There is this interesting philosophical stance that could be called as the "God works in mysterious ways" -argument, which is also known in the Buddhist circles as the "Crazy Wisdom argument". In short, this view says that "since the Person X is a holy one, full of goodness, it follows that all his actions, even those that observably are bad and unethical, are holy and good".
This view takes as it's starting point the status - dogmatically inherent, or socially agreed one - of the actor, and views the actions done by the actor from that initial premise. Hence, if it is agreed upon that God is good, then it follows that when God kills the family of Job, these murderous acts are good. As a justification, or a getaway-clause, to this evident clash of the inherent status of the actor and the unethical status of his acts, the adherent of this philosophical stance typically posits the further view of the "lowliness of the human observer". As the human observer is ignorant, he cannot possibly understand the Great Plan of the God, or the Mysterious Workings of the God. Or in other words, he has no ethical sense, no moral eye. He is blind.
As God is seen inherently good, all his acts are good, and if you do not recognize them as such, you are an ignoramus, little in faith, a non-believer. As some 'Guru' is seen through an empowerment to be good, all his acts are good, and if you do not recognize them as such, you are an ignoramus, little in faith, a non-believer.
To hold this view therefore means, that one also maintains that one is not capable of making moral judgements oneself. This view therefore makes one into an animal, in the sense that one knowingly refuses to use one's reason, but in full cognizance shuns away one's conscience. One ignores the evident. One shuts one's eyes. One bathes in ignorance. One loses one's humanity, and drifts towards the animal realm.
But happily, the Buddha never taught us to practice anything like that. He did not say, that we should have that kind of view, that kind of philosophical stance. On the contrary.
According to the Buddha, one's purity comes through one's actions, and ultimately through one's mind. Time and again, he has taught things like that "no one is pure (brahmin) through birth or status, but through one's deeds, karma, one is pure (brahmin)." In other words, we cannot as Buddhists, start to make ethical judgements from any preconceived view of the status of the actor, but must only look to the acts themselves. If the acts are pure and good, the actor is pure to that extent. Not the other way round. Killing is not deemed bad because evil people do that, but people are deemed evil if they kill. The ethical status of the actor ia a result from the status of the acts done, but not that the status of the acts follows the supposed status of the actor. This difference-in-view is one of the great differences between Buddhism and the Theistic Religions.
In Buddhism, the moral logic, or the proper application of moral labeling, goes like this: Shakyamuni's actions are not pure and good because they are made by a Buddha, but Shakyamuni is a pure being, a Buddha, because all he does is pure and good. It is his pure actions that make him a Buddha. To merely dogmatically proclaim, that as he is labeled as a Buddha all his actions must be pure, is in fact a non-buddhist view, a theistic view.
This is an important point. If one uses "reverse labeling", labeling the acts based on the supposed status of the actor, one remains in confusion, since one cannot possibly check the actual purity of the actor. But using the "upright labeling", that is, labeling the actor based on his evident actions, since one can use the Dharma to reflect the status of the acts, one can have clear indications of the status of the actor, and thereby clear away all confusion.
Using the upright labeling, one uses the Dharma. One bases one's moral judgements solely on the Dharma, instead on some supposed and unproveable status-claims made by third parties. In this way, the upright labeling allows one to grow in view and vision as one grows familiar with the Dharma, and therefore one is prevented from falling into the lower realms, and enabled ultimately to attain freedom from all rebirths. Using the reverse labeling one eventually loses all track of what is Dharma and non-dharma, and one drifts away even further from the shores of the Island of Refuge, into the vast ocean of Samsara. Now that we see the land, the solid ground of Goodness, let us not drift away into the fog!
blessings,
Zhalmed Pawo
