who lives in New Delhi.
He asks, "How can we determine what is good or bad?
Acts that are considered bad in some societies might be considered harmless or even virtuous
in other societies.
Also, the concept of good and bad also seems to change over time."
So, is there any general principle or universal standard that determines which deeds or karmas
are good and which are bad?
What exactly is the fundamental basis for dharma, righteousness?
Prashant continues, "How can we ensure that we don't commit any bad karmas, irrespective
of the society and time in which we live?"
According to the doctrine of karma, the bad karmas we commit will ultimately result in
suffering, both for ourselves and for others.
One answer to Prashant's question is found in the so-called Golden Rule, "Do unto others
as you would have them do unto you."
This rule is based on the Biblical command to love your neighbor as yourself, which is
more or less accepted by all the world's religions and systems of ethics.
The sages of ancient India prescribed a somewhat different rule, one that focused on the importance
of ahimsa.
Ahimsa is a Sanskrit word that's often translated as nonviolence, but that translation has a
bit of a problem.
If I were to hurt you without resorting to an act of great violence, would that be ok?
This translation can perhaps be traced to Mahatma Gandhi's use of ahimsa as a nonviolent
political strategy, a strategy he skillfully used to win India's independence from the
British without bloody warfare.
But, we're not discussing politics here.
Himsa means injury or harm, so ahimsa means the absence of harm - harmlessness.
But now, we have another problem.
If ahimsa prohibits you from causing any harm whatsoever, then what will you eat?
If you eat meat, you obviously cause harm to animals.
But if you eat plants, you harm those plants, which are also living things.
When you eat a carrot, you bring its life to an end.
And when you eat fruit, even though trees aren't harmed, the seeds inside each fruit
are prevented from growing into new trees.
On the other hand, if you don't eat meat, plants or fruit, you'd certainly cause great
harm to your own body.
For these reasons, ahimsa cannot mean no harm; it means minimum harm, least harm.
The principle of ahimsa directs us to live in such a way that we cause the least possible
harm to all living beings.
So, how can we minimize the harm we cause?
Eating fruit and plants causes less harm than eating animals because animals suffer when
slaughtered.
But there's much more to be considered here.
Eating eggs causes chickens to be unnaturally crowded and confined in giant coops, never
to see the light of day.
Drinking milk results in the physical abuse of cows by the profit-hungry commercial dairy
industry.
Even the apparently benign act of eating strawberries contributes to the toil and suffering of underpaid
migrant farm workers who gather berries from the fields for your pleasure.
To determine the course of least harm for all involved in a situation is not so simple.
And of course, ahimsa is not just a matter of diet; it pertains to everything we do.
Any deed we commit can cause harm, directly or indirectly.
And as we just saw, it can be really difficult to anticipate all the possible consequences
of our deeds.
This particular difficulty is absent from the Western Religions - Christianity, Judaism,
and Islam - because they adopted a very different approach to dharma.
They all prescribe a system of commandments to specify what should and should not be done.
These commandments are said to be mandated by God, like laws mandated by federal and
state governments.
Because these commandments explicitly define what's right or wrong, this approach to dharma
seems to be less complicated and easier to follow than the principle of ahimsa.
Then, why is it that Eastern religions, like Hinduism, Buddhism and Jainism, all prescribe
ahimsa instead of simply stipulating lists of commandments?
Well, if they had a commandment that prohibited eating meat, for example, then how could Tibetan
monks live in monasteries high in the Himalayas where plants can't grow?
They have to rely on the milk and meat of yaks for their survival.
That's why there's no commandment like, "Thou shalt not eat meat."
When the Bible says, "Thou shalt not lie," or "Thou shalt not steal," these commandments
are moral absolutes; they have to be followed in all situations.
This approach seems rigid and dogmatic in comparison to the principle of ahimsa that
has to be interpreted and properly applied to each individual situation.
This point is delightfully illustrated by a traditional story about a wealthy man who
was being chased through a village by a thief.
To hide from the thief, the man slipped inside a tiny hut where a Hindu monk was sitting,
deeply absorbed in meditation.
The monk opened his eyes and asked, "What happened?"
The wealthy man explained his terrifying predicament.
The monk told him to lie down and hide under a blanket.
A moment later, the thief burst into the hut and demanded to know where the wealthy man
was hiding.
The monk said, "You just missed him.
He went running down the road."
He cleverly added, "If you run really fast, maybe you can catch up to him."
Now, the monk was firmly committed to living a virtuous life and speaking truthfully.
And, just like the Bible says, "Thou shalt not lie," the holy Vedic scriptures say, "Satyam
vada, speak truth."
In spite of all this, the monk lied to the thief.
But he lied to protect the wealthy man from harm, from being robbed.
The monk practiced the basic teaching found in many Hindu scriptures - ahimsa paramo dharmah,
ahimsa is the ultimate principle of dharma, the highest expression of righteousness.
In addition to Prashant's question about distinguishing good and bad karmas, I received a related
question from Bhavana, in Cupertino, California.
She writes, "When I see a cockroach in my garage, I immediately smash it with my foot
so other cockroaches won't come into my house.
But then I wonder, if I didn't kill it, it might have gone away and I wouldn't have earned
this bad karma.
But then again, if the cockroach stayed, it might have multiplied and infested my home."
Bhavana nicely describes the process of interpreting and applying the principle of ahimsa to determine
the course of least harm.
Killing a cockroach might be a bad karma, but allowing them to infest your home and
affect your family is much more harmful.
Bhavana's struggle with insects reminds me of an incident long ago when I was invited
to teach a summer camp for Hindu children.
I was eating lunch at a picnic table, along with a mother and her children.
She spotted a spider walking across the table and deftly smashed it with a napkin.
No doubt, she felt she was protecting her children, but that particular kind of spider
was harmless.
Besides, she could have simply brushed it away without killing it.
Her behavior might have set a bad example for the children.
I could have pointed out her mistake, but to do so would have caused much more harm,
the embarrassment and hurt of being criticized in front of her children.
Situations in life are often complex, making it difficult to determine the course of least
harm.
A powerful example of a complicated situation is the hotly-debated issue of abortion.
What is Hinduism's position on abortion?
Well, there's no commandment, but to kill a baby before it's born is obviously harmful.
So in general, abortion is considered to be a sin.
But, there are some unique situations in which forcing a mother to bear an unwanted child
might cause even more harm.
For example, pregnancies due to rape or incest.
Or fetuses discovered to have extremely severe physical defects.
In such cases, abortion might result in the least harm for everyone involved.
Here in the U.S., two ideologies have emerged, pro-life, which holds that abortion is a sin,
regardless of the situation, and pro-choice, which maintains that it's a woman's unconditional
right to choose to bear a child or not.
These positions represent two extremes and seem to resemble moral absolutes or commandments.
They're too narrow and inflexible to properly handle the complicated, unique situations
that arise in life.
It's often said that life is not simply black and white; it has infinite shades of grey.
And that's why the sages of ancient India avoided establishing a rigid set of commandments
and instead prescribed the principle of ahimsa.
Figuring out the course of least harm for each and every situation might indeed be more
difficult than simply following a list of commandments.
But this difficulty must be embraced if we are to successfully navigate the challenging
complexities of life and skillfully deal with confusing situations that are neither black
nor white.
The principle of ahimsa is perhaps the best guide to help us find our way through the
convoluted mazes of life.
This is the fourth in a series of videos that answers questions submitted by viewers.
If you have a question that would serve as a good topic for a video like this one, please
email me at this address, and be sure to indicate "video question" as the subject of the email.
I'll try to address your question in a future video.