A friend texted me a question – ‘How to have compassion for terrorists?’ He was asking about the recent Mumbai siege, which killed about 120. My answer would be this – ‘We can nurture compassion for terrorists by realising that they had created immense negative karma (which is likely to bear fruit as much suffering) due to having acted upon great hatred based upon deep delusion.’ As long as we remember that no one would want suffering for oneself, we will remember that all who bring suffering upon others are really deluded about the workings of karma, that they too need our compassion to help them realise this.
Here is a relevant dialogue, from p.84 of ‘Emotional Awareness: Overcoming the Obstacles to Psychological Balance and Compassion’ by H.H. the Dalai Lama & Paul Ekman, Ph.D. -
Jinpa: (translator) This [an earlier discussion] just reminded His Holiness [the Dalai Lama] of a story that he brings up often in his public talks, the story of one of his colleagues who was held in a… prison [unjustly] for a long time. After many years in prison, he was released, came to India, and then met with His Holiness, and they spent many hours together. During this time, he mentioned to His Holiness that occasionally, he experienced deep fear.
Dalai Lama: He was in the… gulag [labour camp]. A few occasions.
Jinpa: On a few occasions, he experienced a deep sense of fear.
Dalai Lama: Of danger.
Jinpa: His Holiness asked him, “What kind of danger?” And he said, “The danger of losing my compassion… for the… prison guards.” What this suggests is that when a person has that kind of mind-set and perspective and appreciation of the value of compassion, then such a person is never going to willingly embrace any hateful emotion. The basic outlook on life that you have probably makes a big difference in how you respond to emotions.
Ekman: There is a side to the story of the man in the… prison that I think for some can cause a problem: When you hear this story and you might think, I could never be like that. It is as if you were to hear a spectacular violinist playing and think, How could I ever play that well? My question is, Should we all be aiming for the level that this man in the… prison reached? Or is that too high a goal for most of us? If we hear something that is so elevated, will that discourage us from even trying?
Dalai Lama: (translated) Not everyone should try to reach that level [at least not immediately]. This colleague was not a well-known, intense meditator; he was an ordinary monk, not even a highly learned scholar. I told this story to underline that your outlook on these emotions, whether or not you are deeply convinced of their destructive nature, or whether or not you are deeply convinced of the value of positive mental states, will make a difference in how you respond to triggers, how you respond to situations, and so on. The goal is to develop an outlook in which you fully realize the interdependent nature of your well-being with that of others, and of your interests with others’ interests…
Eckman: When I asked [Ven.] Matthieu [Ricard] about it, he said to me, “Very few of us could ever be an Olympian javelin thrower. But all of us, if we practice, can learn to throw the javelin farther.” We will not all be the Dalai Lama. But his example points a direction, and we can all, to differing extents, try to move in that direction. It shows us that it is something that humans can do, not that every human should expect to reach the same level [instantly].
Dalai Lama: That is right.
Eckman: But we can all move in that direction.
Dalai Lama: That is right.
Eckman: It is inspirational. But it also marks out a direction for how to lead our lives.
Dalai Lama: That is right.
Sadhu! Sadhu! Sadhu! I feel that for a human being to kill another human being, a lot of hatred must have accumulated inside that person. The process of accumulating so much anger, hatred implies that the person have suffered greatly. That process of suffering implies that the person probably have went thru hell, literally. Given a conscious choice, who would wana go thru hell?