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The Problem of Evil

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yeshuaslavejeff

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So what's your solution to the actual problem of evil?
Who destroyed the works of the devil everywhere He went? Daily.

Not all of the works of the devil, no. In some towns there was so much unbelief He could only do a few raisings from the dead or healings or casting out demons or other miracles.
 
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Occams Barber

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Thanks for that. It brings cause then to find out if God has a reason to create men or not.
Perhaps He says why somewhere in His Word ?

Since I just disproved the existence of God, it follows that the Bible can't be the Word of God, since God doesn't exist.

You can now safely ignore the Bible.

Since I've now shown that the Bible can be safely ignored, I've also eliminated the concept of sin. As someone once said Jeff:

"Go and sin no more"

Problem solved. ;)
OB
 
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durangodawood

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Evil stems from death, and vice versa. We didn't inherit Adam's sin, but the death brought about by his sin.

Death makes man keenly aware of his short time on earth, what he must struggle through just to live, what may keep him safe, what will distract him from his broken condition and escape into pleasure and false security. And when we seek these things, we also risk walking on others to attain them.

The man who fears for his safety ends up building walls, then forts, then weapons, then armies, then attacks outsiders and takes their stuff as well, all in the name of security and his fear that they will attack first. He fears death, and ends up sinning in order to avoid death.

The man who knows how short and pointless his life is could fall into pleasures to distract him. Hedonism, gluttony, and the like stream from this. And to top it off, he ends up abusing other fellow humans to attain this pleasure as well. Lust, adultery, rape, porn, and other predatory actions. While the glutton hordes and takes more than he should. All in the name of escaping his wretched condition of death.

And so on and so forth. Name a vice, and you'll eventually see that it's a delusion to escape from our mortality. Paul put it another way: "Money is the root of all evil." He was making a somewhat similar point about how insuring security and mobility (via money) ends up leading to all other kinds of evils. And ultimately, it streams from death. Which we inherited from Adam.

Maybe some would consider this unorthodox. I'm not sure. A lot of denominations of Christianity (via Augustine) conceive of "original sin" as some entity or force in it's own right. But I say it's the result of death. There is an original sin of Adam, but not in the sense where he is solely responsible for all of our sins. What we inherited from him was death. Our sins are our own.

And unlike the first Adam, the second Adam represents Life. Reverse everything I just said above when talking about Christ. It's a new nature - one that builds treasure in heaven. Sometimes the old nature ("Flesh") fights against it, because we live in these bodies where death is still a reality.
Very interesting.

But why should we have inherited Adam's death if the sin was really just his and not ours too. Seems very unfair.
 
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yeshuaslavejeff

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Very interesting.

But why should we have inherited Adam's death if the sin was really just his and not ours too. Seems very unfair.
That's the PLAN.
From ON HIGH.
No one HIGHER!
He's the ONLY WAY.

Nothing about being fair required.
 
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Occams Barber

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yeshuaslavejeff

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Then what's this?

OB
Don't put your head in a thresher .

It will hurt. (or won't?).

Statements of fact.

No threat involved at all.

You want to die?

No one has to do anything at all.

We all will die. (except those still here when Jesus returns).
 
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AvisG

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If you don't agree with the Problem of Evil, here's why you should. Suppose you are God, and infinitely self-sufficient. Why would you make a world like this? You'd have to be a jerk, right? I certainly wouldn't make a world like this because, if I were infinitely self-sufficient, there's no pleasure that the world could afford me that I couldn't already supply myself. There would be no need to put anyone in harm's way. Likely I wouldn't make the world at all, if suffering is what it can potentially amount to.
Ah, yes, the old "I certainly wouldn't have made the world this way if I were God."

The minor fallacy here is that you and I aren't God. We have no idea what ultimate reality looks like or encompasses. We have no idea what the perspective of an eternal, transcendent being might be like. We don't even know what "good" or "evil" might look like from that perspective. We have no idea what greater, eternal good might be accomplished by populating a temporal creation with creatures who have genuine free will and thus as much capacity for temporal evil as for temporal good.

The attitude you express is really no different from a toddler who thinks Mommy is a big meanie for not allowing her to climb on the roof or ride her tricycle in the street. "That's not what I would do if I were Mommy." Get back to us when you are Mommy, sweetie.

Perhaps you're joking? Because if not, your grasp of the Problem of Evil appears to be thin indeed.

Philosophers and theologians have offered some plausible ideas as to why natural and human evil might be consistent with an omniscient, omnibenevolent Creator - enough that secular philosophers have largely abandoned the notion that the Problem of Evil disproves the existence of God - but ultimately the Mystery of God is the only "answer" we can have in this life.
 
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