GOD CREATED EVIL, Period!

What quote of mine are you referring to? Certainly it is not contained in the one to which you are replying above. I said nothing to the effect that I believe God "destines men to hell." Perhaps you are reading your perception of my theological affiliation into your replies?

[emphasis added]
Once again, I will repeat how I believe God is the first cause and not the author: God can be the efficient cause and man the instrumental or secondary cause of sinful acts without God becoming corrupted or sinful himself.

It is now in order to consider the words of Paul, "Hath not the potter power over the clay, of the same lump to make one vessel unto honor and another unto dishonor?" (Rom. ix. 21). The thought is partially revealed in Isa. xxix. 16; xlv. 9, and lxiv. 8; but in these passages the prophet seeks to disclose the guilt and extreme folly of denying God's authority as Creator. Hence Paul's illustration is generally referred to Jer. xviii. 6, "O house of Israel, can not I do with you as this potter? saith the Lord. Behold, as the clay is in the potter's hand, so are ye in my hand, O house of Israel."

Unless, we have positive knowledge to the contrary, it is fair to suppose that Paul used this illustration according to its historical meaning. As thus given by Jeremiah what is its legitimate teaching? The prophet is told to go down to the potter's house, where he saw him at work on the wheels. "And the vessel that he made of 'clay was marred in the hand of the potter; so he made it again another vessel, as seemed good to the potter to make it." Then comes the divine warning, "O house of Israel, can not I do with you as this potter? saith the Lord. Behold, as the clay is in the potter's hand, so are ye in mine hand, O house of Israel."

Now, laying aside all prejudice, let us see if we can find the prophet's meaning. Notice (1) The potter changed his mind: he started to make something but so far forth, failed. Then he made something else. (2) The reason for this change was outside of the potter: he is not represented as changing for some unrevealed, mysterious reason, but the cause for the change is emphatically affirmed, viz., the temper of the clay. (3) This changed temper necessitates the changed purpose, and this is according to the potter's will. Now I do not expect every Calvinist will concede these points, but I challenge him to prove their incorrectness. So far from affording him any ground for his doctrine the passage directly condemns his position. Two important truths are here taught; viz., (a) God's power. He can plant, pluck up, or destroy: (b) This power is used according to the temper of those with whom he has to deal: hence he says through the prophet, "If that nation against whom I pronounced, turn from their evil, I will repent of the evil that I thought to do unto them. And at what instant I shall speak concerning a nation, and concerning a kingdom, to build and to plant it. If it do evil in my sight, that it obey not my voice, then I will repent of the good wherewith I said I would benefit them." "Let it be noted that this illustration is not used here to show that God makes and moulds the free moral activities of men, even the free action of their will, according to his absolute pleasure, allowing them no more responsibility or activity than the clay has in the potter's hand. This is neither asserted nor implied here. This is not by any means the point of the comparison; but the point is, as we shall soon see, that God can speak concerning a nation to pull it down and destroy it, or to build it up, and instantly the agencies of his providence prove themselves perfectly adequate for this result ..... Note that God does not represent his power as in such a sense arbitrary and sovereign, that it has no respect to the moral state of his creatures. The very opposite of this is true. God shows that he exercises his agency so as to meet their moral state precisely, sparing the penitent and destroying the incorrigibly wicked."

As this is the true teaching of the passage it is more than probable that Paul used it in its historical application, viz., the rejection and acceptance of nations. It is conceded by eminent Calvinists that in the ninth chapter of this Epistle, Paul's primary object is to elucidate how, or for what reason, the Jews as a nation were rejected. Bloomfield says, "Strange some can not or will not see that in all this (comp. Gen. xxv. 23) there is only reference to the election of nations, not of individuals; a point on which all the fathers up to Augustine (a slight authority, owing to his ignorance of the original languages where idioms are concerned) and all the most judicious modern commentators are agreed." Dr. Charles Hodge says, "With the eighth chapter the discussion of the plan of salvation, and its immediate consequences, was brought to a close. The consideration of the calling of the Gentiles, and the rejection of the Jews, commences with the ninth, and extends to the end of the eleventh." Dr. MacKnight says, "Although some passages in this chapter which pious and learned men have understood of the election and reprobation of individuals, are in the foregoing illustration interpreted of the election of nations to be the people of God, and to enjoy the advantage of an external revelation, and of their losing these honorable distinctions, the reader must not, on that account, suppose the author rejects the doctrines of the decree and foreknowledge of God. These doctrines are taught in other passages of Scripture; see Rom. viii. 29." Alford says, "It must also be remembered that, whatever inferences, with regard to God's disposal of individuals may justly lie from the Apostle's arguments, the assertions here made by him are universally spoken with a national reference. Of the eternal salvation or rejection of any individual Jew there is here no question." Dr. Schaff in Lange says, "The doctrine of the predestination of a part of the human race to eternal perdition by no means follows from the statements of these verses, 6-13." Again, "The Apostle is not treating here at all of eternal perdition and eternal blessedness, but of a temporal preference and disregard of nations in the gradual historical development of the plan of redemption, which will finally include all (Chap. xi. 25, 32), and hence the descendants of Esau, who stand figuratively for all the Gentiles."

It is, therefore, reasonably settled that Paul used the illustration of the potter in the same sense as did Jeremiah; but this, instead of proving the Calvinist right, unmistakably condemns him; for beyond all legitimate controversy, the passage teaches that the clay "is a living free agent, the Potter is a wise, impartial divine Reason, and the being made a vessel of honor or dishonor is conditioned upon the voluntary temper and doing of the agent. Salvation and damnation depended upon a momentous pivotal if; the two alternatives of that if were, 'turn from evil' and salvation; or, 'do evil' and destruction." This must be so. Whatever reference this chapter has to eternal salvation must be interpreted according to the primary meaning of the prophet. As God deals with nations according to their temper or disposition, so does he act toward individuals in their eternal acceptance or rejection. To deny this is to affirm that a primary application is of less importance than a secondary. Dr. Howard Crosby is an acceptable minister of the Presbyterian Church. The following is his testimony concerning the meaning of this so-called Calvinistic proof-text. He says, "This text is quoted by many as showing that God arbitrarily makes some men for heaven and others for hell. The whole of God's gospel is thus set aside. He wishes all men to be saved (1. Tim. ii. 4). He does not wish any to perish (II. Pet. iii. 9). God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life. (John iii. 16). He sent his servants to preach the gospel to every creature (Mark xvi. 15). Jesus says to all, 'Come unto Me' (Matt. xi. 28). And yet some would have this one text in Rom. ix. 21 overthrow the whole tenor of the gospel, as above illustrated. Is it not wiser to imagine a false exegesis here?

"Let us see what this text means? The simile of the potter is taken from Jer. xviii. 1-10; and we must go there if we would see the apostle's meaning. In that passage the Lord says that he, as a potter, will cast away the vessel which was marred under his hands and make a new one--that is, he will set aside the Jews and establish a Gentile church. The whole argument of the apostle concern the rejection of the Jews from being the church of God, and has no reference to individual salvation. He shows that God narrowed the church seed in Isaac and in Jacob, and he can now change it again from Israel to the Gentile world; that there was no obligation to keep the line of ordinances in Abraham's seed, and that the conduct of Israel, in rejecting Christ, had made it necessary for God, after much patient endurance (ver. 22) to cast off Israel and form a new church. In the course of the argument he answers the objection that God was unrighteous, by showing (vs. 14-18) that to Moses, who was obedient, he showed mercy, and Pharaoh, who was rebellious, he hardened (by letting him harden himself). He distributes his mercy and his wrath as he will; but his will is interpreted as distinguishing between the obedient and disobedient. The potter is referred to, not as from the first ordaining a man to dishonor, but as devoting a bad man to dishonor. The figure can not be pressed. The vessels, in the making, have a power to resist the potter. The Jews resisted God's grace when he would have made them to honor, and therefore he made them to dishonor. That is all this text teaches. To read it without regarding the apostle's argument in the ninth and tenth chapters, and without regarding Jeremiah's meaning, from whom the allusion is drawn, is to wrest Scripture and make a most horrible and unscriptural doctrine--a doctrine which, logically and imperatively, makes God the author of sin."

The last class of passages to which we will turn our attention is composed of such texts as speak of the non-elect as foreordained to destruction. "Unto you therefore which believe he is precious; but unto them which be disobedient, the stone which the builders disallowed, the same is made the head of the corner, And a stone of stumbling, and a rock of offence, even to them which stumble at the word, being disobedient; whereunto also they were appointed" (1. Pet. ii. 7, 8). "For there are certain men crept in unawares, who were before of old ordained to this condemnation; ungodly men, turning the grace of our God unto lasciviousness, and denying the only Lord God, and our Lord Jesus Christ" (Jude 4).

The Arminian finds no trouble with these passages. If wicked men will not repent, will not turn to God and live, then, like Judas, they shall go to their own place. God, foreseeing this, unerringly knowing their ultimate choice has eternally rejected, and in this sense, foreordained them to destruction. Dr. Thomas W. Jenkyns' comments on the passage in Peter are admirable. "God exhibits his Son as the foundation of salvation to men. In this character 'he is disallowed of men' --they will not submit to it, but are 'disobedient' to the arrangement. As they will not comply and obey, they stumble and fall and perish, and that according to the appointed order of the provision. Are we from this to infer that they were appointed to disobey and stumble? What! that they were appointed to disallow Christ, and yet be blamed and punished for it? the passage teaches no such thing. It is an 'appointment' of the constitution of providence that whosoever will not eat food will die."

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Numbers 22:20-22
20 And God came to Balaam at night and said to him, “If the men come to call you, rise and go with them; but only the word which I speak to you—that you shall do.” 21 So Balaam rose in the morning, saddled his donkey, and went with the princes of Moab.
22Then God’s anger was aroused because he went, and the Angel of the LORD took His stand in the way as an adversary against him. And he was riding on his donkey, and his two servants were with him.

Deuteronomy 32:39
39 ‘Now see that I, even I, am He,
And there is no God besides Me;
I kill and I make alive;
I wound and I heal;
Nor is there any who can deliver from My hand.

1 Samuel 2:6-7
6 “The LORD kills and makes alive;
He brings down to the grave and brings up.
7 The LORD makes poor and makes rich;
He brings low and lifts up

Ecclesiastes 7:13-14
13 Consider the work of God;
For who can make straight what He has made crooked?

Psalm 105:25
25 He turned their heart to hate His people,
To deal craftily with His servants.

Psalm 105:24-25
And he increased his people greatly; and made them stronger than their enemies. He turned their heart to hate his people, to deal subtilly with his servants.

Romans 1:18
For the wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men, who hold the truth in unrighteousness;

Isaiah 6:9-10
9 And He said, “Go, and tell this people:
‘ Keep on hearing, but do not understand;
Keep on seeing, but do not perceive.’
10 “ Make the heart of this people dull,
And their ears heavy,
And shut their eyes;
Lest they see with their eyes,
And hear with their ears,
And understand with their heart,
And return and be healed.”

Mark 4:12
That seeing they may see, and not perceive; and hearing they may hear, and not understand; lest at any time they should be converted, and their sins should be forgiven them.

John 3:18-21
He that believeth on him is not condemned: but he that believeth not is condemned already, because he hath not believed in the name of the only begotten Son of God. And this is the condemnation, that light is come into the world, and men loved darkness rather than light, because their deeds were evil. For every one that doeth evil hateth the light, neither cometh to the light, lest his deeds should be reproved. But he that doeth truth cometh to the light, that his deeds may be made manifest, that they are wrought in God.

Isaiah 19:14
14 The LORD has mingled a perverse spirit in her midst;
And they have caused Egypt to err in all her work,
As a drunken man staggers in his vomit.

Isaiah 66:4
4 So will I choose their delusions,
And bring their fears on them;
Because, when I called, no one answered,
When I spoke they did not hear;
But they did evil before My eyes,
And chose that in which I do not delight.

2 Thessalonians 2:9-11
9 The coming of the lawless one is according to the working of Satan, with all power, signs, and lying wonders, 10 and with all unrighteous deception among those who perish, because they did not receive the love of the truth, that they might be saved. 11 And for this reason God will send them strong delusion, that they should believe the lie, 12 that they all may be condemned who did not believe the truth but had pleasure in unrighteousness.

First of all, although you will probably say something to the effect that you just posting verses in reply is because they are self-evident, you should really explain how they fit into your argument and the way you are reading them.

This is the root of misunderstanding. Evil is a created thing. It has nothing whatsoever to do with Gods character or person. It was created for His purpose which we can't understand but yet we try and place our finite understanding upon a infinite scope which is beyond our comprehension.

God is by no means evil because of what He created for a purpose. If you understand that, then this thread need not continue further. If not, we will pray the father for understanding and leave the reaping to Him.

hismessenger

If God didn't create it then how did it get in the garden in the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. It is a created thing, not the person of God, just as we are a created thing, also not the person of God but both being sustained by who else in this creation? Nobody but God.

hismessenger