Gossip and Malice: An Invisible Energy Pollution
Throughout human history, every ancient belief, philosophical movement and religion has defined gossip, intrigue, malice, envy and slander as the gravest moral weaknesses and spiritual diseases. In the sacred texts and ethical teachings passed down for centuries, these behaviours have been seen not merely as simple errors that disturb the social order, but as serious offences that sever the human being’s divine bond with the Creator and the universe, dragging the soul into a spiritual darkness. Yet to understand what these concepts mean within the cosmic order beyond being a mere "bad habit", what kind of energetic structure they possess, and what destructive effects they produce in the soul’s journey of evolution, we must examine the subject in the light of experimental spiritualism (spiritism) and the metapsychic sciences.
Every trap set behind another’s back, every malicious word spoken, is in truth a shirt of fire we drape over our own soul.
According to the spiritual and spiritist point of view, everything in the universe is energy, and our thoughts are among the most powerful and concrete reflections of that energy. People generally assume that a piece of gossip leaving their mouth, or a malice they nurture within, simply mixes into the air and disappears. The situation is not at all like that. As the spiritual master Ergün Arıkdal explains very clearly in his work Kendini Bilmek (Knowing Oneself), a far more dangerous "mental pollution" began in our world even before physical environmental pollution. Arıkdal states that the beings living upon the earth have created an enormous imaginative pollution with their evil, low-level and negative energies, with thoughts full of gossip and malice. This mental pollution, like a giant mirror, finds places and people of suitable low vibration upon the earth; it activates them and ignites the fuse of negative events. In other words, when you gossip about someone, or harbour resentment and malice toward them within, you do not merely wrong that person morally; you also release a toxic, dark particle of energy into the world’s atmosphere, feeding this colossal mental rubbish heap.
The Creative Power of Thought and the Darkness We Create
To grasp the nature and mechanism of this dark energy more clearly, we must look at the creative power of thought. As expressed in the sittings conveyed in Cannon’s work Between Death and Life, thoughts are most certainly real manifestations and are energy itself. When a person produces intrigue and malice about another, this intense negative emotion forms a concrete energy form in the universe. People tend to search for a horned "Satan" or "evil spirits" roaming outside, possessing souls and making them do evil. Yet, as Cannon emphasises, in the spiritual realm there is no incarnated, concrete concept of evil; evil is merely the disharmony between two forces. By producing gossip and slander, by thinking with hatred and malice, human beings create these very satanic energies with their own hands. To evade responsibility by saying "the devil made me do it" only gives more power to these negative energy forms that the person has produced themselves.
The "Slanderer Selves" Within: The Psychological Root of Gossip
So why does the human being turn to such a destructive act as gossip and intrigue? We find the psychological and esoteric roots of this question in Psychological Commentaries on the Teaching of Gurdjieff and Ouspensky. This work speaks of the false personalities the human harbours within, that is, the "slanderer selves". The greatest pleasure and activity of these slanderer selves (the egos) is to denigrate others, to distort events and to gossip. These entities so stir the mental and emotional material of the human that the person begins to seek evil even in the most sincere and pure things. In the work, this state is associated with the "sin against the Holy Spirit" mentioned in the Gospels, which corresponds to seeing the worst aspect of everything. These slanderer "selves" suck the energy within the human like a vampire and completely block the person’s spiritual awakening, their journey of self-knowledge. Confronting this false self within us becomes possible only by truly disciplining the ego — what is meant by slaying the "self" within.
Psychic Vampirism: Who Is Stealing Your Energy?
This state of "psychic vampirism" is directly related to how those who produce malice and gossip affect the people around them. As the spiritual master Ergün Arıkdal notes in his work Pozitif Yaşam (Positive Life), people with inflated egos, disharmonious and constantly searching for the faults of others, steal all the energy around them like thieves. These people are psychic vampires who try to satisfy the dissatisfaction within themselves by speaking behind others’ backs and distorting events. When you leave their company, you feel exhausted, weary and drained of energy. For the vibrations of malice they produce have plundered your life energy and tried to pull you, too, into their own low-vibration world.
Gossip and Slander in Sufism: The Corruption of the Noblest Faculty
Sufi philosophy and Islamic mysticism approach this subject from an extremely profound perspective. In the magnificent work Tafsir al-Kabir / Ta’wilat of the great mystic Muhyiddin Ibn Arabi, it is emphasised that to spread corruption upon the earth means, in truth, to squander the eternal and luminous essence within us for the sake of the dark and transient mortal world. Ibn Arabi explains with magnificent logic why acts such as gossip, slander and hatred have far heavier consequences than simple bodily sins: within human nature there are the powers of lust, wrath (anger) and reason (the rational faculty). While errors stemming from lust or anger drag the human down to the animal level, acts such as gossip, slander, lies and malice arise from the human’s most exalted and honourable power — the faculty of "reason and speech". For this reason, the slander and intrigue that arise from the corruption of the noblest power drag the human far below a mere animal, to a "satanic" level. The soul of the jealous and envious person resents the illumination of others and, by eavesdropping, tries to steal the light of the heart and to veil it. This is why gossip and slander are among the thickest veils, sticking to the soul like tar, depriving it of Divine presence and light.
The Principle of Causality and Its Counterpart in the Spatium
The counterpart of all this in the life beyond death (in the Spatium) is far more shaking. According to the "Principle of Causality" (the Law of Cause and Effect / Karma) that the spiritual master Dr. Bedri Ruhselman explains in detail in his work Mukadderat ve İcabat (Destiny and Its Requirements), no act, no word and no thought in the universe is ever lost. The divine mechanism of governance in the universe has bound every cause to an effect and every effect to a cause. A being who darkens another’s life through gossip and intrigue, who causes them unjust suffering, must, according to the cosmic laws, personally live through the consequence of this negative energy they have created. This is not an eternal punishment, but a necessary bend in the road of evolution, so that the soul may notice the darkness it has produced and purify itself of it. At this point, recalling the balance of freedom and responsibility that shapes our destiny keeps us conscious of every energetic step we take.
The sitting records in Dr. Bedri Ruhselman’s book Ruhlar Arasında (Among the Spirits) reveal the state into which such souls fall in the spatium (the world beyond) after leaving their physical bodies. Beings who set people against one another while on earth, who fed on gossip and arrogance, who took pleasure in dominating others, after death enter a state of "confusion" (a great bewilderment, turbidity and chaos) in the spatium. Though they have no physical body, these souls are imprisoned within a dark mental prison composed of the hatred, enmity, malice and lies they created while in the world. They still look for the gullible around them who will believe them and listen to their gossip; yet, because everything is transparent in the world beyond, they cannot satisfy these desires. The torment and suffering they endure is so great that this state is the very hell they created themselves. Unable to free themselves from the illusions of malice they produced, these souls are all but suffocated by the weight of the lovelessness and arrogance within, and only when they comprehend their own errors and confront their conscience do they slowly begin to emerge from this dark state of confusion.
The Path of Purification: Love and the Consciousness of Light
In the compilation Wisdom of Silver Birch, the famous spiritual guide Silver Birch also brings clear illumination to these matters. Silver Birch states that sin is not related to dogmatic rules or to the absence of formal worship; that true sin consists of acts that harm oneself and others, devoid of compassion and love. Envy, greed, gossip and jealousy are the greatest sins that cut the human off from the divine. Saying "the greatest sin is falseness, the betrayal of a truth you know in your heart of hearts", Silver Birch emphasises that the cruelty and intrigue people needlessly inflict upon one another carry the seed of punishment within the very one who commits the act. On the unerring spiritual scale of justice of the universe, every harm given to another through gossip and malice must be brought back into balance in the spiritual reckoning.
So how will humanity protect and purify itself from this heavy energetic burden, from the poison of gossip and intrigue? The answer to this question is hidden in the consciousness of love and light. As stated in the works The Angels of Light and Darkness and There Is No Separation in Love, which contain the teachings of White Eagle, evil is always destructive and annihilating; but the Light is always constructive and creative. Every living being in the universe is filled with a sacred fire of life. When a person thinks badly of others, criticises them or gossips, they block the divine light within their own being and the flow within their chakras (energy centres). The doubts, malices and rebellions that crowd the mind are the distressing darknesses reflected in the mirror of the person’s own soul. White Eagle counsels people to see the "Light" in everything around them. For when you think of matter and of people as dark, flawed or evil, you increase the power of darkness and evil in the universe. To approach every event and every being with love and compassion, however, is the only way that instantly neutralises gossip and intrigue and weaves the web of universal brotherhood. This inner cleansing deepens only through confronting the reflection in the mirror and purifying from the self.
In conclusion: in all beliefs, religions and in spiritualist philosophy, gossip, intrigue and malice are acts that must never be taken lightly. They are not merely moral weaknesses; they are a radical drop in frequency in which the human betrays their divine origin, uses their creative power (thought) for destruction, and emits a black, poisonous aura (energy) into their surroundings. Spiritualism teaches us that every trap set behind others’ backs, every evil word spoken, is in truth a shirt of fire we drape over our own soul. The sole purpose of the human in this world is to awaken their consciousness, to hear the voice of conscience within, and to attain a universal love. And reaching this goal will be possible only by purifying our tongue and mind from intrigue and malice, and by striving to see the light of the Creator in every being.
Frequently Asked Questions
Is gossip really a "sin"?
From the spiritist and metapsychic point of view, gossip is far beyond a "sin" in the dogmatic sense. It is the human using the word and thought — their noblest power — for destruction; releasing toxic energy into the universe; and, by the Principle of Causality, being obliged to live through the consequence of that energy themselves. In other words, gossip is an energetic debt that sabotages the person’s own spiritual evolution.
How can I protect myself from the energy of gossip and slander?
The strongest protection is to raise your vibration. Not taking part in gossip, striving to see the "Light" in people and events, and approaching with love and compassion neutralise the energy of intrigue. Setting boundaries with the "psychic vampires" who drain your energy and preserving inner serenity also keep your spiritual field clean.
What should I do if I am the target of gossip?
The cosmic scale of justice is unerring: every intrigue produced unjustly carries the seed of punishment within the one who produces it. What you should do energetically is not to descend to the same low vibration by becoming defensive or by gossiping back, but to protect your own inner peace and frequency of love. Forgiveness and silence are the highest way to dissolve this dark energy without reflecting it.
References:
- Arıkdal, Ergün. Kendini Bilmek (Knowing Oneself). Istanbul: Ruh ve Madde Publications.
- Arıkdal, Ergün. Pozitif Yaşam (Positive Life). Istanbul: Ruh ve Madde Publications.
- Cannon, Dolores. Between Death and Life.
- Ibn Arabi, Muhyiddin. Tafsir al-Kabir / Ta’wilat.
- Nicoll, Maurice. Psychological Commentaries on the Teaching of Gurdjieff and Ouspensky.
- Ruhselman, Dr. Bedri. Mukadderat ve İcabat (Destiny and Its Requirements). Istanbul: Ruh ve Madde Publications.
- Ruhselman, Dr. Bedri. Ruhlar Arasında (Among the Spirits). Istanbul: Ruh ve Madde Publications.
- Silver Birch. Wisdom of Silver Birch.
- White Eagle. The Angels of Light and Darkness.
- White Eagle. There Is No Separation in Love.