You will not be punished for your anger; you will be punished by your anger.

The saying frames anger not as a moral infraction that invites external retribution, but as a self-inflicted harm whose consequences unfold internally and socially. In Buddhist ethical psychology, anger (often grouped with hatred/ill-will) is a “poison” that distorts perception, drives unskillful speech and action, and perpetuates suffering for oneself and others. The point is causal rather than judicial: the mind-state of anger is itself painful, and it conditions further suffering through rumination, conflict, and karmically unwholesome habits. The line also implies a practical path: freedom comes less from fearing punishment than from understanding anger’s mechanics and cultivating patience, compassion, and mindfulness.