Whoever stores evil in the heart cannot see beauty.
Hazrat Pir-o-Murshid Inayat Khan
Related Material by Pir-o-Murshid Inayat Khan
Compiled by Wahiduddin Richard Shelquist – wahiduddin.net
When someone tells another about some evil, they each think that they are so good, so free from all evil. This side of human nature we see even in children. One child will come and tell how naughty the other is, thinking, ‘I must be called good.’ Such a tendency grows and develops. Life gathers the wickedness in people. The heart becomes impressed. In time the evil is stored up. That which is the store becomes the treasure, the world within.
The one who stores evil cannot see good, because there is no good in this world that has not a little spark of evil in it. There is no evil in this world that has not a little spark of good. If people only tried to find the spark of good, it could be found. But if they seek to find a little spark of evil in every good, they can do that also. Someone may say of another, ‘That person is very good.’ But the neighbor says, ‘Yes, that one is good, but you do not know this about that person: I will just tell you what that one does!’ Is there anyone who never contradicts when somebody is praising another? There has never been anyone in history about whom somebody has not spoken evil.
What is really good? The answer is, there is no such thing as good or evil. There is beauty. That which is beautiful, we call good. That which is ugly compared with the beautiful, we call evil: whether it is custom, idea, thought or action. This shows that this whole phenomenon of the universe is the phenomenon of beauty. Every soul has an inclination to admire beauty, to seek for beauty, to love beauty, and to develop beauty.
( from the Sufi Message Series, Volume VII – In an Eastern Rose Garden: The Presence of God )
Once an ascetic thinker was taken to a variety show in New York, where there were all sorts of dances and acts and different amusements. The one who took the ascetic thinker there was eager to find out the opinion of the other about it was and said, ‘This must disgust you, a contemplative person, to come and see this nonsense going on the stage.’ The other replied, ‘No, never. How can it be disgusting? Is it not my Krishna who is playing there?’ It is those who have touched the inner beauty who are capable of appreciating beauty in all forms. It is not only that they appreciate it, they admire and worship it. If worship is given to anything or anyone, it is given to God who is hidden in the form of beauty.
Commentary by Murshid S.A.M. (Sufi Ahmed Murad)
Samuel L. Lewis
Evil, being of the nature of shadow or darkness, destroys spiritual vision, and so blinds one to the beauty which was the purpose of creation. This condition should be called avidya, blindness or ignorance.
There is, however, a difference between one who has evil in the mind and evil in the heart. The average person who does not know or seek truth may be called evil in mind. This person is under the sway of sin, as the Christians explain and has been demonstrated. But there is another sort of person called diabolical, who may be mentally alert but who has deliberately turned the heart into a charnel house, a hidden chamber where evil is planned, to be committed in the world. These people can put wicked thoughts into the minds of others, and can command evil elementals to influence others, so that they may never perform any particular vile act directly.
This shows that all evil thought, desire or speech is responsible for the wrong acts of others. In this there is universal karma, which was the explanation of the Buddha. So long as anybody sows karma, it prevents others from being delivered from pain, disease, injury and death.