A Question on Evil

OrthodoxyUSA said:

We cannot reduce God to logic.

God is ineffable.

Forgive me...

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Uh huh. That means you can make ABSOLUTE declarations about these matters and YOU are SPOT ON...but that works ONLY if we reduce God to YOUR FORM of logic, right?

That might appear to some to be wildly stupid and illogical methodology. But hey, you are welcome to bow at any form of logic you want to put forth. Doesn't mean a whit of any of it is true.

OrthodoxyUSA said:

We cannot reduce God to logic.

God is ineffable.

Forgive me...

Click to expand...

Hey brother,

God can not be ineffable since that would make Him unknowable (equivocal). God revealed Himself in special revelation for us to know Him through scripture. God also revealed Himself through general revelation so that none would have an excuse. There is actually quite a bit we know about God.

AmericanCatholic said:

If God is perfectly good and created evil, is evil good? If evil is good, then does evil even exist?

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It exists, and it is used by God to guide and influence. I'll explain.

Hentenza said:

Evil was not "created".

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Then where did it come from?

As far as I am concerned, NO EVIL GETS DONE WITHOUT GODS KNOWLEDGE. Conversly, since he has the power to stop any and all evil events, it must serve God a purpose.

For all the free will folks who claim that man clings onto evil, so therefore it's a self perpetuating disease created/used by man. I say, that's not the point.

That's like saying that because man loves to ice skate, and it's completely in his realm, then man must have created lakes, and ice.

I also present to you Job. Poor, kind, loving Job. This story is presented in an effort to show us how deeply we must love the Lord. But the underlying reason it's there is to show us the relationship between God and satan.

When it wanted to have it's way with Job he had to ask Gods permission. Through this we can plainly see the relationship between God and evil.

God didn't send someone else to take the meeting with satan, reasoning that because he can't be around unclean evil. Nope, he talked directly to the EVIL one and gave him PERMISSION to do evil.

......and there are tons of other references to this relationship. It can't be denied.

I live and hang around some pretty dangerous folks and I can see how tough love can be the only alternative at times.

I'm okay with Gods relationship with evil. I would much rather it be under his control.


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Hentenza said:

Hey brother,

God can not be ineffable since that would make Him unknowable (equivocal). God revealed Himself in special revelation for us to know Him through scripture. God also revealed Himself through general revelation so that none would have an excuse. There is actually quite a bit we know about God.

Click to expand...

What God has revealed is all we know. God is limitless and has been described by The Church Fathers as ineffable through the centuries.

Know this... God being the "CREATOR of EVIL" is not Christianity.

And yes, I know what Isaiah says.

Isa 45:7 I form the light, and create darkness: I make peace, and create evil: I the LORD do all these [things].

However, this should not be taught without the context of the Church's teachings... lest we think that evil is created.

Forgive me...

OrthodoxyUSA said:

What God has revealed is all we know. God is limitless and has been described by The Church Fathers as ineffable through the centuries.

Know this... God being the "CREATOR of EVIL" is not Christianity.

Forgive me...

Click to expand...

God is not the creator of evil. Heck, evil is not even a creation.

What we know about God is quite large. He made sure that we would. Each one of His revealed attributes define who He is. I think that what we can't do is define God in God terms because we are finite beings and He is infinite, however, we do know Him. If we didn't, then we would all be agnostics.

Hentenza said:

God is not the creator of evil. Heck, evil is not even a creation.

What we know about God is quite large. He made sure that we would. Each one of His revealed attributes define who He is. I think that what we can't do is define God in God terms because we are finite beings and He is infinite, however, we do know Him. If we didn't, then we would all be agnostics.

Click to expand...

We are in agreement here. Ineffable, in Christianity, refers to not being "ALL" knowable. Not to what we do know, but what we cannot.

Forgive me...

OrthodoxyUSA said:

What God has revealed is all we know. God is limitless and has been described by The Church Fathers as ineffable through the centuries.

Know this... God being the "CREATOR of EVIL" is not Christianity.

And yes, I know what Isaiah says.

Isa 45:7 I form the light, and create darkness: I make peace, and create evil: I the LORD do all these [things].

However, this should not be taught without the context of the Church's teachings... lest we think that evil is created.

Click to expand...

That's part of the problem. God can come right out and make a statement like that in Isaiah 45:7 and people can somehow justify that is NOT the case, when anyone who can read can say, Yeah, that IS what God Himself stated.

We sure wouldn't want anyone believing what GOD SAID about it would we? So let's just dance around that with some fanciful constructs and ELIMINATE just plain old readin'.

JusSumguy said:

It exists, and it is used by God to guide and influence. I'll explain.

Then where did it come from?

As far as I am concerned, NO EVIL GETS DONE WITHOUT GODS KNOWLEDGE. Conversly, since he has the power to stop any and all evil events, it must serve God a purpose.

For all the free will folks who claim that man clings onto evil, so therefore it's a self perpetuating disease created/used by man. I say, that's not the point.

That's like saying that because man loves to ice skate, and it's completely in his realm, then man must have created lakes, and ice.

I also present to you Job. Poor, kind, loving Job. This story is presented in an effort to show us how deeply we must love the Lord. But the underlying reason it's there is to show us the relationship between God and satan.

When it wanted to have it's way with Job he had to ask Gods permission. Through this we can plainly see the relationship between God and evil.

God didn't send someone else to take the meeting with satan, reasoning that because he can't be around unclean evil. Nope, he talked directly to the EVIL one and gave him PERMISSION to do evil.

......and there are tons of other references to this relationship. It can't be denied.

I live and hang around some pretty dangerous folks and I can see how tough love can be the only alternative at times.

I'm okay with Gods relationship with evil. I would much rather it be under his control.
-

Click to expand...

Ah, another BRILLIANT conclusion of SIMPLE LOGIC. Thank you!

The fact of many of these matters is that scripture DOES give conflicting views on MANY matters.

We know that God is not the Author of confusion...

yet we also know that God CONFUSED the language of the people at the Tower of Babel.

We know that God is not a LIAR...

yet God employed and OK'd the uses of LYING SPIRITS.

We know that God does not CAUSE adultery, yet GOD DID cause Adultery to come into the household of David.

There are explanations for all of these matters IF one reads these accounts and presses to DEAL with them. The difficulty is when certain constucts are made that DENIES the OPEN FACTS of scripture and just makes an IGNORANT declaration of some sort to justify a construct that cannot be justified.

That is why HARSH and CRITICAL reasonings MUST continue to be applied, rather than to camp on some nonsense, make a sect and never move off the spot to try to EXPLAIN these matters and throw IRRATIONALITIES at each other. That solves NOTHING but to serve further divisions.

s