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Our responsibility
When Adolf Eichmann was executed for his World War II crimes against humanity, he displayed the wretchedness of his soul, unconcerned about what he had done. Death and destruction had become so trivialized in his mind that his own funeral was a frivolous thing. This same concept has been expressed by an increasing number of murderers--many of them just children--who take their own lives following a killing spree. When the soul makes light of evil, the result is indifference.
It is within this indifference that secular theory and Christianity meet on common ground. You don't have to be a Christian to abhor the ugliness of violence. It is from this point of agreement that we can begin to define the impact of evil. Evil cannot be renamed and thus solved. When we look upon the face of evil, there is an inner voice, the voice of the soul, which tells us that evil cannot be trivialized. This is what the gospel message is really all about. It is our responsibility to take it seriously.
God never defines evil as a vaporous theme or idea. In the Bible, evil is always personal, and the one who acts wickedly is always responsible. Whether the evil is as seemingly trivial as a prideful suggestion, or as hideous as murder, the one who acts upon it is always held to account. As Ravi puts it, the mystery of evil is removed when we see wickedness as God sees it and when we see ourselves as God sees us. Personal responsibility is a vital element of dealing with the reality of evil.
The grounding of reality
Ravi reminds us of the words of Dietrich Bonhoeffer, the Christian who died because he stood up against Hitler. He was able to pinpoint the only source of right in a world of wrong:
"With the best intentions and a naive lack of realism, [reasonable people] think that with a little reason they can bend back into position the framework that has got out of joint. In their lack of vision they want to do justice to all sides, and so the conflicting forces wear them down with nothing achieved...
Still more pathetic is the... collapse of moral fanaticism. The fanatic thinks that his single-minded principles qualify him to do battle with the powers of evil; but like a bull he rushes at the red cloak instead of the person who is holding it; he exhausts himself and is beaten...
Then there is the man with a conscience, who fights single-handed against heavy odds in situations that call for a decision. But the scale of the conflicts in which he has to choose--with no advice or support except from his own conscience--tears him to pieces. Evil approaches him in so many respectable and seductive disguises that his conscience becomes nervous and vacillating, till at last... he lies to his own conscience in order to avoid despair...
No one who confines himself to the limits of duty ever goes so far as to... act in the only way that makes it possible to score a direct hit on evil and defeat it. The man of duty will in the end have to do his duty by the devil too.
As to the man who asserts his complete freedom to stand foursquare to the world, who values the necessary deed more highly than conscience or reputation... let him beware lest his freedom should bring him down. He will assent to what is bad so as to ward off something worse, and in doing so he will no longer be able to realize that the worse, which he wants to avoid, might be better...
Anyone who [flees into the sanctuary of private virtuousness] must shut his mouth and his eyes to the injustice around him. Only at the cost of self-deception can he keep himself pure from the contamination arising from responsible action...
Who stands fast? Only he whose final standard is not his reason, his principles, his conscience, his freedom, or his virtue, but who is ready to sacrifice all this when he is called to obedient and responsible action in faith and exclusive allegiance to God--the responsible man, who tries to make his whole life an answer to the question and call of God."
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