英国新闻听力 对巴基斯坦白沙瓦大屠杀的思考（在线收听）

Of all the horrors we’ve seen in the international conflict with radical Islam, Wednesday’s massacre at the army school in Peshawar must be among the most ghastly. When defenseless women and children are targeted on this scale, we’ve reached a new level of barbarism.

How did we get here? Without detracting from the attack’s distinctive horror, it stems from a spiral of violence and escalating conflict. When did it all start: the Pakistani army’s campaign against the Taliban? The wars in Afghanistan and Iraq? 9/11? The legacy of occupation and empire that stretches back over centuries? The causes are endless: perhaps that’s the nature of conflicts. And the solutions are doubtful. The Pakistani army may be victorious, but at what cost, and with what consequences? Perhaps this war will spread, or merge into the region’s other conflicts; or perhaps the barbarism will just continue to escalate.

Reflecting on the conflicts of his own time, the Buddha alighted on a singular term for what he observed: proliferation. Causes multiply into diverse effects, especially when ideology and beliefs magnify them. He made sense of this by noting the parallel with what happens in our minds: one irritable thought begets another, which becomes a compelling narrative about what’s happening; and, soon enough, we act.

This psychological approach led the Buddha to locate the ultimate causes of war and conflict in the minds of individual human beings. We’ll do anything to banish unpleasant feelings and put things right when we feel they’re wrong, even if that leads us to act in ways we’d otherwise condemn. That’s how otherwise decent people come to justify the use of torture.

In the Buddhist view, nothing good can result when we’re driven by hatred, anger and the desire for revenge. Blood will have blood. This doesn’t mean that force should never be used or that wars are never justified; but it’s a strong caution to check the impulse to act out of anger, to note the moral distortion that rigid ideology can bring, and to allow space for other wiser responses that come when we put anger aside.

Proliferation ends, the Buddha suggested, when we learn to tolerate pain, rather than reacting to it, and when patience and forgiveness give us the mental space to act with love. For me, that’s the ultimate challenge of the barbarity in Pakistan. The world is good at creating warmongers. Peacemakers have to make themselves.

在我们所看到极端伊斯兰教国际冲突带来的所有恐怖事件中，周三白沙瓦军事学校的大屠杀肯定是最令人发指的。当毫无抵抗力的妇女、孩子被大规模屠杀时，这个世界的野蛮程度也就达到新的水平。

怎么会发生这样的惨案呢？除了袭击案本身的恐怖外，这一悲剧是由不断升级的暴力和冲突造成的。这一切是从何时开始的？从巴基斯坦军队对塔利班作战开始吗？从阿富汗和伊拉克战争开始吗？还是从911事件开始？亦或是从若干世纪以来的占领和帝国而来？原因太多而找不到源头，可能这就是冲突的性质。而解决方法令人怀疑，巴基斯坦军队可能胜利了，但为此所付出的代价呢？这一切带来的后果呢？可能这场战争会蔓延或并入该地区其他冲突之中，或许野蛮行径将继续升级。

佛陀通过反思他那个时代的冲突，偶然发现他观察到的一个词：proliferation(增值，繁殖，扩散)。各种原因相结合造成多种结果，尤其是当思想意识和信念扩大了这些结果。他弄懂了这一现象，指出了伴随我们思想带来的东西：不安的思想会导致另一个不安的思想，这种思想就成为现实强有力的叙述，很快，我们就为此做出行动。

这种心理范式让佛陀从个人心理中发现了导致战争和冲突的根本原因，我们会做一切事情来消除不好的感觉，当事情不对头时我们会拨乱反正，即使这回导致我们去做些其他时候我们会加以谴责的行为，这也就是为什么有时正派人士会为酷刑的使用进行辩护。

在佛陀看来，当我们被仇恨、愤怒和报复的欲望驱使时，是无法促成好的结果的。血债血偿，这并不意味着永远不该使用武力，或者发动战争永远是不正当的，但我们一定要提醒自己，检查我们因愤怒而做出的冲突举动，要注意僵化的思想意识可能带来的道德扭曲，当我们把愤怒放在一边时，给明智的应对让出空间。

佛陀说，当我们学会容忍痛苦，而不是以牙还牙时，当耐心和原谅给我们以善举的心理空间时，proliferation(增值，繁殖，扩散)就会终止。对我来说，这就是巴基斯坦野蛮行径所面临的最终挑战，这个世界善于制造好战者，而缔造和平者必须自我创造。