Dalai Lama: In a Buddhist text called the Four Hundred Verses by Aryadeva, an Indian pandit, there is a verse which says that the Buddha sees the afflictive emotions as the faults, not the person who possesses them. It's more or less the case that there's no such thing as justified anger directed toward the person. There are no authentic grounds for being angry toward a person.
Yearley: Could one's anger toward a quality one thought had to be eliminated lead one to destroy the quality if it might involve destroying the person? For example, as I saw the concentration camp guard in Nazi Germany whose furious hatred was leading him to kill a person, I also realized he was a good father and a person who deserved to live. However I understood that the only way his hatred could be destroyed was to destroy the person.
Dalai Lama: This is justified in the following case: You recognize this evil propensity, or vice; you know it must be dispelled because of the ensuing harm that it would bring about; and – this is an extremely important point – out of great compassion arising from the wish to avert the great harm, you see that you must dispel the vice. Recognizing that there is no way to dispel that vice other than through an act of violence, then you may take the life of the person who bears that vice, without ever losing compassion for that person, and while being willing to take that act yourself.
What the above statements from the Dalai Lama mean is that when there is evil existing in the world, it is our responsibilities to confront it and resolve it with compassion.
So, if you have the opportunity to kill Adolf Hitler, it is justified to do that, out of compassion, to ensure that millions of people do not suffer due to his actions. Of course, there are consequences, from the karmic perspective, of killing someone but on the other hand, you also generate a lot of good karma and merits because of your act of removing this evil.
So, if you see evil, please do not turn the other cheek. You have to face up to it, with compassion and with equanimity for the good of your fellow human beings.
