First Evil

[Mark Quayle]

That is why satan means adversary. Personal will over the will of
God. We are all satans.

Interesting way to think.

 

[Ligurian]

Maybe... if corporate entities are wearing sheep-skins.

They even wear them when they step in front of the mirror.

A Mr. Hyde pretending to be Dr. Jekyl? How can they not know what they are underneath the mask? Wait. Who told them they were sheep?

 

[Mark Quayle]

A Mr. Hyde pretending to be Dr. Jekyl? How can they not know what they are underneath the mask? Wait. Who told them they were sheep?

It's their self-justification.

 

[FutureAndAHope]

When was the first evil act/thought and when was it committed. I'm guessing it was before the fall of man... was it also before the creation of the heavens and the earth? Or somewhere in between?

How? When? By whom?

Thank you.

The bible does not tell us what happened before the creation of Earth, but there has always been the existence of God. There have also been other creations, or existences prior to Earth being made. The devil is one such example, Jesus said that he was a murderer from the beginning.

John 8:44 You are of your father the devil, and the desires of your father you want to do. He was a murderer from the beginning, and does not stand in the truth, because there is no truth in him. When he speaks a lie, he speaks from his own resources, for he is a liar and the father of it.

 

[Ligurian]

Maybe... if corporate entities are wearing sheep-skins.

Many may not even realize their wolf nature, seeing themselves as being benevolent even if they are anti-Christ in nature. They are completely of the world with no inkling of God. The Adversary mimics what God has done and that will include coming across as some sort of messiah, but of the world rather than the Kingdom. We see it in action now on a global basis with a so called think tank of the world's 'greatest' in their own minds calling the shots. (WEF)

BTW when I said controlling governments I didn't mean as politicians.

Absolutely.

But benevolence done by wolves must actually only benefit other wolves. The targeted-benevolence itself is the key. If it's welcoming illegal aliens, then who will the aliens vote for? If it's feeding the poor, then to whom will the poor cleave?

Liberation theology is done by turning a previously-subjugated or uncivilized people loose on the world. Like opening the prison doors for people who've been turned into less-human people by the conditions artificially-created within the prison. Prison... does it really reform anyone? If career-criminals are put in charge of the package-delivery system and therefore run the black-market in the prison... what are the people like who are becoming subjugated by them? The timid don't really survive, but monsters can be created.

What are the women like, who've been beaten by a stick as large as their husband's thumb? Or today, told that their work isn't as $-valuable as that of a man? When a woman wants equality from a man, she's called a female liberationist... as though equality between men and women is a crime. So what does she do when she's liberated? She becomes obnoxious in her freedom... no doubt led to these conclusive-actions by the very people who've freed her from one prison... and then chained her higher-up on the walls of another prison. She's on her tiptoes now, and she can barely breathe.


First Evil: Power.

 

[timothyu]

Interesting way to think.

It is what the fall of man and the rebirth is all about.

 

[Maria Billingsley]

Interesting way to think.

I agree sort of, I don't think Satan has a choice to repent, but we do,

 

[Maria Billingsley]

So, the servant was in opposition to God, no? Not that he was successful in opposing what God had planned all along, but....

Not so sure. God made him " cunning" He did not make Adam and Eve cunning. The adversary has a purpose, to test humanity, within Gods will.
" Now the serpent was more cunning than any beast of the field which the Lord God had made."

 

[timothyu]

I don't think Satan has a choice to repent, but we do,

You may wish to think of satan as an entity rather than simply as opposing the will of God. Peter wasn't called Satan but a satan, a description of his adversarial thinking to the will of God.

 

[Maria Billingsley]

You may wish to think of satan as an entity rather than simply as opposing the will of God. Peter wasn't called Satin but a satin, a description of his adversarial thinking to the will of God.

Actually, he does Gods will, he is the tester. He needed God's permission to test Job.

 

[timothyu]

Actually, he does Gods will, he is the tester.

Exactly, know as the Tempter

 

[TedT]

Not so sure. God made him " cunning" He did not make Adam and Eve cunning.

I must disagree. No one can be made, formed or created as evil (cunning in evil) by GOD but only by a free will decision to repudiate YHWH's divinity or to rebel against one of HIS commands.

Light cannot create darkness.
A good tree cannot put forth rotten fruit.
A stream of life giving water cannot put forth salt or brackish water.
Psalm 5:4 You are not a God who takes pleasure in evil; with you the wicked cannot dwell. As one who utterly detests all evil, YHWH would never create HIS Bride as disgustingly evil in her righteousness even with a plan to save her.

So, Adam could not have been created sinful...but there he was, looking to the animals for a helper to fix the NOT GOOD (a kind of opposite to the later very good) in HIS creation when GOD had Eve waiting for HIM.

 

[Chriliman]

Possibilities do not indicate existence.

If the possibility of evil (opposition to all GODliness) had a real existence within GOD's mind then YHWH is a house divided and so cannot last: Mark 3:25 If a house is divided against itself, it cannot stand. The idea of the eternal existence of evil as an existent evil outside of YHWH is a Gnostic belief shared by Zoroastrianism, et al.

If knowledge of something necessitates that it exist then Gods knowledge of evil had to eternally exist, which means it was at least always in his mind, but also maybe outside himself, in the form of not God.

If you don’t agree then you have to say Gods knowledge of evil is not eternal, which either means it came into existence without God knowing or he learned that evil is eternal.

What do you think I’m missing here?

 

[Mark Quayle]

If knowledge of something necessitates that it exist then Gods knowledge of evil had to eternally exist, which means it was at least always in his mind, but also maybe outside himself, in the form of not God.

There is cold hard logic, and there is presumptive logic. Ours, at best, is unavoidably a little of both. We don't even know what "exists" means, except as we conceive of it. And so we throw our logic at it.

If you don’t agree then you have to say Gods knowledge of evil is not eternal, which either means it came into existence without God knowing or he learned that evil is eternal.

God, as first cause, is not affected by principles from outside himself, or he is not God. God does not learn —he is the very source of fact and reality.

What do you think I’m missing here?

Maybe evil does not even exist. None of us knows what existence is —we only know what we think we mean by it.

We're not going to find all our answers to this, in this life. We hardly even know how to ask valid questions.

 

[Chriliman]

There is cold hard logic, and there is presumptive logic. Ours, at best, is unavoidably a little of both. We don't even know what "exists" means, except as we conceive of it. And so we throw our logic at it.



God, as first cause, is not affected by principles from outside himself, or he is not God. God does not learn —he is the very source of fact and reality.



Maybe evil does not even exist. None of us knows what existence is —we only know what we think we mean by it.

We're not going to find all our answers to this, in this life. We hardly even know how to ask valid questions.

While I don’t think it’s consistent with Christian Biblical teaching—the idea that our perception of evil is really a lack of understanding/knowledge of what God is doing, is somewhat interesting to me.

 

[Mark Quayle]

While I don’t think it’s consistent with Christian Biblical teaching—the idea that our perception of evil is really a lack of understanding/knowledge of what God is doing, is somewhat interesting to me.

Or, at least, that our lack of knowledge of what evil is, is due to our faulty understanding of God and what God is doing? I don't mean to be playing with words, there. But Evil being the privation of Good, it is not understood until Good is understood. And, maybe that is all you were saying. Anyhow, I don't see how that is inconsistent with Christian Biblical teaching.

 

[timothyu]

But Evil being the privation of Good, it is not understood until Good is understood.

Which is why we must reverse what Eve and Adam did. We must see what we call good is actually evil. We must understand how our 'self' oriented nature produces all sin simply because we take rather than give. God's will and His second commandment was to do the opposite.

 

[Mark Quayle]

Which is why we must reverse what Eve and Adam did. We must see what we call good is actually evil. We must understand how our 'self' oriented nature produces all sin simply because we take rather than give. God's will and His second commandment was to do the opposite.

Where do you find your narrative in Scripture?

 

[Maria Billingsley]

I must disagree. No one can be made, formed or created as evil (cunning in evil) by GOD but only by a free will decision to repudiate YHWH's divinity or to rebel against one of HIS commands.

Light cannot create darkness.
A good tree cannot put forth rotten fruit.
A stream of life giving water cannot put forth salt or brackish water.
Psalm 5:4 You are not a God who takes pleasure in evil; with you the wicked cannot dwell. As one who utterly detests all evil, YHWH would never create HIS Bride as disgustingly evil in her righteousness even with a plan to save her.

So, Adam could not have been created sinful...but there he was, looking to the animals for a helper to fix the NOT GOOD (a kind of opposite to the later very good) in HIS creation when GOD had Eve waiting for HIM.

He made them innocent vs cunning.

 

[eleos1954]

When was the first evil act/thought and when was it committed. I'm guessing it was before the fall of man... was it also before the creation of the heavens and the earth? Or somewhere in between?

How? When? By whom?

Thank you.

The first sin was committed in heaven by lucifer/satan before creation.

Ezekiel 28:12-19
King James Version

12 Son of man, take up a lamentation upon the king of Tyrus, and say unto him, Thus saith the Lord God; Thou sealest up the sum, full of wisdom, and perfect in beauty.

13 Thou hast been in Eden the garden of God; every precious stone was thy covering, the sardius, topaz, and the diamond, the beryl, the onyx, and the jasper, the sapphire, the emerald, and the carbuncle, and gold: the workmanship of thy tabrets and of thy pipes was prepared in thee in the day that thou wast created.

14 Thou art the anointed cherub that covereth; and I have set thee so: thou wast upon the holy mountain of God; thou hast walked up and down in the midst of the stones of fire.

15 Thou wast perfect in thy ways from the day that thou wast created, till iniquity was found in thee.

16 By the multitude of thy merchandise they have filled the midst of thee with violence, and thou hast sinned: therefore I will cast thee as profane out of the mountain of God: and I will destroy thee, O covering cherub, from the midst of the stones of fire.

17 Thine heart was lifted up because of thy beauty, thou hast corrupted thy wisdom by reason of thy brightness: I will cast thee to the ground, I will lay thee before kings, that they may behold thee.

18 Thou hast defiled thy sanctuaries by the multitude of thine iniquities, by the iniquity of thy traffick; therefore will I bring forth a fire from the midst of thee, it shall devour thee, and I will bring thee to ashes upon the earth in the sight of all them that behold thee.

19 All they that know thee among the people shall be astonished at thee: thou shalt be a terror, and never shalt thou be any more.