Non-Reaction and Non-Violent Are Not the Same Thing

Jesus famously said that if someone slaps you on one check, you should offer him the other cheek as well. "Turn the other cheek" has long since become a catch phrase for what Eckhart Tolle and others (like the Buddha even before the Christ) call non-reaction. It's really the only sane response to violence. Anything else will only perpetuate a cycle of violence that will never end until one of the parties is either annihilated or until one of them decides, finally, to employ non-reaction.

The first key to non-reaction is internal. It means that your response isn't a knee-jerk, unconscious response to what's happened or what's about to come your way. It means that your ego doesn't take you over, causing you to act without really realizing what you're doing.

An Excerpt on Ego from A New Earth by Eckhart Tolle

Ego is no more than this: identification with form, which primarily means thought forms. If evil has any reality--and it has a relative, not an absolute, reality--this is also its definition: complete identification with form--physical forms, thought forms, emotional forms. This results in a total unawareness of my connectedness with the whole, my intrinsic oneness with every "other" as well as with the Source. This forgetfulness is original sin, suffering, delusion. When this delusion of utter separateness underlies and governs whatever I think, say, and do, what kind of world do I create? To find the answer to this, observe how humans relate to each other, read a history book, or watch the news on television tonight. (p. 22)

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An Excerpt from A New Earth by Eckhart Tolle

Trying to become a good or better human being sounds like a commendable and high-minded thing to do, yet it is an endeavor you cannot ultimately succeed in unless there is a shift in consciousness . . .

In Hindu teachings (and sometimes in Buddhism also), this transformation is called enlightenment. In the teachings of Jesus, it is salvation, and in Buddhism, it is the end of suffering. Liberation and awakening are other terms used to describe this transformation. (pp. 12-13)

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