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Post by Josh on Jul 22, 2012 21:39:56 GMT -8
The question came up today in discussion. What do you think and why?
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Post by lesbrewer on Jul 23, 2012 5:55:04 GMT -8
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Post by stevekimes on Jul 23, 2012 7:52:21 GMT -8
It depends on what you call evil.
Usually in the bible "evil" is a bad circumstance or intention toward another. An "evil" spirit is not necessarily one who is evil intrinsically, but one that does evil actions toward human beings.
If by "evil" we mean people who do actions that harm others on a regular basis, certainly. If by "evil" we mean people whose intention is to do evil without justification, I would say certainly not. It is in the human heart to be justified and right in all of our actions, even our most evil one. This is why good intentions are not enough. Every "bad guy" from Antiochus Epiphanies to Hitler had "good" reasons for what they did. We must also be committed to not harm, no matter what our intentions.
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Post by christopher on Jul 24, 2012 8:42:16 GMT -8
I don't see evil existing as a thing itself, but the corruption things that are good. It's the broken parts of creation, including the will of free agents.
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Post by Josh on Jul 25, 2012 9:13:25 GMT -8
I don't see evil existing as a thing itself, but the corruption things that are good. It's the broken parts of creation, including the will of free agents. This is akin to my view, largely influenced by C.S. Lewis (and, ultimately, I'd argue, Scripture) My answer to the question is, yes and no. No, in the sense that evil is a dependent variable. Good can exist without evil, but evil cannot exist without good. But if we just say that "evil doesn't really exist", we would be denying the very real experience of evil. Just as other dependent variables like fear or coldness are very real experiences (and therefore exist) things that don't exist on their own can still exist in another very real sense. And I think it's important to recognize and not downplay the reality of the experience of evil in the world. That's why, for instance, Scripture talks a lot about evil.
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Post by atheist jon on Jul 28, 2012 21:08:02 GMT -8
The broken parts of creation? Now that needs some explaining.
We'll leave 'the will of free agents" for another day.
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Post by christopher on Jul 28, 2012 22:41:47 GMT -8
It just means the parts that were corrupted by the fall. It's not all broke, just parts of it.
That's about all I have time for at the moment.
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Post by Destroyer on Jul 30, 2012 23:15:35 GMT -8
Does murder happen? Does rape happen? Evil DOES exist. Is anybody completely evil? I can't know. I don't know anybody well enough to judge that.
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