This quote is commonly seen on social media, and it’s a genuine scriptural quotation. It’s from verse 5 of the Dhammapada.
In Buddharakkhita’s translation this is:
Hatred is never appeased by hatred in this world. By non-hatred alone is hatred appeased. This is a law eternal.
In Thanissaro’s version this is:
Hostilities aren’t stilled through hostility, regardless.
Hostilities are stilled through non-hostility: this, an unending truth.
Narada Thera has:
Hatreds never cease through hatred in this world; through love alone they cease. This is an eternal law.
You can see that they’re all basically very similar.
In Pali this is:
Na hi verena verāni sammantīdha kudācanaṃ
Averena ca sammanti esa dhammo sanantano.
Very literally this is:
Not (na) indeed (hi) by means of hatred (verena) hatreds (verāni) appeased (sammanti) here (idha) at any time (kudācanaṃ).
By means of non-hatred (averena) and (ca — acts to connect this sentence with the one before) are they stilled (sammanti). This (esa) truth/law (dhammo) eternal (sanantano).
Our quotation uses the more conceptually positive word “love” rather than the strictly correct but conceptually negative “non-hatred,” but sometimes translators feel (quite justifiably in my opinion) to make such changes for the sake of accessibility. “Non-hatred” is of course a much broader term than “love,” and can encompass not just love and compassion, but even calm, mindfulness, and patience, which are all “non-hateful” qualities that promote inner peace.
The original translator was Eknath Easwaran, who rendered this verse as:
For hatred does not cease by hatred at any time: hatred ceases by love. This is an unalterable law.
Eknath’s initial “for” has been dropped, and “by” has twice been changed to “through” by some unknown transmitter of the quotation.
I think this verse is so profound, and ought to be a focus of contemplative reflections (not that I have any to offer). Nations like to think that coming out ‘victorious’ through hostile actions is what leads to peace… But what do we see time and again? … that it just leads to more and more hostile forces crowding in on us. Attack the enemy in front, and more enemies pop up on the sides or from the rear. We have to learn from experience and stop going about things the wrong way. (I didn’t want to specifically target the U.S. Middle East policies in recent decades, since there are so many examples out there to choose from.)
Our first instinct may be to think of applying these verses to others, but the main thing is to use them as a reminder to scrutinize our own actions…
hey, I’m using this for my enrichment project do you mind ?
I don’t know what that means!
Use them to scrutinize our own actions, use them to scrutinize the world’s actions. Either starting point is a useful beginning. Ideally we can do both simultaneously, testing them with our own experiencing and the world’s experiencing.
Yes, that’s why I said “the main thing is to use them as a reminder to scrutinize our own actions” rather than saying that’s the only thing we should do.
“Never anywhere at any time did hatred cease by hatred. Always ‘t is by love that hatred ceases; only love. The ancient law is thus.”
–Edwin Arnold’s The Dhammapada
I find it so true… However, I’m happy to know that the exact meaning is “non-hatred”. It sound more right to me. I had a former employer who is a professional deceiver and liar. He acted badly toward me and other employees (one of them is becoming a true friend). When I think about him, I cannot say that I love him, but I pity him. He has such a sad vision of the world. Never being able to trust anyone must be so terrible… In fact, I think I would have loved the man he could become, should he take another path… Such a waste… I was happy to realize I was able to meditate for him.
However non-hatred does’nt mean to me to accept passively any misdemeanour without fighting (I used to act like that before). A good honest fight does’nt need to be violent. It’s the principle of Tai Chi Chuan… But it can give a good lesson to people who don’t behave properly. And they need it, for their own good.
There is more about this topic in Buddhist discussions of lovingkindness (metta), which is somewhat similar to the Christian concept of brotherly love. It is recognized that lovingkindness is different from approval. I can love someone, yet strongly disapprove of their behavior. It’s easy to see how this can apply to people like children, family or friends. However, it more broadly applies to everyone, including people who I might contend with. Being consumed with hatred interferes with my ability to fight both verbally and physically. Hatred is like a poison.
Non-hatred in my opinion is the right translation because it resembles the mental qualities and experiences one would have through practicing satipatthana meditation, which is not really just cultivating loving kindness.
Non-hatred is definitely a more accurate translation. As I said in the article,
I can understand the temptation to use the word “love,” though, since “non-hatred” needs a bit of explanation.
While I find this quote true for many scenarios, there are some cases where I consider it to be just naive… my first thought is the Nazi Germany, is it reasonable to think that such situation could have been stopped without a war? Or in the context of our daily lives, is it reasonable to stop thieves and killers without using some violence against them?
In my life I have encountered quite a few people who simply have no consideration for others, even to the point of being violent and feeling no regret about their own violence. I have tried to talk with those people in the past, and they haven’t listened to me. I have tried to stop their violence in non-hateful ways, still they didn’t care much. So I reached a point where I had to become agressive myself, and while at first I encountered some resistance from them, in the long term it did helped to diminish their agressive behaviours.
Maybe I don’t understand Buddha well enough yet… but I sometimes feel he was kind of naive, like many other teachers we’ve seen through out history.
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PS: If the author of the website reads this, I love the work you’ve done here, thank you very much for this website!
Hi, Fabian.
These are good things to think about. I have a few comments on your example. First, were the allies motivated, on the whole, by hatred? It seems to me that the motivation of protecting allies, even if this causes suffering, is very different from the simple desire to make an enemy suffer. Had the allies been primarily motivated by hatred, would the US have set up the Marshall Plan after the war to help European countries — including Germany — rebuild their infrastructure. Hatred is about wanting to destroy. It’s about wanting to make someone suffer as a way of gratifying yourself. Hatred would presumably look more like getting revenge by punishing the entire German population for having supported the Nazi regime and for having waged war. It would have involved killing them, enslaving them, humiliating them. But that’s not what happened. So what you’re talking about is, I believe, not hatred opposing hatred, but force opposing hatred, which is a very different thing.
Also, was hatred defeated? Only in a very limited sense. A particular political manifestation of hatred was militarily defeated, but hatred itself, no. Similarly, with your aggressive opposition to hateful people, you didn’t eradicate their hatred. You just helped them to keep their hatred in check. It wasn’t defeated. And I wonder if you did act out of hate (a desire to hurt) or whether you were simply standing up for yourself. I don’t know, of course.
Even if the other person does overcome their own hatred, they’re going to have to do that by learning to empathize and to replace their ill will with love. So in the end, only love can eradicate hatred.
I doubt very much that the Buddha was naive. His words are very similar to those of Dr. King: “Returning hate for hate multiplies hate, adding deeper darkness to a night already devoid of stars. Darkness cannot drive out darkness; only light can do that. Hate cannot drive out hate; only love can do that.” MLK, like the Buddha, was a smart and effective guy, living at a turbulent time. They both got a lot done. The Buddha was lucky enough to live a long life. Sadly the same was not true for Dr. King, but he wasn’t naive: he knew and accepted the risk. I don’t think the Buddha was naive either.
And thanks for the appreciation. I hope you buy the book!
Thank you very much for your reply. I would like to comment a few things:
1) By definition, “hatred” means an intense dislike or aversion for something or someone. It is true that it usually leads to ‘wanting to destroy’, as you correctly mentioned in your comment, but not necessarily to ‘wanting to make someone suffer as a way of gratifying yourself’, as you suggested. You can hate actions or ideas, but that doesn’t mean you hate the person who follows those actions/ideas.
2) ‘were the allies motivated, on the whole, by hatred?’ –> This question is extremely difficult to answer, because there’s so much speculation involved regarding motivations in a war. One could also argue that Hitler was motivated by a desire to protect his own people from those he considered to be evil… all wars are justified according to each side.
3) ‘Had the allies been primarily motivated by hatred, would the US have set up the Marshall Plan after the war’ –> The Allies also dropped two atomic bombs on Japan, killing thousands of innocent people.
Besides, the Marshall Plan happened AFTER the war. We can totally agree that there was not much hate after the war finished, but that has nothing to do with what happened DURING the war. I don’t think your point is relevant here.
4) “Also, was hatred defeated? Only in a very limited sense.” –> Ok, I agree. But still violence was a necessary thing to happen in order to reach a more peaceful state. And that’s my whole point: there are moments in life where lovingkindness is useful (probably most moments), but there are also moments where you need to use different resources, even to the point of hating an action or an idea. A strong aversion against certain stuff can be useful too, it can be part of the process of overcoming hate, and I think the example of WWII shows this. Hate doesn’t always lead to more hate, it depends a lot on the situation, and how you manage it.
5) “And I wonder if you did act out of hate (a desire to hurt)” –> I did feel that way, I acted very violently (I didn’t physically hurt anybody, though I wanted to). And looking back to what I did, I’m glad I felt that way: It’s only because of my strong aversion towards them that the problems started fading away.
This personal example of mine shows that hate doesn’t always lead to more hate.
6) “they’re going to have to do that by learning to empathize and to replace their ill will with love. So in the end, only love can eradicate hatred.” –> Love is part of the process, of course, but not the only one: it’s common in life that we need to show strong aversion towards something in order to start making a change.
Non-hateful/loving attitudes are not always useful, this is what I find naive in the quote from Buddha: what happens when you find an aggressive person that doesn’t want to listen to you? What happens if that person simply ignores whatever you do to change their behaviour and keeps acting violently just because they want to? What happens if you also do not have the choice to leave, and you have nobody else to get help from? What happens if, even after standing up for yourself, that person becomes even more agressive? Or another scenario: will you stay passive and do nothing else, even if the victim of such violence is a child, for example? Sometimes an intense aversion against certain behaviours is the only way to deal with them.
7) “I doubt very much that the Buddha was naive. His words are very similar to those of Dr. King” –> Take into account that MLK is simply talking about not hating people: he DID have a strong aversion against racism (by definition, that’s called hate), he actively tried to eradicate it, and I think we all should feel that way too (to my understanding, this is not the same case as Buddha’s, since Buddha talks against aversion in general… please correct me if I’m wrong).
Despite your quote, MLK is actually a good example of how hate doesn’t always lead to more hate: by feeling a strong aversion against racism, sexism, etc. it’s actually possible to overcome those problems.
8) To summarize: I’m not saying we should hate each other, or anything similar. Lovingkindness should become the general rule in our lives, but rules also have exceptions: there are certain life situations that require a different approach, and a strong aversion might sometimes be the only way. Hate (strong aversion) is not always a bad thing… not always.
I recently discovered a couple of comments that were long-overdue for a reply, including this one.
I’ll be brief:
I love tofu. I love my children. The word love is used in both those sentences, and yet it means something different. “Hating” a person and “hating” an idea are different things, because the objects are different and therefore the relationship between subject and object is different. And in saying that hatred does not destroy hatred, it has never been understood that the Buddha was talking about hatred of anything but other living beings. The traditional story accompanying this particular Dhammapada verse is about jealousy, murder, and revenge. As far as I’m aware the term translated as “hatred” is only used to refer to hatred of sentient beings.
OK. When you get into false equivalencies between the Nazis and the allies, conversation is over.
Worldly goals and the Buddhist goal are drastically different. Buddhism isn’t about getting more gains in this world. It is about release from suffering, where suffering is twofold: mental & physical.
Buddha’s words of wisdom are meant to help to break the bonds of the world, and help one not to be further entangled. Therefore that’s how “hatred does not cease through hatred” should be understood, because practicing hatred entangles one further in this world.
The goal of a war was not to cease hatred at all, therefore if you try to understand it with the Buddha’s words you’ll find yourself bewildered. Once again, the Buddha’s words were to be understood as helping one to be released from Samsara’s bonds, but if you’re seeking ways to get worldly gains, fame, power, etc., Buddhism may not be the right practice for you. Although there were certain times that the Buddha described what kind of practice leads to those, but he wouldn’t really teach people those arts since that’s not the goal.
I don’t think this accurately reflects the Buddha’s teachings, Peter. There are suttas where he talks about how we can act in ways that create positive conditions in society. Yes, his main purpose was to encourage individuals to liberate their hearts from greed, hatred, and delusion, but he recognized that social conditions can create or reduce suffering, and create better or worse conditions for people to practice the Dharma in.
And so he talked about the drawbacks of having rulers who didn’t follow ethical principles (e.g. AN 4.70) and outlined how rulers could promote the general welfare (e.g. in DN 26). He talked to the Vajjians how they could conduct themselves so that their society would prosper rather than decline (AN 7:21). And he also talked about the futility of war (SN 3.14).
And just on the topic of “gains,” he encouraged lay-followers to work diligently and to create wealth. The important things were to do so ethically, and to practice non-attachment through giving, particularly in supporting religious teachers.
Lastly, I don’t think it’s wise to try o convince someone that the Buddhadharma is not the path for them. It’s a path for everyone. Not all of us want to become monastics, but we can still benefit ourselves and others through our practice.
It’s true that in various places in the Sutta that the Buddha taught these things as I mentioned, and to clarify what I said, I meant those were not the primary teachings in Buddhism. The primary teachings were the four noble truths and most importantly, the way leading to the cessation of suffering through the eightfold noble path with Satipatthana.
I disagree that Buddhism is for everyone because as mentioned in the suttas: (1) when the Buddha was enlightened, he was not willing to teach because human beings had strong attachments and most would not understand. It was not until the Brahma asked him three times did he decide to teach. (2) people who killed own parents can’t take the triple refuge and five precepts.
Both were indications that it’s not meant for some people. And the sutta also described occasions where when people didn’t receive the dhamma well, bad kamma followed. (I.e. devadatta)
Surely there were a lot of people who approached him trying to learn how to get worldly gains, solving conflicts or whatever, and he responded in kind, but once again, those were not the primary teachings of Buddhism and can be found in other religious and worldly texts. I.e. the doctrine of kamma existed before Buddhism though Buddha’s was finer, and you can learn economics of supply and demand. If one goes to the Buddha just to learn how to get fame, power, long life, etc., that’s like missing the forest for a tree.
When people asked the Buddha how to get those things, he simply responded with the basic principles of kamma: give something and get something. Please don’t mistake those as primary attributes of Buddhism.
Hi, Peter. I just realized I never replied to this.
The thing is that people come to the Dharma for all sorts of reasons. Some people went to talk to the Buddha because they wanted to trick him and make themselves look superior. Some of those people ended up becoming his followers. I know people who wanted to learn to meditate in order to be better at business and make more money, and ended up becoming very sincere practitioners.
I confess I’ve really no idea what your concern is. Fabian asked a reasonable question based on an incomplete understanding of Buddhism, and the next thing is that you’re telling him that maybe he shouldn’t explore Buddhism. That seems odd to me. Perhaps I’m missing something.
“Fabian asked a reasonable question based on an incomplete understanding of Buddhism”
–> Wow, this part seriously annoyed me. You and me have been having a difference of opinions, that’s all… yet you try to portray it as “Fabian has incomplete understanding of Buddhism”? Is that really your narrow perspective of what’s going on here?
I mean, I AM still learning about Buddhism (I haven’t pretended otherwise), but so far our discussion has had NOTHING to do with that. I stated an opinion, which is that I consider Buddha to be naive sometimes. You have stated yours… but none of your two replies so far include further understanding about Buddhism.
And now I read how you are trying to portrait the issue, and I cannot believe how arrogant you are.
Do not bother to reply to me anymore, I won’t continue the conversation. In the two replies you’ve made to me, it is already clear that you are not very good with presenting arguments, and now I also see this… I’m not interested in following the conversation anymore.
May you have a good day.
Well, all of us have an incomplete understanding of Buddhism. What I meant was that I thought you asked an honest question based on misunderstanding what the Buddha was talking about in that Dhammapada verse.
But just to get this straight: you think that an enlightened teacher who lived in incredibly violent times, who had attempts made on his life, whose homeland was invaded, and who faced down a murderer intent on killing him, was naive about the nature of hatred and violence, which means you think you know more than he did on the topic. At least that’s how it sounds to me.
You think that one of the great civil rights leaders of the 20th century, who put himself in harm’s way on numerous occasions, was naive on the matter of hatred and violence, which means you think you know more than he did.
You tell me, on my own blog, not to reply to you.
And you can’t believe how arrogant I am?
That’s interesting.
I Find the original translation of ‘non-hatred’ more helpful than ‘love’.
This is because I was raised with Judeo-Christian values, which through a kind of neglect or veiling commonly leads to attitudes to oneself which can be categorised as self-jusgmentally hostile. (I think it is fair to say this is a widespread condition in such populations. This is the key behind Kabat-Zinn’s style of meditation… Diminishing and letting go of this.)
Regardless, I don’t want to try to cultivate loving kindness on top of habitual held hostility. Sugary frosting to cover over the unpalatable.
It can seem like it is positive, but it leaves a trap underneath which can be triggered. If someone does something averse towards me, no matter how ‘lovingly friendly’ I have been travelling, the trap will trigger into aversion, which sudden switch is very unpleasant and leads to attacking behaviours.
That’s gift-wrapping on a loaded mouse-trap.
Non-illwill also takes care of those low-grade negative thoughts which I can suffer as an inner commentary, or towards others whom I indulge in criticising to make myself feel better.
As it is a release from an unpleasant mental action, it feels like a relief. Ah, that’s better….
Thanks, Chris. I appreciate your comment about the “sugary frosting” and the aversion that can so easily be triggered toward someone who does something we don’t like. I think that a lot of the time when people think they’re being loving and compassionate, they’re actually “being nice,” and that the primary motivation for this is to be liked, which brings pleasant feelings. When we get the opposite of pleasant feelings (for example it feels unpleasant when someone does something averse to us) our instinct is to react with aversion. The person is no longer responding the way we want to our “being nice” and so no longer deserve our niceness. In fact they deserve to be punished.
I believe that this “being nice” is what the Buddha referred to as pema.
Actual kindness is based on an empathetic understanding that another person’s happiness and unhappiness are as real to them as ours are to us. When we relate to another in this way, we naturally don’t want to act in a way that causes them to suffer. We naturally want to act in ways that support them experiencing wellbeing. And so if they act in a way that’s averse to us, we don’t seek to “punish” them. True kindness is unconditional.
I also like “non-hate” because there are so many ways to be unhateful. Hate doesn’t have just one opposite. We can be loving, compassionate, patient, appreciative, grateful, reassuring, and even (kindly) challenging.