Originally Posted by The Author
Actually no. Religion comes from re-ligo. It has nothing to do with the word reg-; it's re- + lig-.~
Yes
No
Not sure
Actually no. Religion comes from re-ligo. It has nothing to do with the word reg-; it's re- + lig-.~
Where did you hear that from???Children have no sin! At all! (According to the christ ...
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Ah, here's the answer to my question. Catholic doctrine does teach so ...
Last edited by librarius_qui; 11-06-2008 at 09:20 PM. Reason: adding ... | correcting
theodicy again... lol... I think this has come up quite a few times in this section..
you should read St Augustine's "Confessions".. he has an interesting solution to the problem of evil.. and I really don't feel like typing it out here.. but it suggests evil is just the absence of good, or something that has less good in it then something else.. there is no separate entity or thing called evil... Augustine goes a lot deeper than this, it is quite interesting.. but just look up the theodicy question, you will find an infinite number of solutions to the problem and numerous people tearing each solution down after.. lol..
A wonderful, intelligent post! I agree with you on many points, although we don't view it all exactly the same. You said for many it comes down to saying "it's a matter of faith." It's similar with me, but I can understand a vast amount of the world around me, or my own place in it. There are unknowable things, but there's many things I can be sure about. I know that I am a limited being with limited knowledge and experience. I know that beyond my walls, what I call myself, is the other, the world; the vast world, and all it contains. I am fairly sure, although I also can't give you a proof of it, that all is interconnected. I have knowledge about myself, my experiences, memories, my place in the material world or what not; and yet since I am nothing more than a form; more or less complex, there is no need for me to actually exist. And since I am a form, I am actually eternal; occurring here and in countless other instances; infinite.
Buddhists also say that all are interconnected. The idea in Buddhism is that if you are afflicted mentally, then you will create worlds of affliction out of attachment. If you come to true or correct vision, the fabricated worlds and bonds will dissipate of themselves. There is no question of atheism, the only question is if it's an impersonal or a personal universe- which idea can be set aside, while we work about curing our afflictions.
I also agree that we should not personalize Evil. It only breeds paranoia.
Last edited by NikolaiI; 11-06-2008 at 11:43 PM.
No .. God didn't creat Evil.. its impossible.
Evil is just the absence of Good.
God created everything that is good .. everything that benefits the human
and we chose the evilness.. just because some people chose it.
If anyone claims that God created evil that means that God wants it ; which is not true.
"He is asleep. Though his mettle was sorely tried,
He lived, and when he lost his angel, died.
It happened calmly, on its own,
The way the night comes when day is done."
Bism Allah the Merciant the Merciful
I believe in Allah the One and Only, He has no partners, He is the Owner and Possessor of the Whole whole cosmos.
Allah created Life and death to test which of us is the best of doers. This sentence is a verse from the Muslim Holy Scripture The Quran.
Life and death are the most two extremes in the Universe and hence any other opposites are also the creation of Allah.
One other Muslim belief and a saying of Allah but not in the Quran, but in the reported speech carried by his messenger sin and evil are not the same. Someone good can commmit a sin due the imperfection of human beings and Allah said, if mankind did not sin, he would have took them away and created others that would sin, to come back to him, when they recognize him.
Evil, is represented through satan, and Allah created Satan. It is true that he was not evil from the beginning but he commited a sin that led to evil, which is pride. It was when he refused to submit to his creator, that he became evil.
Lots of actions of sin not followed by repenting lead to evil.
Goodness is the rule, and is mentioned around 214 times in the Quran while while evil is mentioned 30 times only. Allah Himself is gooness and who does an atom weight of good finds it, while who does an atom weight of evil finds it. Repenting turns evil to good again.
I want to add somehting THe presence of Allah is evident all around
Wherever you look, there you will He find
Use your heart’s eye and don’t be blind
Know Him to love Him and not to suspect Him with your mind
With choice he honoured you and called you man-kind
If you don’t find him in everything, know you are a way behind
I really wish this is of benefit. Allah deserves to be loved, because he loves us so much.
Oh, not at all!, thank you!
However I'd read Augustinus in Latin. Possibly will, after I read T. Liuius (usually called Livy
I shouldn't actually be writing in this forum on religion! Blaarg!
librarius
hi guys ..
well.. i was rethinking about what i said ..
and i would like to correct my answer..
YES .. GGod created Evil.. just like how He created everything in this earth..
He created Evil, hell, Devil.. but there is one line i have to add which is :
that " There is a wise reason behind all this.. "
and that is to test us to see what we chose and how we react to it..
I am sure am right :-)
"He is asleep. Though his mettle was sorely tried,
He lived, and when he lost his angel, died.
It happened calmly, on its own,
The way the night comes when day is done."
What God creates, reflects His character. God's character - as the Bible describes it - is good; He is described as perfect justice, mercy, love, compassion, judgment, etc. God desires to give and receive love - but love can only exist where the choice between two plausible alternatives exist. If I have no choice but to love, then we cannot correctly call that "love." Love must the result of a choice. As such, the Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil is a testament to God's love for us: He desired that we love Him, but for that to be so, we had to have a viable alternative to choose to not love Him back - and that required that God provide the choice (here in the form of the tree).
Unfortunately, the free will required for love also carries inside it the risk of not choosing God - which is disasterous; if God is Life (He is), then choosing to refuse His love is choosing Death. Evil came from the choice to disobey. Many theologians point out that God left creation unfinished and invited humanity (via their creative and procreative abilities) to continue the job. We, unfortunately, created something terrible.
"I believe in Christianity as I believe that the sun has risen, not only because I see it, but because by it I see everything else." - C.S. Lewis
This time hoope..You ar really right..at least to me..100%
This exactly what I beileve too
Love is an un tamed force. When we try to control it, it desrtoys us. When we try to imprison it, it enslaves us. When we try to understand it, it leaves us feeling lost and confused
This time hoope..You ar really right..at least to me..100%
This exactly what I beileve too
for that to be right requires a huge amount of faith in something that there is not one shred of evidence for..
why, if god is omniscient, omnipotent, and all good would he create a world that is not all good? because, even if we are created ex nihilo, we are still made by god, and through god, so if god does not have evil as a inherent part of it, well than how did evil come to be? god created it, so the idea of evil was there inside this infinitely good god?? that doesn't make sense...
the only answers are: that evil doesn't actually exist as a separate entity (therefore evil is just an absence of good to varying degrees), or that god is not all good, or that we just can't understand god (which admits that god is part evil in human defined terms, but that this is irrelevant as we don't know what is good, because we can't know the mind of god)... but neither of these will satisfy organized religion lol... so herein lies the problem..
also there is the problem that if any theodicy actually works.. well this is pulled off wikipedia as I don't feel like using energy to explain this...
this illustrates the problem with the below argument, which is part of the free will argument for evil by Augustine and others... so if this true than all evil acts are justified in my opinion and work towards the greater good, which was allowing man free will..An argument that has been raised against theodicies is that, if a theodicy were true, it would completely nullify morality. If a theodicy were true, then all evil events, including human actions, can be somehow rationalized as permitted or affected by God, and therefore there can no longer be such a thing as "evil" values, even for a murderer (indeed, this is the basis of the moral argument from evil, by Dean Stretton).
Volker Dittman argues that "the crucial point is, that when we accept the perfect solution for the POE, than there will be no evil, because every suffering could be justified. Worse: It would be impossible to act evil. I could torture and murder a young child, but this would be justified for a higher good (whatever the perfect solution is, it could be something else than free will). This would be the end of all moral, which clearly is absurd. The theist could not point to the ten commandments and claim that they are necessary, because one goal of morals – to prevent evil – would be granted no matter how I behave, if he is right with his perfect solution to the POE
for as is suggestedEvil, we can say exits only in good things. The reality of evil is not that of what is; it is that of what is not (negation), or rather more exactly, of what is not when it ought to be (privation). Evil is not a being; it is a hole in being, a lack
the idea that a perfect and infinitely good and omniscient and omnipotent god punishes for evil acts that this god choses to allow to happen, chose to create creatures that this god knew would chose to perform these acts, as god is omniscient (so arguing otherwise is absurd lol), well that suggests god is evil in another way, creating humans so that they can be damned and punished for actions that this god knew would occur... if god is testing us, well that suggests this infinite god is quite insecure, which should not be possible.. why does god who is perfect in every way need praise bestowed, need to test what he/she/it created? why does god damn people to hell for following a nature that god created them with? this gets into the free will argument as well, for god necessarily knows our actions before we do, or maybe at the same time as we do.. see if god is omniscient which every monotheistic religion suggests, well he knows everything and can forsee our choices and actions, but this eliminates free will, or does it? one argument for free will with an omniscient god, is that just because god knows what we will chose to do, we still chose it... god didn't force us.. another suggests that because god is outside of time, everything for god is one singular moment, with no spatial and temporal definitions, therefore god being Omniscient doesn't mean anything with regard to free will in a finite and temporal world... but regardless, for evil to exist even as just a lack of good, it requires god to permit it for the greater good, and therefore it invalidates all morals in my opinion... and if any action contributes to some greater plan, to the greater good, why is it punished?Permitting evil, as He does, within a design (creation) that is essentially good, exerting his causality only in what is positive in this design, God applies himself, when evil occurs, to preserve and enhance the value of the good that still remains.
St. Augustine in dealing with the question of evil and free will pointed out that “God judged it better to bring good out of evil than to suffer no evil to exist” (St. Aug., Enchirid., xxvii). Evil contributes to the perfection of the universe, as shadows to the perfection of a picture, or harmony to that of music (De Civ. Dei,xi). As darkness is nothing but the absence of light, and is not produced by creation, so evil is merely the defect of goodness. (St. Aug., In Gen. as lit.) Further St. Augustine, holding evil to be permitted for the punishment of the wicked and the trial of the good, shows that it has, under this aspect, the nature of good, and is pleasing to God, not because of what it is, but because of where it is; i.e. as the penal and just consequence of sin (De Civ. Dei, XI, xii, De Vera Relig. xliv).
In other words as Augustine seems to imply the question of evil can clearly be seen as another sign of God’s omnipotence as it shows that He is capable of allowing evil while Himself remaining independent from it; and in His infinite wisdom foreseeing the greater good which is to result from it.
anyways, check out the wikipedia link Theodicy if you want to study the theodicy question it is a good place to start from, you can branch out to more reliable sources from there, although the wikipedia article is pretty good.. There are too many just personal opinions flying around here without any relevance to the actual issue... if you have an answer to the problem of evil, please explain how it works, lol... because no one has come with a universally satisfactory answer in the history of humanity, so if you can I would be very interested in reading it... and even if it isn't satisfactory I would be interested anyways as the question is quite fascinating to ponder... I studied the theodicy question in a few different classes in university, even ended up participating in a directed study on it for fun after I left school..
Last edited by islandclimber; 11-07-2008 at 04:34 PM.
Is there really a DEVIL?
What did your CHILDHOOD look like?
Can you remember the earliest Days in your Surroundings
Did you play with your Schoolmates? Or maybe you was alone.
My Childhood Was a Big Fairy Tale-Rich of Play,Imagination,Full of Laughters
I Wasn't Born like a Child Bringing HATE in myself.
Unfortunately the Hate that Somebody was born with Finally define our FATE
The Secret Question and the Answer give us a HORRIBLE TRUTH-There is
NO HELP
Everybody Draws the SIGN belongs to.
One Question came out :Can we really to Recognize EVIL?
Maybe EVIL is present too much all around.
Maybe,since Relationship with DEVIL is Hidden, it make we feel Confused, and
again a terrible TRUTH EVIL possess ATTRACTION.
I think no SALVATION for Nobody-the little Particles ,emitted by our Bodies ,
works without our Control.
This is my Abstract written a couple months ago and reflect some my thoughts
about Evil.
If we look for answer in physics ,there are particles bear positive and negative energy.Spirit contain energy as well and since a Life organism radiate more powerful energy it is possible to create Evil.
Thank you
hello there zep
nice post. i notice you use some logic to make your point, and a good job of it i must admit. yet, your reasoning is based on a proposition that i find impossible to say whether its true or false, ie...god's character is good bc the bible tells me so. shouldn't profound issues such as good vs evil and god's character have their foundations based in the present day god/good/evil rather than 2000 year old references to said issues? i'm assuming its the same god today as it was back in bible times. so why not bring forth some syllogisms with logic rooted in the present day?
Allah (God as you call Him) created everything. He made it clear when he explained in the Holy Qur'an that everyone is responsible for what they do. So He gave us the clues to differentiate between what is right and what is wrong. Consequently, we are free to be good and to be evil. It's something we control.
Our souls might be separated though your smell still there ..
Since you'd gone everything turned dark for me ..
Did you remember my words I said downstairs ..
Now everything has come to an end .. But your memory still lives as long as your magical eyes can bear!
Syoof.[/SIZE][/COLOR]
Or maybe He just forgot to put the fence up. Or maybe the concept of 'attractive nuisance' is part of the evil that's been introduced to the world.
You know this, and I know this, but what we know ain't always so.
Agreed. The act, the transgression, was evil and it's reasonable to say that 'The tree of knowledge of good and evil' might not be literal in its meaning. But much has been made of the 'days' in Geneis, with different experts asserting that they were 'ages' or twenty-four hour days marked by evening and morning. We can't rule out that the writer was saying that evil was indeed a property of the fruit.
Wonderful story about the altar, but I've developed a problem with exegesis. There is no sure way to know when the 'drawing out' has gone too far. Parables and scripture have useful meaning within certain limits, outside of which the meaning is at the mercy of the interpreter.
Forgiveness is not required, I do pick and choose.
Schools of thought, like parables and scripture, have their limits. Some scripture is gold, and some is not. I think scripture should assume its rightful place, alongside the concept of four elements, as a milestone in our search to understand ourselves and the universe. We need to move on, but not via extension.
You speak of sin in you. I call it adaptability. Jesus went to the slaughter, but also cleared the temple.
Last edited by El Viejo; 11-08-2008 at 02:31 AM.
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