Comments on: Literary Quote of the Day: Anzia Yezierska http://themoderatevoice.com/10385/literary-quote-of-the-day-anzia-yezierska/ An Internet hub with domestic and international news, analysis, original reporting, and popular features from the left, center, indies, centrists, moderates, and right Wed, 15 Feb 2012 10:08:52 +0000 hourly 1 http://wordpress.org/?v=3.1.2 By: Gray http://themoderatevoice.com/10385/literary-quote-of-the-day-anzia-yezierska/comment-page-1/#comment-45439 Gray Sun, 21 Jan 2007 17:06:55 +0000 http://themoderatevoice.com/entertainment/literature/literary-quote-of-the-day-anzia-yezierska/#comment-45439 <em>What is "evil" anyway? I do not pretend to have the answer to such a question but my faith tradition teaches me that all of us have the potential inside of us for both good and evil. Indeed, the first example of murderous violence in the Bible is the story of the two sons of Adam and Eve. With slight differences, it is the same story told in Chapter five, verses 27 through 31 of "Sura" in the Koran, where Muslims read that both Cain and Abel "offered an offering, but it was accepted from one of them and was not accepted from the other." Feeling disrespected by God, Cain said to his brother, "I will most certainly slay you... then his mind facilitated to him the slaying of his brother, so he slew him; then he became one of the losers." Disrespect, the feeling that what one has to offer in life has been rejected, the feeling that one has joined history's losers can make us as human beings more vulnerable to evil. Conservative theologian Michael Novak wrote recently of America's founders' view that, "there is evil in the world and it coagulates, it gathers force, and if it bursts its bounds endangers everybody." In a brilliant essay that was otherwise full of praise for President Bush's actions in the war against terror, Novak concluded with an important caution: "The word 'evil', when used only of others, can intoxicate the user before he knows it. I commend to him [the President], and all of us, [Reinhold] Neibuhr's pregnant warning: 'the final enigma of history is therefore not how the righteous will gain victory over the un-righteous, but how the evil in every good and the un-righteousness of the righteous is to be overcome.</em> Al Gore, 'Commentary on the War against Terror', Feb.2002 http://www.algore.org/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=79&Itemid=84 What is “evil” anyway? I do not pretend to have the answer to such a question but my faith tradition teaches me that all of us have the potential inside of us for both good and evil. Indeed, the first example of murderous violence in the Bible is the story of the two sons of Adam and Eve. With slight differences, it is the same story told in Chapter five, verses 27 through 31 of “Sura” in the Koran, where Muslims read that both Cain and Abel “offered an offering, but it was accepted from one of them and was not accepted from the other.” Feeling disrespected by God, Cain said to his brother, “I will most certainly slay you… then his mind facilitated to him the slaying of his brother, so he slew him; then he became one of the losers.”

Disrespect, the feeling that what one has to offer in life has been rejected, the feeling that one has joined history’s losers can make us as human beings more vulnerable to evil.

Conservative theologian Michael Novak wrote recently of America’s founders’ view that, “there is evil in the world and it coagulates, it gathers force, and if it bursts its bounds endangers everybody.” In a brilliant essay that was otherwise full of praise for President Bush’s actions in the war against terror, Novak concluded with an important caution: “The word ‘evil’, when used only of others, can intoxicate the user before he knows it. I commend to him [the President], and all of us, [Reinhold] Neibuhr’s pregnant warning: ‘the final enigma of history is therefore not how the righteous will gain victory over the un-righteous, but how the evil in every good and the un-righteousness of the righteous is to be overcome.
Al Gore, ‘Commentary on the War against Terror’, Feb.2002
http://www.algore.org/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=79&Itemid=84

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