Devils — “The supreme soul — Paramatma, God — is nowhere to be searched for. For He is very near you; He is with you. Seek Him within. You could easily see Him were it not for the big ‘devils’ that stand in your way. They are egoism, lust, anger and greed.“ (TMBJ/246)
Hell — “What is hell? [...] Whatever you take hell to be, know that I am there too. I cannot be excluded from hell because I am in all existence.“ (ITS/95)
Evil — “There is no evil. There are only degrees of good.“ (GM/99)
Evil — “Evil is the minimum of good.“ (D/78)
Evil — “Unless evil temporarily triumphs, suffering cannot be experienced. This universe is based on duality [...]. Evil and virtue are interdependent. If only one aspect existed, there would be no meaning or interest in life. For the attainment of ultimate freedom and happiness, temporary victory of evil over virtue is necessary.“ (TMBJ/134)
Evil — “Good as well as evil are impressional products of the evolutionary momentum. They come into conflict with each other, and as such are to be recognised as separate groups of forces. Satan, Lucifer, Beelzebub, each in his own way symbolises the forces of evil. However, it is a mistake to think that evil is an irreducible active force by itself. Both good and evil are abstractions, and have to be seen in their true perspective as inevitable phases in the subhuman and human evolution.
Evil is the lingering relic of earlier good. Some impressional tendencies, which were necessary and inevitable at a particular phase, are carried over to the higher phase of evolution, and they persist in their existence due to inertia. They hinder harmonious functioning in the new context, and appear as evil.
Good as well as evil have an undeniable relationship with the circumstances. No judgement can be passed on the goodness or other aspect of any action without considering the concrete context in which the judgement is called for. An act which is normally undeniably evil may, under special circumstances, be not only defensible but praiseworthy.
Take for example the following exceptional case. Suppose a mother has given birth to a baby and has not her own milk to feed it. The baby has to be fed on cow's milk, which is very difficult to obtain. A neighbor may have some cow's milk, but the mother knows that he will not part with it for money or for any philanthropic consideration, even though he does not need it himself. Under such circumstances, if a person steals the cow's milk and feeds it to the newborn baby in order to keep it alive, the act of stealing is in this case not only justifiable but definitely good.
Of course an exception of this type does not make stealing a good act under all circumstances. Normally stealing continues to be evil, but in the exceptional case above it has become good. The illustration proves how considerations of good or evil must, in their very nature, be dependent upon circumstances in all the variety of detail which obtains in concrete situations. Good is relative to a concrete context of actual circumstances, and so is evil. But for many practical purposes certain trends of action have to be classified as good, while other trends of action have to be classified as evil.
Everything happens according to divine will, and it is a mistake to think that God has a rival in the form of a devil. Accentuation of the forces for good is necessary for releasing divine life in its fulness. But evil itself often plays an important part in accentuating the forces for good, and it becomes an inevitable shadow or counterpart of the good. Like other opposites of experience, good and evil are also, in a sense, opposites which have to be withstood and transcended. One has to rise above the duality of good and evil, and accept life in its totality, in which they appear as abstractions. Life is to be seen and lived in its indivisible integrity.
Nevertheless, there is an important factor in the opposites of good and evil. Evil is to all appearance the converse of good, yet at the same time it is capable of being converted into good. Thus, generally speaking, the path lies from evil to good, and then from good to God, who is beyond both good and evil.
If any suffering comes to a Perfect Master or Avatar, it should not be interpreted as a temporary victory of evil. It happens by divine will, and is a form of divine compassion. He voluntarily takes upon himself the suffering of others in order to redeem those who are engulfed in gnawing cravings, unrelieved hatred and unabated jealousies.“ (B/55-58)
Evil — “In the general sense of the word, “evil” is merely perverted good, a lower stage of the ladder of evolution, an obstacle the overcoming of which enables man to test and strengthen his character. Looked at from the personal point of view, evil is the result of ignoring the Law of Karma and of indecision or weakness of the personal character. […]
Virtue or goodness is the antithesis of evil or sin in an individual character. Virtue, then, is due to cooperation with the Karmic Law, and sin is due to conscious or unconscious failure to cooperate with the Karmic Law.
As separate worlds, or as separate planes, “heaven” and “hell” do not exist. They are states of mental peace or torture. The person who lives in accordance with the Law of Karma experiences happiness and may be said to be in the heaven state; while the person who ignores and disobeys the Law of Karma suffers spiritually, mentally, and physically, and may be said to be undergoing the tortures of hell.
The individual’s possession of strength of mind or weakness of character, of the rudiments of virtue and vice, and the various experiences of heaven and hell, are all due to the past impressions (“sanskaras” as they are termed) of previous lives. And every human being must pass through the dual aspects of both good and evil before attaining to Perfection.” (PM-Q&A/56-57)
Evil — “With the dropping of every form, the sanskaras want to take another body. If these sanskaras are crooked — meaning, evil — the body is also crooked — diseased, for example. If the sanskaras are evil, the body suffers pain; if they are good, the mind is happy.“ (LM/7-8/2879)
Evil — “The difficulty concerning the abode of evil is not so much in perceiving that it is a limitation but in actually dismantling it after arriving at such a perception. The difficulty concerning the abode of the good is not so much in dismantling it as in perceiving that it is, in fact, a limitation.“ (D/65)
Evil — “[When] the two opposite types of sanskaras are almost in a state of balance [...] the after-life of the individual terminates and he finds himself precipitating into a new physical incarnation on earth [...]. If [he] has been exhausting an excess of evil sanskaras and has therefore been undergoing a hell-state, he may jump into a new incarnation in which good sanskaras tend to dominate [...]. Thus a man who had been a profligate in his last life might begin a new incarnation with a marked inclination towards asceticism [...]. [But] a change over at incarnation from good to bad or from bad to good should not be taken as a universal law. Reversal of individual nature is frequent, but cases are also quite common in which the individual remains consistently good or bad for several incarnations.“ (LH/106-107)
Evil — “The souls of all men and women, of all nationalities, castes and creeds, are really one; and their experiences of good and evil, of fighting and helping, of waging wars and living in peace are all part of illusion and delusion, because all these experiences are gained through bodies and minds which in themselves are nothing.“ (GS/202-02)
Evil — “Don’t you all worry about evil thoughts, lust, etc. Let them come and go. Don’t worry so that you may not forget Me. If you always remember Me, nothing will touch you.“ (LJ/16)
Evil — “The ego exchanges the abode of identification with evil for the abode of identification with good because the latter gives it a greater sense of expansion. Sooner or later the aspirant perceives the new house to be no less of a limitation. Then he finds that the process of breaking through it is less difficult than the process of breaking through the former abode of identification with evil. The difficulty concerning the abode of evil is not so much in perceiving that it is a limitation but in actually dismantling it after arriving at such a perception. The difficulty concerning the abode of good is not so much in dismantling it as in perceiving that it is, in fact, a limitation. This difference arises because the animal sanskaras are more firmly rooted owing to their ancient origin and long-term accumu- lation. It is important to note that the good binds as much as the evil, though the binding of the good can be more easily undone after it is perceived as being a limitation.” (D/65)
Evil — “Thus, evil is not utterly evil but goodness in its lowest degree; weakness is not mere incapacity but strength in its lowest degree; and vice is not pure vice but virtue at its lowest. In other words, evil is the minimum of good; weakness is the minimum of strength; and vice is the minimum of virtue.” (D/78)
Evil — “Worldly people try to counteract evil through opposition, but in doing so they often unconsciously become authors of other evils.” (D/89)
Evil — “To portray others as evil is to glorify oneself by suggesting a comparison — a comparison the ego would willingly develop, though it often restrains itself from doing so.” (D/170)
Hell — “Hell and heaven are both states of bondage […] whose duration is determined by the nature, amount, and intensity of the accumulated impressions...and after they have served their purpose in the life of the individualized soul, they both come to an end.“ (D/310)
Hell — “What is hell?...[W]hatever you take hell to be, know that I am there too. I cannot be excluded from hell because I am in all existence.“ (ITS/95)
Lust — “Love is God; lust is Satan.“ (TMBJ/56)
Satan — “The truth is that Jesus was not tempted by Satan, but that Jesus got himself tempted, and he overcame the temptations. There was a great purpose behind this. He had to get himself tempted. Thereby he shouldered the burden of the forces of temptations that predominated in the world. Jesus then overcame all the temptations, and in that way created a tremendous force which acted as a great setback to the forces of universal temptations. The same was true in the case of Buddha.“ (GS/68)
Satan (Temptation) — “The truth is that Jesus was not tempted by Satan, but that Jesus got himself tempted, and he overcame the temptations. There was a great purpose behind this. He had to get himself tempted. Thereby he shouldered the burden of the forces of temptations that predominated in the world. Jesus then overcame all the temptations, and in that way created a tremendous force which acted as a great setback to the forces of universal temptations. The same was true in the case of Buddha, and it is the same every time in Avataric periods.” (GS/68)
Sources:
Aw — The Awakener Magazine, ed. Filis Frederick; copyright by Universal Spiritual League in America, Inc.
B — Beams from Meher Baba on the Spiritual Panorama, by Meher Baba (Peter Pauper Press, 1958).
Be — The Beloved: The Life and Work of Meher Baba, by Naosherwan Anzar (Sheriar Press, 1974).
D — Discourses, 7th rev. ed., by Meher Baba (Sheriar Press, 1987).
EN — The Everything and the Nothing, by Meher Baba (Meher House Publications, 1963).
GM — The God-Man (1964), by C. B. Purdom (Sheriar Press, 1971).
GS — God Speaks, by Meher Baba (Sufism Reoriented, 1955).
ITS — Is That So? Stories told by Eruch Jessawala, compiled by Bill Le Page (Meher Nazar Books, 1985).
LAP — Love Alone Prevails, 2nd ed., by Kitty Davy (Sheriar Foundation, 2001).
LB — Life At Its Best, by Meher Baba (Peter Pauper Press, 1957).
LH — Listen, Humanity, by Meher Baba, ed. D. E. Stevens (Dodd, Mead, 1957).
LJ — Life Is A Jest, by Meher Baba (Avatar Meher Baba Jabalpur Centre, 1969).
LM — Lord Meher, 20 vols., by Bhau Kalchuri (MANifestation, Inc., 1986-2001), copyright by AMBPPCT (The online revised edition may have different wording for some sayings.)
MB — Meher Baba, By His Eastern and Western Disciples (Publication Committee, Meher Baba Universal Spiritual Centre, 1939).
M-M — Mehera-Meher, 3 vols., by David Fenster (Meher Nazar Publications, 2003).
PM-Q&A — Shri Meher Baba, The Perfect Master: Questions and Answers (1933).
RD — Ramjoo’s Diaries, 1922–1929, by Ramjoo Abdullah (Sufism Reoriented, 1979).
SW — The Silent Word, by Francis Brabazon (R. J. Mistry for Meher House Publications, 1978).
TAO — The Ancient One, by Eruch Jessawala, ed. Naosherwan Anzar (Beloved Books, 1985).
TMBJ — Treasures from the Meher Baba Journal, 1938-1942, ed. Jayne Barry Haynes (Sheriar Press, 1980).