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Overcoming Hate with Non-hate

Warm greetings to all of you as I begin this talk. There is a renowned verse from the Dhammapada^[1], an ancient anthology of Buddhist poetry, and it goes something like this: Hate is not overcome by hate, but by love alone is hate overcome. This is an ancient truth.

It is possible that translating the ancient word as love doesn't really capture the full richness of this verse, and I will talk about that a little later. But I want to evoke this very well-known verse because it is really a central idea in Buddhism that we cannot pacify hate by adding more hate to the fire. Hate is considered to be a fire that burns the one who is hating, that harms the one who is hating. To respond to hate with hate means that there are two people now who are burning and suffering, who are wounding each other, wounding themselves both.

The Climate of Hate

This is such an important topic in the climate of the world right now. I don't know if there is more or less hatred in the world than there has ever been before, but we're certainly becoming acutely aware of it here in the United States. Perhaps we're coming into an era in this country where there is the possibility of beginning to recognize the tremendous harm that hate causes. Maybe it was difficult to see before, when hate was expressed so violently that people were mostly spending their time protecting themselves from lynchings, riots, and all kinds of things. Hate was certainly present back then, but maybe it was not what was being addressed directly. Now we come to a time where there's a real heightened sensitivity to what hatred looks like, how hatred speaks, and how it spreads as a kind of poison to our society.

I speak about this in the wake of the rising hate crimes against Asian Americans. Here in California just a month ago, there was arson and vandalism at an Asian Buddhist temple in Los Angeles. It was a Japanese Buddhist temple in the Pure Land tradition—a very peaceful, peace-loving form of Buddhism. The temple was partly destroyed; not dramatically, but enough to be quite disturbing. This is a tradition of Buddhism that has been in this country for well over a hundred years. The members of that temple, and of that form of Buddhism, have been here in the United States for six, seven, possibly even eight generations by now. To be the recipients of hate, as if they don't belong in this country, is quite painful for all of us in this family that we hope to be, and in this country.

We have seen images of elderly Asian Americans being attacked on streets, right here in San Francisco. It's not like this kind of violence only happens "over there"—it's close in. It didn't just start then, but it certainly raised people's worry a year ago when hateful things started being said to people of Asian descent, especially Chinese descent, here locally on the peninsula because of the coronavirus. The spreading of animosity towards people of any kind of Asian descent because of a virus shows the ease with which people sometimes hate. This is part of the issue here in this country.

There is a need to stand in solidarity with the people who are the recipients of hate. We must stand in solidarity with the Asian Americans who are struggling with fear and worry about what it means to be out in public, or not in public at night, knowing what is coming. We need to offer our protection and create places of sanctuary where it feels safe to come—not just where they feel welcome, but where they feel like it's home, like they belong.

It is a little bit hard here at IMC^[2] to be teaching all alone this last year, but I want this place to be a home for all people. I want everyone to come here and feel like they belong. Even more than just welcoming, I want them to feel like it's their place where they can really engage fully and bring themselves completely. Certainly, I am concerned for the membership of IMC that are Asian American, the membership of IMC that are Black, and all the people who have been the recipients of hate crimes here in the United States.

Hate as a Disposition

The phrase hate crime is an interesting term because the definition of hate in this regard is very different from some of the other meanings we use. We use the word hate when people say they hate spinach; that has a very different connotation and meaning than when we say we hate an ethnic group. I think the highest number of hate crimes in the United States is against African Americans, and another really high number is against the LGBTQ community.

When there's a hate crime, it's not just a dislike of someone. One distinction some people make between anger and hate, in the context of a hate crime, is that anger is for a particular behavior, a particular event, or a particular situation. Racial hate, gender hate, or ethnic hate is directed towards a whole category. It is directed at the whole person—not just their behavior, what they say or do, but the whole being of the person, their family, and their community. It's not just a singular emotion; it's an attitude, a disposition, a way of seeing. It's an interpretation that is overlaid on the totality of who a person is.

That is why hate crimes and expressions of these categorical crimes are so total, and why they are so painful for people. It is a diminishment and a contempt for who they are as a human being. To repeatedly be the recipient of the message that you, as a human being, are somehow worthy of my hate is quite difficult. Furthermore, to know that this is a lingering disposition and attitude means it's not just a mistake of the moment or a fleeting passion. It is something that stays and will continue.

When someone is the victim of a hate crime, it's not just the individual who suffers, but also their families and community, because it's known that they are all connected. It is a tear in the fabric of society. It is a rupture in our ability to be together cooperatively and harmoniously as fellow citizens and companions in our humanity. It is a diminishment of people's humanity. One of the great tasks of our society, our times, and for ourselves is to learn how to see the humanity of other people and how to share our humanity with them.

Discovering Shared Humanity

I saw an interview recently between an imam, the religious leader of a mosque, and the neighbor of the mosque. The neighbor, a man who had been high on drugs, heard about some violence—I think it was a mass shooting in Paris by ISIS followers where many people died. He came home high on cocaine and was just angry at Muslims. He said he had been listening to a lot of social media, so he thought all Muslims were somehow violent terrorists and terrible people. So he shot up the building next door, the mosque. No one was hurt, but he still shot at it.

He was arrested and went to jail for what he did, and he apologized. I think when he was no longer high, he understood the huge mistake he had made. When he apologized, the religious leaders of the mosque forgave him, and apparently brought him food and little gifts in prison. When he was released, because he lived next door, they invited him over to the mosque. They were able to tell him a little bit about what their form of Islam was. He was shocked; he found these people to be fantastic, wonderful, peace-loving people who had forgiven him. He then brought his friends over to see them. They were all discovering the humanity of each other, sharing their humanity, and getting to know each other. This is not possible when there's hate, or when there's a categorical idea that someone is somehow contemptible.

Responding with Non-Hate

So how do we respond to hate as individuals in society? From a Buddhist point of view, we don't respond with more hate. We have to take a lot of care. It's hard not to be upset with the people who are doing it. Of course, we should take a strong stand against acts of violence and this level of hate. Hopefully, we stand up and help protect our fellow humans who are struggling with this situation, as it affects all of us. But we shouldn't hate.

The Dhammapada verse says that hate is not overcome by hate. The common translation is, by love alone is hate overcome. But the actual original language of the line literally says, by non-hate is hate overcome. Non-hate is a larger category and points to a wider range of responses than love. Love is maybe too hard or difficult to draw up, and expecting that we are always supposed to be loving might not even be appropriate as the first response in situations of hate.

What does non-hate mean? Most literally, it means not to hate. The idea of loving is a great one, and the motivation to love can arise out of deep meditation practice. In meditation practice, we let go and quiet all the fevers of greed, hate, and delusion. We settle and discover a deep level of peace and well-being within a settled, contented, and reassured heart. We discover that there is a way of living and being that becomes one of the most precious things there can be. A feeling of kindness, love, friendliness, and compassion radiates from within. This feels like home; this has integrity. This is the place of value regarding how to live this life, and we feel a commitment that this is how we want to be.

The Practice of the Sacred Pause

Rather than always being loving, there can be the wish to be loving. We can't always love, but maybe we can always have the aspiration to love. Sometimes that aspiration to love means that the best we can do today is not to give in to our hate and hostility. The wish to love commits us to pausing—a sacred pause—to hold in check any movement we have to hate. We hold our tongue in check so we don't speak words of hostility. We hold our hands in check so we don't express physical hostility.

Learning to hold ourselves back because we want to love is not a kind of repression. Rather, it's an expression of something deeper that wants to come out. Something deeper is saying, "Wait, hold it, there's something more important here. Don't lose yourself. Don't give in to something that adds to fragmentation and alienation. Don't give in to something that is going to burn you."

Dramatic metaphors for hate in Buddhism include a poisonous snake that bites itself, or a fire that burns itself. The fire of hate burns the person who is hating; the poison of hate poisons the person who hates.

One of the dynamics of hate is that it is sometimes a person's response to their own pain and hurt. It's often said that hurt can evoke hate—a kind of blaming others to avoid the pain we feel ourselves by turning our attention outward and attacking. Hurt evokes hate, but hate, in return, evokes hurt. It becomes a vicious cycle that goes round and round and gets stronger and stronger.

The Cycle of Hate and Alienation

Hate evokes alienation, and alienation is a condition that promotes more hate. When we hate, we separate ourselves from the humanity of other people. We become more alone, unless we find companionship with other hateful people. We may think we're connected by the mutual cause of what we are hating, but it's a shallow connection. To feel supported or enlivened by hate is a kind of self-alienation. The more we are alienated from others and ourselves, the more it drives further hate. Hate brings alienation, and alienation promotes even more hate.

In Buddhist ideas, hate is a form of bondage. To freely do the wishes of our jailers is not real freedom. Feeling that we have the freedom to freely express hate is really just doing the work of our jailers. We are enslaving and jailing ourselves more and more. People who hate are caught, diminishing themselves, and jailing themselves in these very strong feelings.

To find freedom is to find freedom from hate. It is finding the ability to allow something deeper than hate to come forth and move through us. For those of us who are practitioners, one of our great possibilities is not to diminish ourselves when we feel hate, animosity, prejudice, or bias, but rather to turn the light of awareness onto it. We must be honest, learn to see it, and recognize our anger or hostility in whatever form it takes. We keep turning back 180 degrees away from the object of our hostility or bias, and instead look at what it is like for us to have that bias or intense hatred.

If we want to love ourselves, we must take the sacred pause. We don't give in to it, but look at it deeper and deeper. What's going on here? We bring a calming awareness that is peacemaking—a non-contentious awareness that is not hating or in conflict. We start relaxing and settling the fires, the hurt, and the alienation. We relax the way in which we recoil from pain. We feel our own pain deeper and deeper until we find where the healing is, where there is peace, where there is wholeness, and maybe where there is love.

Our Noble Task

We discover that when we respond to hate in the world with non-hate, it might take the form of generosity—perhaps sending meals to someone in prison who hated us. Maybe it takes the form of forgiveness. The imam who spoke about forgiving the man who shot their mosque said it made sense to forgive him because he had apologized. We can discover the ability to forgive and the ability to be friendly; we don't have to love someone to be friendly to them. Through all these expressions, maybe we discover how to bring more love into the world, bringing a peaceful, settling, pacifying presence to benefit a world that is so challenging.

I think one of the great, noble, and important tasks these days in the United States, and perhaps in many countries, is for us to stand in solidarity with everyone who is a recipient of hate crimes. Black people in the United States, Indigenous people, Hispanic people, the LGBTQ community, Asian Americans, and the list goes on and on.

More than just standing in solidarity and support, we must be actively involved in making this world a better and safer place for all. We need to understand the roots of hate in ourselves as deeply as we can. We must learn to develop the strength, courage, and confidence to always wish and want to be loving. It doesn't mean you have to always be loving—it is a difficult task—but we can always want to do it. In wanting to do it, we take a sacred pause to avoid causing more harm, and we at least do not actively express our hostility to anyone.

Slowly, we can begin learning how to truly meet the challenges of this world with ways of being, loving, caring, standing up, and speaking up that will heal the great divides of our society. Let's discover our common humanity so that we don't live fractured, but live together as a community, a family, and a society where we all care for everyone we encounter. Thank you.