The Criminal...1
ONE: A religion that authorises man to torture and slaughter and exploit his fellow-creatures is quite unworthy of consideration as religion. It could only be an ethic devised by men for the unrestrained exploitation of the ego-complex. That is not a religion at all, and nothing of the kind was either explicit or implicit in the teachings of Sri Krishna, the Buddha, or Jesus, but precisely the opposite of that.
TWO: Religions are apt to be turned upside down, and to become ethics only, in the hands of later generations who have never understood the teachings of the founder.ONE: Quite so, but then they are no longer religions except in name. The re-ligion - re-uniting (with God) - may survive in certain aspects of each sect or church, but an ethic, even a good one, is not a religion.
TWO: There should be other justifications.ONE: There can be no justification for becoming an enemy of that to which you belong, that of which you form a part; and man forms a part of nature. Ignorance may be an excuse, probably the best, but it is not a justification.
TWO: And commercial necessity?ONE: Whatever could that be? There is quite certainly no such thing. The word 'necessity' is entirely inapplicable to such an activity as commerce. Commerce is merely the organisation of greed, of avidity, of grasping, unless it places service to the community before personal gain. When it does that it fulfils a useful, but never a necessary, function; when it does not, it constitutes an unmitigated evil alike to those who exploit it and to the public that suffers from it.
TWO: And to which category does modern commerce as at present observable belong?ONE: Look about you - and stop asking me questions you can answer yourself!
TWO: But is there no punishment for enmity to nature?ONE: If you mean vengeance - who is there to avenge?
TWO: 'Vengeance is mine, saith the Lord, I will repay'.ONE: Any such Lord must be on a par with those on whom he seeks vengeance. Do you know of one? To the only Power that is Real such a word would have no meaning whatever.
TWO: Penalty then.ONE: Of course there is a penalty. No one can exploit nature without paying a penalty. But it is not recognisable in the context of our absurd and primary notions of punishment and vengeance.
TWO: What is it then?ONE: It is an impartial, impersonal process that appears to us as cause and effect. But we hardly notice its workings, for it does not trouble to wear a wig and a gown.
TWO: Then how do we know it?ONE: In the West I doubt if many of us do. In the East it is known as karma. Unfortunately that word also has suffered at the hands of people who do not understand it, but it connotes a tremendous reality.
(Ed. note: the above is a brief extract from a long chapter discussing ethics, the law, economics, etc.)
