Turning the Other Cheek
The only ‘greater good’ is the life of the Hereafter. Those who have discovered faith in the life Hereafter will readily bear any other loss as everything else is insignificant in comparison.
The corpse of a sixty-year-old man was found near Faiz Road in Delhi on July 31, 1984. It showed signs of a brutal murder. The police conducted intensive investigations, but the dead body could not be identified for a long time. Then, finally, the police managed to lay their hands on a clue. The shirt worn by the dead man bore the label of ‘Azad Tailors’ with code no. 52 on it. The police investigators now went to a small tailor’s shop called ‘Azad Tailors’ in Sawan Park. The owner, Mr Salahuddin, knew of a person called Panday who answered the descriptions given by the police, but he was not aware of his full name. The police then tried at another shop close by called the Kamal Cloth House. Here they were able to get the information they required.
The full name of the murder victim was Dev Narain Pandey. He belonged to Faizabad but lived in Delhi, where he worked polishing mosaic floors. The investigation of the murder proceeded. More missing links were brought to light one after another. Forty years ago, it was discovered that the murdered person had taken a man’s life to redress some personal grievance. One Mahendar Kumar Choudhery, a nephew of the murdered man, was brought up in an environment where he repeatedly heard that Pandey had murdered his uncle. He decided, therefore, that he should avenge his uncle’s murder. To carry out his plan, he came to Delhi and pretended to become friendly with Dev Narain Pandey. One day he got the opportunity he had been waiting for and lost no time in murdering him. The police finally took him into custody, and he confessed. He found himself in this terrible position because his family could not bring themselves to forgive the murder even after the lapse of forty years. It is a sorry truth that in all societies, people have some cause or the other for complaint against those with whom they come into contact. However, retaliation is no solution to this problem. The solution lies instead in rising above such feelings of vengefulness. The deliberate overlooking of such matters can diminish the existing tensions, whereas retaliation and revenge only serve to aggravate the situation.
However, it is no simple matter to stifle such feelings. Man can give up something only when he receives something more significant. The feeling of a cause being lost, and justice not being done can only be overcome by gaining some ‘greater good’. The only such ‘greater good’ is the life of the Hereafter. Faith in the next eternal world gives man this greater good and everything else is rendered insignificant. That is why those who have discovered faith in the life Hereafter will readily bear any other loss.
