Taylweaver wrote, >It occurs to me that I would not want to call anyone evil - or bad or any word like that. Deeds are good and evil. People are people
Mar Gavriel responded, >I'm not sure whether or not I have ever heard such a distinction (between moral charged actions vs. morally neutral people)
I've heard the distinction many times, and I make it myself. And it's not a distinction between moral deeds vs. moral people - it's a distinction between the judgements that we are able to make about deeds vs. the judgements that we are able to make about people. To wit, we cannot really make judgements about people. We cannot know what went into a person's decision to commit a particular act, or the struggle that went on in his mind and heart before he commited himself to that act. So I leave to God ("bochen kelayot valev" and various other quotes to that effect) the judgement of whether a person is good or evil. Deeds, on the other hand, can be viewed more objectively.
To perhaps throw a wrench into this discussion, upon the aforementioned topic of God's ability to judge people, I'm fond of saying that God is the ultimate subjective judge, and hence is the only truly objective judge.
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Evil Deeds vs. Evil People
Date: 2005-07-18 04:02 pm (UTC)>It occurs to me that I would not want to call anyone evil - or bad or any word like that. Deeds are good and evil. People are people
Mar Gavriel responded,
>I'm not sure whether or not I have ever heard such a distinction (between moral charged actions vs. morally neutral people)
I've heard the distinction many times, and I make it myself. And it's not a distinction between moral deeds vs. moral people - it's a distinction between the judgements that we are able to make about deeds vs. the judgements that we are able to make about people. To wit, we cannot really make judgements about people. We cannot know what went into a person's decision to commit a particular act, or the struggle that went on in his mind and heart before he commited himself to that act. So I leave to God ("bochen kelayot valev" and various other quotes to that effect) the judgement of whether a person is good or evil.
Deeds, on the other hand, can be viewed more objectively.
To perhaps throw a wrench into this discussion, upon the aforementioned topic of God's ability to judge people, I'm fond of saying that God is the ultimate subjective judge, and hence is the only truly objective judge.