What an enemy can do to an enemy, or what a hater can do to a hater, a wrongly directed mind can do even more harm.

Diso disaṃ — a thief to a thief, an enemy to their enemy: these hostile relationships generate considerable harm. But the verse affirms that the wrongly directed mind can do even more harm (pāpiyo) than any external enemy.

Micchāpaṇihitaṃ — wrongly directed, wrongly oriented: paṇihita is orientation, direction. A mind oriented toward deception, resentment, greed, illusion, works against the being that harbors it more effectively than any external enemy, because it has inner access, continuous access, access without rest.

The external enemy can only harm the body, reputation, possessions. The wrongly directed mind can poison the very experience of living, destroy peace from within, build an inner hell that no external circumstance can alleviate.

This teaching does not invite contemplative narcissism — worrying only about one’s own mind and not about the world. It invites recognizing that inner work is the most urgent work, because the quality of the mind determines the quality of all action in the world.