Can You Help But Do Evil? I Do Not See How. Do You?

[Gnostic Christian Bishop]

Can you help but do evil? I do not see how. Do you?
And if you cannot, why would God punish you?

Christians are always trying to absolve God of moral culpability in the fall by putting forward their free will argument and placing all the blame on mankind.
That usually sounds like ----God gave us free will and it was our free willed choices that caused our fall. Hence God is not blameworthy. Such statements simply avoid God's culpability as the author and creator of human nature.

Free will is only the ability to choose. It is not an explanation why anyone would want to choose "A" or "B" (bad or good action). An explanation for why Eve would even have the nature of "being vulnerable to being easily swayed by a serpent" and "desiring to eat a forbidden fruit" must lie in the nature God gave Eve in the first place. Hence God is culpable for deliberately making humans with a nature-inclined-to-fall, and "free will" means nothing as a response to this problem.

If all do evil/sin by nature then, the evil/sin nature is dominant. If not, we would have at least some who would not do evil/sin. Can we then help but do evil? I do not see how. Do you?

Having said the above for the God that I do not believe in, I am a Gnostic Christian naturalist, let me tell you that evil and sin is all human generated and in this sense, I agree with Christians, but for completely different reasons. Evil is mankind’s responsibility and not some imaginary God’s. Free will is something that can only be taken. Free will cannot be given not even by a God unless it has been forcibly withheld.

Much has been written to explain evil and sin but I see as a natural part of evolution.

Consider.
First, let us eliminate what some see as evil. Natural disasters. These are unthinking occurrences and are neither good nor evil. There is no intent to do evil even as victims are created. Without intent to do evil, no act should be called evil.
In secular courts, this is called mens rea. Latin for an evil mind or intent and without it, the court will not find someone guilty even if they know that they are the perpetrator of the act.

Evil then is only human to human when they know they are doing evil and intend harm.
As evolving creatures, all we ever do, and ever can do, is compete or cooperate.
Cooperation we would see as good as there are no victims created. Competition would be seen as evil as it creates a victim. We all are either cooperating, doing good, or competing, doing evil, at all times.

Without us doing some of both, we would likely go extinct.

This, to me, explains why there is evil in the world quite well.

Be you a believer in nature, evolution or God, you should see that what Christians see as something to blame, evil, we should see that what we have, competition, deserves a huge thanks for being available to us. Wherever it came from, God or nature, without evolution we would go extinct. We must do good and evil.

There is no conflict between nature and God on this issue. This is how things are and should be. We all must do what some will think is evil as we compete and create losers to this competition.

These links speak to theistic evolution.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XXOvYn1OAL0&list=UUDXjzOeZRqLxhYaaEhWLb_A&index=9

If theistic evolution is true, then the myth of Eden should be read as a myth and there is not really any original sin.

If the above is not convincing enough for you then show me where in this baby evil lives or is a part of it’s nature and instincts.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HBW5vdhr_PA

Can you help but do evil? I do not see how. Do you?
And if you cannot, why would God punish you?

Regards
DL

[Nihil Obstat]

wtfrak

Edited July 8, 2014 by Nihil Obstat

[chrysostom]

phishy alert

Edited July 8, 2014 by chrysostom

[Credo in Deum]

How fitting that the OP's avatar is a serpent.

[Perigrina]

So I guess this thread can go straight to Doctor Who discussion.  Does everyone realize there will be new episodes starting on Aug 23?

 

http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/p0225wyr

[Guest]

Interesting videos.

[Guest]

I disagree you can't not do evil. Alot of good people choose not to do evil everyday.

Edited July 8, 2014 by Guest

[CountrySteve21]

Should we at least try to point out the error? 

[John Ryan]

I tend to take an approach towards the concept of sin and evil that comes from St. Athanasius, Hans von Urs Balthasar and Karl Rahner. Sin is a radical corruption. It is sickness. It is not that God has to externally punish us, but our own disease destroys us. Plato gives a great parable of this in his Phaedo, where he proposes that the afterlife becomes hell because those dead cannot let go of worldly self-destructive tendencies. 

 

I also disagree that all competition is evil. I should also disagree with the modernist idea that agency is required for a thing to be considered evil. Natural evils are in fact quite evil. 

 

If theistic evolution is true, then the myth of Eden should be read as a myth and there is not really any original sin.

 

Non sequitor. 

[Anastasia13]

Catechism: 1730 God created man a rational being, conferring on him the dignity of a person who can initiate and control his own actions. "God willed that man should be 'left in the hand of his own counsel,' so that he might of his own accord seek his Creator and freely attain his full and blessed perfection by cleaving to him."²⁶

 

Man is rational and therefore like God; he is created with free will and is master over his acts.²⁷

26 GS 17; Sir 15:14.
27 St. Irenaeus, Adv. haeres. 4,4,3:PG 7/1,983.

 

If God is perfect, then He will deal justly with people.* The Old Testament presents a pattern of sin and punishment and of righteousness and goodness and reward. The afterlife aspect of this is developed further in books like Job.

 

While God did make mankind such that we could fall, that same free will is what makes us able to love. Love is the greatest opposite of sin. It helps us see more clearly. The greatest commandments are to love God and love neighbor. Let's look at a couple other verses that talk about how we are to live.

 

Micah 6:8 He has shown you, O man, what is good; and what does the Lord require of you but to do justly, to love mercy, and to walk humbly with your God?

 

How can we be the ones doing this if we are merely puppets? How can we love if we cannot care or value? Would we really be walking with him or just being dragged along?

 

James 1:27 Pure and undefiled religion before God and the Father is this: to visit orphans and widows in their trouble, and to keep oneself unspotted from the world.

 

Interesting translation there, keep oneself. Indicates a sort of ownership of the self almost, no?

 

If we have no free will, then that brings us back to why would God ask something of us if He made us so incapable of it?

 

If we are unable to love and God wants us to love and gave us a savior and a Holy Spirit to help us for his glory only, that makes Him more seeking glory for himself, no? Not the loving God that scripture presents him as, nor is He just for again punishing the incapable.

 

If God makes us so we can sin, knowing that we would be a fallen people, and then helps us to be better in our fallenness, and gives us hope for an eternal life, that is loving that he offers that to us, and gives Him a chance to reward what is good, gives Him more glory when we choose to follow Him, gives us a reasonable hope for our eternal life, and punishes not our failure to be perfect but our willful rejection of what is good.

 

Conclusion: though some of the creation story may be put mythological (and I am a theistic evolutionist-the important parts are what God and people did, not how God did everything), rejecting it as nothing but myth with no reality for the actual state of mankind and such that we have no freewill is unscriptural and belittles God without sufficient reason.

 

*Deut. 32:4 He is the Rock, His work is perfect; For all his ways are justice, A God of truth and without injustice; Righteous and upright is He.

Psalm 145:17 The Lord is righteous in all His ways, Gracious in all His works.

Scripture references are NKJV.

Edited July 8, 2014 by Light and Truth

[Anastasia13]

 

I tend to take an approach towards the concept of sin and evil that comes from St. Athanasius, Hans von Urs Balthasar and Karl Rahner. Sin is a radical corruption. It is sickness. It is not that God has to externally punish us, but our own disease destroys us. Plato gives a great parable of this in his Phaedo, where he proposes that the afterlife becomes hell because those dead cannot let go of worldly self-destructive tendencies. 

 

I also disagree that all competition is evil. I should also disagree with the modernist idea that agency is required for a thing to be considered evil. Natural evils are in fact quite evil. 

 

 

 

Non sequitor. 

 

I have reached my quota of props for the day.

[Guest]

IF and I emphasize the word IF the story of original sin and Adam and Eve were complete myth it doesn't change humanity's need for Jesus and what He did for us. I actually think it's easier to understand and makes more sense if it's myth. Then I'm not being punished for something I "didn't do". Also it takes away the suspicious thoughts I have of why God would allow Adam and Eve to be tempted by a super being in the first place and fall from a perfect state. As if Adam and Eve ever stood a chance saying no to a super being like satan. With that said I'm not throwing the Adam and Eve story out as pure fiction. I just don't think it matters much in the absolute necessity of me needing Jesus to take my place,die for my sins,and receive the wrath I deserve from a perfect and Holy God.

Edited July 9, 2014 by Guest

[Selah]

I know you. Do you post on orthodoxchristianity.net? 

 

I just saw the avatar and that made me think of the gnostic poster on there.

[John Ryan]

I have reached my quota of props for the day.

 

Merci beaucoup.

[mortify ii]

 

My magick will beat your magick