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christian beliefs about good and evil
christian beliefs about good and evil
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The Power of Good and the Power of Evil According to Christian Belief
Most Christians believe that the devil, or Satan, is the power of evil
and that God is the power of good. Satan is an ancient Middle Eastern
word meaning "an accuser". Satan appears at various times through the
Bible as the opposite to God. Satan, in the form of a snake, tempts
Adam and Eve to eat the apple and so disobey God. Satan also tests Job
and even tempts Jesus to abandon his ministry (but is unsuccessful).
Many Christians say the devil is a real being, who has the power to
corrupt us into doing evil. Some of these people's lives revolve
around "resisting Satan". They ban the music of rock groups whose
lyrics supposedly include satanic ideas. They hold exorcisms to rid
people of satanic influence.
In the Middle Ages the Church developed an obsession with Satan.
Satan, or the Devil, was seen as an ugly man dressed in red, who lived
in the fires of a place called Hell. Life was pictured as a cosmic
struggle between God and Satan, or Good and Evil, in which humans were
little more than pawns.
Most Christians believe that Satan was once one of God's high angels
until he became greedy and wanted to become more powerful than God.
God then threw Lucifer (Satan) out of heaven and into Hell, "And he
said to them, "I saw Satan fall like lightning from Heaven" (Luke
10:18). Some Christians take this to have literal meaning, but others
say Satan is just a made-up person to symbolise evil.
Some Christians say that Evil does not exist, it is merely an absence
of good. St Augustine first suggested this view in the fourth century.
He said that all things were created good, but because of free will it
was possible for things to grow away from good and become evil.
However, he added, that what appears evil may be good in the context
of eternity.
There was a great deal of talk about evil in the weeks following the
Macbeth is a play, written by Shakespeare, about a soldier who is overtaken by ambition. The soldier, Macbeth, starts out as a loyal soldier who fights for Scotland. As the play progresses, Macbeth becomes more and more evil, killing whoever is a threat to him. Evil overtakes good for Macbeth.
During the peaceful time in the garden God gives Adam and Eve a specific rule. God allows Adam and Eve to eat off any tree except nothing from the tree of good and evil. God explains that death would be the result of eating off this tree. This part of the story relates to the heroes journey’s step of the call to adventure or the problem. Now the decision of obeying or rebelling became upon them. Eve begins to wonder around in the garden, she discovers the tree of good and evil. She notices something different, Satan, in the form of a serpent. Satan tries to entice and persuade her to eat fruit from the tree. Satan begins to ask her, ‘Has God indeed said, “You shall not eat of every tree in the garden’? (Genesis 3:1).” She feels hesitant at first, not wanting to sin against God, but Satan begins to persuade her with all the right words. Eve feels reluctant and does not know what to do. Satan encourages Eve in a negative way to disobey God. As
The Book of Job is a book about a wealthy man Job who lived in a land called Uz with his large family and extensive flocks. He was “blameless” and “upright,” and was always careful to avoid doing evil. One day, Satan (“the Adversary”) ap...
...en by Mitchell. The words he chose to describe evil in his story, to describe two beings, are very similar and one could conclude that the two are the same being. The only problem with this assumption are the visual associations that already exist in people’s minds. It seems impossible that an angel, something noted for its winged physique and angelic appearance, or a fallen angel, namely Satan, who is characterized as a red demon, could be the same as the Serpent, which is described as a sea monster. Although modern conceptions of the devil have changed, and the devil has become more monster like, it can still be hard to imagine the devil, who was an angel, to look like a sea monster. Once visual connotations are put aside, it is possible to interchange the two characters.
The ancient philosopher Plotinus once said,“those inquiring whence Evil enters into beings, or rather into a certain order of beings, would be making the best beginning if they established, first of all, what precisely Evil is…” (Enneads, I, 8, 1). What does it mean to be incomprehensible? Is it to simply not understand it, or is it to not comprehend its magnitude? This is a problem that is rarely prevalent in our lives, most of the time everyday things are comprehensible; but, what if there is something in our lives that we hear casually thrown around and said in an everyday conversation. This word is “evil”. A word someone hears to describe a certain character from a book, movie, or videogame. “That Darth Vader is such an evil character!
“The third rope was still moving; being so light, the child was still alive… For more than half an hour he stayed there, struggling between life and death, dying in slow agony under our eyes… Behind me, I heard the same man asking; ‘Where is God now?’ And I heard a voice within me answer him: ‘Where is He? Here He is-He is hanging here on this gallows.’” (Wiesel, 1982) What possible good could have come out of this child being executed? He committed no recognizable crime. How could an all powerful, all knowing, perfectly good God allow such a thing to happen? Philosophers and theologians have struggled with this question for centuries. It is known as the problem of evil, as the existence of evil and the classical theistic concept of God appear to be logical incompatibilities. Many philosophers have devised theodicies or justifications of evil; however; J. L. Mackie proposed that the only plausible explanation is not that evil is justifiable but rather that the problem lies in the traditional concept of God.
Evil exists in all human beings, even children. This is proven in William Golding's novel Lord of the Flies in which a group of youthful, inncocent boys are stranded without any contact with the outside world. The boys are not in the civil surrondings that they are used to, but their instincts kick in and their ultimate goal is to survive, together. The first sense of security is when all of the boys find eachother. They are given hope. Hope that is immediately lost when the division between the two born leaders, Jack and Ralph, begins. Their innocence is lost due to the lack of proper authority and consequence. They are no longer just juvenile boys under someone else's care, but survivors fighting to stay alive.
Evil is a metaphysical term used to describe the thoughts and actions of humans that are seen as morally wrong or ‘bad’. In extreme cases even a person can be labelled as overall evil, such as Adolf Hitler and Jeffrey Dahmer. Previously, it has been thought that a person has the ability to choose between being ‘good’ or ‘evil’ and that they simply make this decision based upon what pleases them. Recently, however, neuroscientists have shed some light upon the physical explanations of human thought and action. In this essay I argue that evil does not exist, and that actions and thoughts previously termed ‘evil’ are in fact malfunctions of the human brain.
People have constantly attempted to understand what evil truly is, and, if possible, how to eliminate this evil from their lives. However, first it must be known what it is that is being eliminated. Different people, cultures, and eras have all had a different view of what evil is, and how it affects their lives, and there is no true answer. Because of this, discussing the idea of whether people are born or can be evil is meaningless. The idea of what evil is, and whether people can be evil, is relative and cannot be applied to human nature in a universal way.
As the book opens, Job is God's "pride and joy", so to speak. Job was free of sin, he "feared God and shunned evil"(1:1). God apparently thinks higher of Job than any other mortal. This is evidenced when he tells Satan that "There is no one on Earth like him; he is blameless and upright . . ."(1:8). When Satan questions Job's faith God allows him to test Job, as if to show off his favorite servant. This is an almost human quality in God--pride. Satan's test involves the total destruction of everything Job owns and lived for: his children his animals, and his estate. Everything was destroyed but his wife, and of course the Four Messengers of Misfortune. "In all this, Job did not sin by charging God with wrongdoing"(1:22).
Satan then challenges God to test Job. Reluctantly, God accepts the challenge. On Earth, Job is stricken with misfortune. All of his animals are either stolen or struck by lightning. All his children died of one tragedy or another.
Evil exists. This bizarre conundrum has perplexed philosophers since the dawn of civilization, and remains in hot debate today because of the theological implications inherent in the statement. To many on this planet, the source of life is an all-loving, all-powerful, omniscient god who created the universe – and all the laws therein – in seven days, as described in the Bible. And yet still, evil exists. How can these two premises be simultaneously true? Surely, an all-loving god would want to do something about this problem, and an all-powerful god could absolutely remedy a situation if it so desired. It seems as though the common perception of the Bible’s god is inaccurate. However, it could be argued that the Bible’s god is accurate, and that said perception is somewhat skewed, considering that on numerous occasions, God claims responsibility for evil. “I make peace and create evil. I the Lord do all these things.” (Isaiah 45:7). The Greek philosopher Epicurus put the Good God’s Evil puzzle in a very clear logical progression:
Good versus evil is an eternal struggle, conflict, war, or a unification. Good exists while evil does as well, this is because without evil, there can be no such thing as good, and without good, there can also be no evil. The question exists that if there is an all-good & powerful God who is omniscient; omnipotent; omni-benevolent; then how can evil exist within such absolute terms?
Ask anyone to draw Satan and you 'll get a red snake-like figure with horns and a pitchfork. Satan, as introduced in the Hebrew bible is an unworthy adversary of God. His longing to be like God is quickly recognized and dealt with. God banishes him from Heaven and sends him to Hell. That 's the last we see of him until he talks with God about his faithful servant Job. In each interaction we see Satan in, we get only a glimpse of who he really is. Satan 's motive is not developed and we assume he does evil simply because he is evil
Before one understands why there is evil in the world one must ask two important questions. First, who is God and what is His personality/characteristics, and second, what is sin and how does it affect humans and their relationship with God? By understanding these two different types of questions, one will understand the implications of evil and therefore be able to establish if God truly is evil or if sin truly is the root of all the evil in the world. Sin is defined by Erickson when he refers to the work of Satan, saying, “In their case the god of this world has blinded the minds of unbelievers, to keep them from seeing the light of the gospel of the glory of Christ, who is likeness of God.” 1 Consequently,