Evil isn't like some black, gooey stuff floating around the universe that gloms onto people and causes them to do awful things. Evil is the absence of good, a privation of good, not a thing in itself. When God created the universe, he created everything good. He made a universe that was perfectly good. Everything was as it should be. After God was completely done with creating everything, something happened that reduced the good in the world. That loss of good is called evil.
That's why in Genesis 1 we read "it was good" many times. From the record we know that God didn't create evil. But something did happen in which evil-the loss of good-took place, and as a result a lot of other grotesque things came about.
The next question is, if God created everything good, why would He allow evil to infect His creation?
Satan would be the first example of an independent a source of evil. Adam and Eve would also be a source of evil with regard to the human race. They didn't get Satan's evil; they initiated their own. Satan influenced them he made his own hole in goodness but Adam and Eve made their own holes in goodness. They're responsible for their own evil.
It isn't that Satan did something bad and passed that stuff on to them, because evil is not a stuff. This is a key point in this discussion. They cannot "dip into" evil because it's not a thing to dip into. When we make a shadow, we don't do it with shadow stuff, but by blocking existing light. It is all in the ontology of it all.
In the same way, evil doesn't cause our actions. In fact, it's the other way around. Our actions are what cause evil-or the loss of goodness in us, and that loss of goodness does have an impact on future actions, giving us a predisposition to cause further evil.
God did not create Adam and Eve with bad stuff in them. What He did was to create them with a capability to rebel against Him or choose to do wrong. This is called moral free will, and it's a good thing, but it can be used for bad. It can be used to rebel against God, which digs out a hole in goodness, so to speak.
Satan and man both used their free moral agency to originate actions that fell short of the goodness of God. I'm sure God had a good reason for allowing evil. It has caused a lot of suffering, but that suffering has, in turn, also brought about a lot of good under God's direction.
When you forgive someone who's wronged you and you treat him kindly, is that a good thing? Sure it is, but you couldn't forgive him if he hadn't done something bad against you. I'm not saying that we should do evil so that the good of forgiveness could come about. I'm showing that it's not a contradiction to claim that good can come out of evil.
That's why in Genesis 1 we read "it was good" many times. From the record we know that God didn't create evil. But something did happen in which evil-the loss of good-took place, and as a result a lot of other grotesque things came about.
The next question is, if God created everything good, why would He allow evil to infect His creation?
Satan would be the first example of an independent a source of evil. Adam and Eve would also be a source of evil with regard to the human race. They didn't get Satan's evil; they initiated their own. Satan influenced them he made his own hole in goodness but Adam and Eve made their own holes in goodness. They're responsible for their own evil.
It isn't that Satan did something bad and passed that stuff on to them, because evil is not a stuff. This is a key point in this discussion. They cannot "dip into" evil because it's not a thing to dip into. When we make a shadow, we don't do it with shadow stuff, but by blocking existing light. It is all in the ontology of it all.
In the same way, evil doesn't cause our actions. In fact, it's the other way around. Our actions are what cause evil-or the loss of goodness in us, and that loss of goodness does have an impact on future actions, giving us a predisposition to cause further evil.
God did not create Adam and Eve with bad stuff in them. What He did was to create them with a capability to rebel against Him or choose to do wrong. This is called moral free will, and it's a good thing, but it can be used for bad. It can be used to rebel against God, which digs out a hole in goodness, so to speak.
Satan and man both used their free moral agency to originate actions that fell short of the goodness of God. I'm sure God had a good reason for allowing evil. It has caused a lot of suffering, but that suffering has, in turn, also brought about a lot of good under God's direction.
When you forgive someone who's wronged you and you treat him kindly, is that a good thing? Sure it is, but you couldn't forgive him if he hadn't done something bad against you. I'm not saying that we should do evil so that the good of forgiveness could come about. I'm showing that it's not a contradiction to claim that good can come out of evil.
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