Nothing is Evil

I recently implemented something new. On Facebook I started a group called "

De' Tinker's Thoughts: Facebook Discussion Group", and asked the few members I had which post title they wanted me to write on. Well, the vote is in! So here I go...

Nothing is evil. How could that be? Don't we live in an evil world? Isn't evil all around us? What about the wars, the starvation, the lies, etc?

There is more to the saying then that. Maybe this makes more sense: Nothing was evil in it's original created form; or, nothing was created evil.

Whatever it is, it us us humans who make it evil or commit evil actions. Guns aren't evil, they are just a tool. Yet we use them for evil purposes. Eating meat isn't evil, yet we torture animals unnecessarily to get that meat or we intentionally provide low quality meat for people to eat. Even technology! Technology isn't evil, but as with the gun example, it can be used for evil purposes.

For instance, weather control technology. Some of you may not even believe we have the technology to effect the weather on any noteworthy scale. That's fine if you don't believe, it's up to you. Technology like that doesn't sound evil, does it? Well, it's not, whatever you were thinking. However, evidence suggests that this type of technology is responsible for multiple natural disasters and will also be used for a mass deception in the (near) future, with the intent of setting up a One World Government.

That brings me to another point, a Wold Government. Is that evil? Well, the idea itself isn't. However, the methods used to achieve such a government and the reason for that government are. The Almighty confused the languages of man at the tower of Babel when they created a One World Government, with the intention of being their own god. Mankind has always had that goal in mind, and is trying once again to create a modern "Tower of Babel" situation.

Getting away from the "conspiracy theories", here's another example: sex. These days I hear jokes about how Christianity means "if it's fun, stop doing it". In part this joke is talking about this very issue. The original purpose of sex was for pleasure between one man and one woman and to populate the earth. However, we have perverted it from it's original purpose, making most instances evil. Once again, it's not the idea that's evil, but what we do with it. That is why there is rape, adultery, homosexuality, etc. They have perverted the original purpose, in a similar way as was done with technology.

Since everything was originally "very good", any evil must have come afterwards. And of course, any object itself can't be evil anyway, just as an animal or idea can't. We are the ones that cursed creation through our actions, and we pervert and corrupt all of these things.

Of course other issues, such as killing and murder, are a little harder to explain. According to what I hear (to lazy to look it up myself), in the original Hebrew the same word is used for "murder" as is used for "kill". That means the commandment "thou shall not murder" could just as accurately be translated to "thou shall not kill". So does that mean killing isn't evil? Well... as I said, it's a little harder to explain, and I may be wrong on this one.

It is said that death will be the last enemy to be defeated. Also, in original creation there was no death. However, upon further investigation of science, you realized that destruction was both possible and necessary before the Fall. You see, there is a fine balance in creation. Destruction and creation. We can't even see without this balance! As light comes into our eyes, it destroys certain chemicals. When these chemicals break down, it sends an electrical signal to the brain, telling us what we see.

Before the Fall, things were probably balanced differently. Balanced in such a way that there was no net decay, meaning that things could not die of age; or die at all. However, as I said, things changed. So the act of killing also upsets the balance, but adding lots of net decay. This is against God's original plan, for He wanted no death. But we now live in a fallen world, where death not only is possible but happens every minute.

I have not fully answered the problem though, is killing evil? Digging a little deeper, we find Jesus said that even if you are angry with someone in your heart, you committed murder against them (in your own heart). So based off all this, it seems it is really a matter of the heart. Even God commanded the killing of thousands (men, woman, children, even babies). The people that were killed were of a corrupt heart, and this was a punishment. But when we kill someone ourselves, we have no power, right or authority to give them that punishment; except in the case of government (which I will get to in a moment).

An individual on his own does not have this authority by default, but circumstances can present them self, such as getting attacked and taking a life defending yourself. Although you may not have been given the authority to "punish" this person, per se, you were fulfilling a God given instinct of self defense. Things are different when someone is causing you trouble and you hire someone to "silence" them. That is a heart problem right there. Also since man is created in God's image, he also is set apart and special from the rest of creation. Doing something evil towards another human is far different than it is from an animal or plant.

However, governments have been given certain authority from above to make and enforce laws, including the death penalty. This amount of authority has been given to them, to take a life, so it is up to the governments to respect these privileges. No matter how powerful a government becomes, they still answer to a greater power. It is the same for all of us, we each answer to something greater than ourself. In the case of killing and murder, it is a hard concept to clearly understand. You've just seen some of how I think it through.

Ultimately, death and killing isn't part of the plan, but is happening now. We must live with that. But as long as our heart is following God, our actions will lead us away from these evil acts (although we are still fallible humans). This means that it is possible to kill someone and not sin. It is the heart, the intent, that God looks at. This isn't to justify those who fought in the Crusades for "the glory of God", or any other similar circumstances. I merely mean that He will reveal His will if we listen, and there is example after example in the Old Testament where killing was part of that.

The simple answer? No. Killing is not evil (oh boy, is that weird to say!). It is our heart that is evil, and often times we kill because of our evil heart. The origin of evil also has an evil beginning, the Fall and Satan. But death also began there as well, but death is not evil. It is just a balance of nature that is not part of God's ultimate plan. There will come a time where he gives creation it's proper balance, then death and killing will be impossible.

There are many other examples, but this will suffice for now. This post is plenty long. However, I will soon be writing another post talking more about this issue.

School Assignment, still read it though

I had needed to do an assignment for a class, and I liked what I did since it related to subjects I enjoy discussing, so I decided to share it here. Tell me what you think (the assignment was to make a list comparing some contradictions between creation and evolution and then discuss some of them in greater detail):

Contradiction	Creation	Evolution
Sun and Earth	Earth created first	Sun came first
Origin of Death	Death came after sin as punishment	Death is permanent
Origin of Man	Created in God's image on day 6	Evolved from ape-like ancestor
Original form of Earth	Earth started as water	Earth started as molten rock
Noah's Flood	Is a historical event which explains fossils and much more	Is an impossible myth that contradicts with "evidence" for an old earth
Origin of Life	Life came from the living God (life came from life, does NOT contradict science)	Life evolved from a non-living primordial soup millions of years ago (This contradicts an observable law of science)
Origin of Matter	An all powerful ever existing God created all matter and energy	All matter and energy arose spontaneously (different theories have different answers)
DNA	An all knowing intelligent God created the complex coding seen in DNA	Information came about without an intelligent creator (contradicts science, information must come from intelligence)
Evolving	Everything reproduces after it's kind within it's genetic information, or even lose information which is more of devolution	One kind of animal can change into another, which requires addition of information which is impossible without intelligence
Miracles	The very core of Creation relies on an all powerful God who created everything supernaturally	Evolution relies on there being no god and uses only natural processes, there can be no miracles or anything supernatural
Man's Specialness	Being in the image of the Creator, man has dominion over the earth and is above all the rest of Creation, and has an eternal soul	Man is just an animal and is no more special than anything else. When man dies they die just like an animal.
Logic and Reasoning	Logic was made to follow universal laws of order by an All Knowing God of Order	Our minds evolved randomly and are controlled by chemical processes that arose from random chance, therefore we cannot trust our own mind's wisdom

Key contradiction 1: The order of creation (and original form of earth)

I chose to only mention the sun and earth for this, so that is what I put in the table. In reality there are many more aspects of this I could have discussed.

The evolutionary theory requires that dense gases and matter gathered around to form the sun billions of years before a ball of molten rock would form to eventually become the earth. Stars came first to evolutionists, and that included the sun. All other celestial bodies, such as planets and the earth, formed billions of years after. Another conflict that is underneath this is the fact that evolution says the earth started as fire (for simplicity’s sake), the Bible says it started as water.

Now on the other hand, Biblical creation clearly states that the earth came before the sun and stars, as well as the moon (which evolution claims formed closer to the time of earth than the sun). When the earth was formed, it began as water and land came afterward (Genesis 1:2, 6-10). It wasn’t until two days after the earth was formed that we see the creation of the sun, moon and stars (Genesis 1:14-18).

This isn’t even getting into other aspects of the order of creation that evolution gets wrong; there is birds and fish created on the same day (Gen. 1:20) vs fish evolving into land and then sea creatures, plants being created before the sun (Gen 1: 11-12, 14-18) vs evolving billions of years afterwards, man and dinosaurs created on the same day (Gen 1: 24-30) vs man evolving millions of years afterwards, etc. But I chose to mention just the sun and earth in the above table.

Key contradiction 2: The Supernatural vs the natural (and several other points)

One of the sharpest contrasts between creation and evolution is the fact that creation requires there be miracles and supernatural beings, while evolution strictly forbids it. This, I believe, is where the science for evolution falls apart, right at step one. Since evolution requires only natural processes (that follow the natural laws of physics), there is no reasonable explanation for the origin of all matter and energy, now why to explain how life came about, no way to explain logic, and no way to explain pretty much anything. Their problem is there is no way for something to come from nothing, and that is what they need to explain their world view. Where did everything we see today come from?

Creation, on the other hand, has a reasonable answer for this. Since creation relies on the supernatural, which by definition supersedes the natural (and it’s laws of physics), it is very easy to explain the origin of everything. It goes something like this, “In the beginning God created…” (Gen 1:1). Right there we have our answer; an all powerful, all knowing supernatural being, which is above nature and it’s laws (and which actually created those laws), is the one responsible for everything we see today. A more detailed answer to this problem may be found in John 1:1-5

 “In the beginning the Word already existed. The Words was with God, and the Word was God. He existed in the beginning with God. God created everything through him, and nothing was created except through him. The Word gave life to everything that was created, and his life brought light to everyone. The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness can never extinguish it”

“God created everything. . . and nothing was created except through him”, that makes our answer pretty easy. Provided God had the power to do so (which of course He did)  and was telling the truth when He wrote this down (and of course, He was), then creation has no problem answering this.

Key contradiction 3: Man

The final point I will discuss is the conflict between Man’s place in creation. When we compare the worldviews, we see two drastically different opinions. On one side we have creation which says Man was created in the image of the Creator Himself (Genesis 1: 27), and was also created perfect to live forever with the Almighty, and later turned away from the Creator and had to live with death and suffering (Genesis 3); while on the other side we have evolution, which says man evolved from an animal and his life has no meaning, when he dies he dies and there is nothing left, that he is no more important than an ant or a leaf. There is a drastic contradiction between these two beliefs, isn’t there?

Adolf Hitler, A Miracle To Mankind

To be honest, I'm hoping this post stirs up a little bit of controversy. I do rather enjoy having debates about my views, as it gives me a great oppurtunity to refine my arguments and hopefully teach someone something.

Anyway, to the actual reason of this post. There are many discussions (some of which I've actually started) about who defines morals without God, and other similar things. What's right and wrong without the Bible? If God doesn't say it's wrong, then who does? We can't trust the Bible and it's morals, it's changed to much. I think you get the point. It comes in many shapes and forms, but it all centers on morals in a world without the Almighty.

So now, let us pretend for a moment that there is no All Powerfull and All Knowing Creator above us all right now. Then the only other commonly accepted solution is evolution. And according to that, Hitler is one of the greatest things that happened to mankind, and someone we should all strive to be like. If there is no God, the Hitler is one of the greatest role models.

Don't believe me? Let's take a closer look.

The theory of Evolution is all about survival of the fittest, right? Well, purging the species of the weak would certainly guarentee less competetion for the strong, therefore keeping the entire species stronger. If you take out all the old, sick, deformed, ect. the species as a whole is "improved". What did Hitler do?

If evolution is the answer, then anyone who furthers the cause of the species should be seen as a hero. So then why do we see Hitler as a villian? Probably... because ever since man breathed his first breath right and wrong was defined by the Creator in his heart. Only later did the pagans think of things like evolution or a pantheon of gods and goddesses to replace the one true God.

As the Creator of everything, the Almighty has the right to declare right and wrong. And all of us, as part of creation, are obligated to obey His laws. However, He did give us the option to choose otherwise, a right we did not and do not deserve. Also, as the Absolute Authority, He is the only one can can declare an absolute moral principle. So if He says murder is wrong, then it's wrong, not matter what we think. If He says (as He told the Jews before Christ) that the punishment for adultery was being stoned to death, then we have no authority to say this is unjust or to extreme a punishment.

However, if you remove this absolute authority, then we decide for ourselves. So if one person says he believes murder is wrong, I can just kill him and move on with my life. I have no reason not to, especially if I am a fitter part of the species. Then I would simply be doing my job as the superior being! This is also what Hitler and many other people thoughout history have done. So if there is no God, who says they were wrong? If you remove God and the Bible, then simple logic dictates that they should be commended.

Think about it. They (being Hitler and the Nazi's) killed thousands of weaker people who were sick, old, deformed, or otherwise "inferior" subjects. They did experiments on these subjects which helped further science. They used weapons and tactics that allowed them beat back their "inferior" enemies. They weeded out the weak to allow for the stonger members of the species to continue without the weak gene pool. All those left wounded, sick and dying all around Europe, or even the world, were all a good thing because with them out of the way the species would be improved.

Now if you look at this same scenerio with the morals cleary defined by the Creator, you can see that what Hitler did was dispicable. When you look at it through the Almighty's high moral standards, I can't even describe how horrible the things Hitler did were. I wouldn't know where to begin! And since America was founded on Chistrian principles, and Christianity (or at least Judiasm) was such a major part in the history of the rest of the world (considering it was the same Creator for the entire world and all of mankind), it is no wonder we see Hitler as such a horrible man!

Oh, but there's more. If we take the Creator and the Bible out of the picture, hospitals should be closed. So should orphanages. And so should so many other things that we consider "good". Because if it's survival of the fittest, then these things are merely allowing the weak to water down the gene pool and drain the resources of the strong! So those people starving in Africa that I hear so many people talk about, if evolution is the answer, we should let them starve. After all, if they can't take care of themselves, why should we do it for them?

But once again, if you look at it through the morals defined in the Bible, we know that things are far different. All these people, no matter how weak or strong, are made in the image of the perfect Creator. Each of these people would be loved to an unimaginable extent, and allowing them to die without care would be a pretty bad thing.

I could go on for awhile with examples from either side, but the final decision is up to in your mind. Who defines moral absolutes? Us or the Creator? Was Adolf Hitler a curse... or a blessing?

First!

That oh so common comment you see on just about everything these days. Everyone is so happy to be the first to comment on something that all they can think of to say is "first". But, since this is my first post, I decided to name it just that.

I decided to make this my more intellectual, or philosophical, blog. My other is more science fiction with a comedic edge. This will be about deeper, more serious stuff.

So, the thought that made me finally decide to start this blog:

Food.

Yes, very deep, serious, intellectual and philosophical, I know. I just came off a fast this morning, and my mind was going over our society's view of food and everything involved with it. You want to know what I came to realize? Almost everything involving food in these modern days (in America I know) is sinful and just wrong. We eat to much, to often, and we eat stuff that is so far removed from the way the Almighty created it that it isn't even funny. Yet, we say all this is healthy!

Let me explain further, laconic speech won't help to much with any controversial subject I bring up. We live in a society that says homosexuality, nudity, sex before marriage, bribery, disrespect, thievery, adultery, idolatry, and so much more is acceptable, and christians try their best to stay out of that and usually disagree with the world's view and that stuff (unfortunately, many christians are giving in). We live in a society that has taken the Creator out of as much of the created as possible, perverted everything they can, yet we still say their views on food and health are correct! But we say their views on morality are not... hmm, something seems wrong to me.

If the Creator wanted the Creation to stay healthy, why would he make health attainable by technology only available, at most, two times so far in history (one of those times is today, the other in ancient history. A subject for another post)? What about all those thousands of years where people were still living in little wood houses and using axes to chop wood for heat? They didn't have all the processing equipment to make our modern, "healthy" food. Why would anyone do something that stupid? Lead alone the All Powerful, All Knowing Creator of the Universe? No, he made it so we could be perfectly (at least as perfect as we can be in the fallen world) healthy without the aid of modern processing technology.

Let's start from the beginning. When He, the Creator, created the world, everything was a vegetarian. Also, everything was more efficient. We were protected from the harmful rays coming from outer space, had a thicker and more energizing atmosphere, had higher quality soil, ect.... making all the plants unbelievably healthy compared to anything today. Every living beast of the earth and foul of the air, as well as man, could get all the nutrients they needed from eating these plants in their natural form. There are some theories that they could have eaten fish too, something about the word for life describing fish as opposed to describing other animals being different in Greek and therefore fish weren't alive in a certain way, but I'll keep it simple and just say everything was a vegetarian in the beginning. No cooking or processing required, other than that which the body did naturally during digestion.

Move forward to after the fall. Death and degradation came into the world. Carnivores started appearing (the animals already existed before, they just ate plants; possibly a subject for another post), and in an estimated less than 1700 years, there was the flood. During that time, the world hadn't degraded, or "died" enough that we needed to eat animal products at all. We still had the protection from space, the thick atmosphere, really good soil, good plants, ect. It was still similar to the way things were when they were made "very good". Of course, sin was rampant, but biologically things were a lot closer to the beginning then they were today.

Then the flood happened. It fundamentally changed the entire world. Some of our protection from space was gone (and continues to deteriorate today), the atmosphere had changed, and several plants that might have fed us the right mix of nutrients possibly went extinct, amongst many other things that happened after the flood. Something interesting I noticed was, immediately after the flood receded and Noah and his family were back on dry land, was the fact that the All Knowing told them they could eat animals now. I realized, just hours before typing all this, that this was probably because He knew they could no longer get the all their required nutrients from plant matter alone. So mankind was allowed meat, by the Law of the Creator, for the first time.

Fast forward an estimated 4,300 years to today. The quality of the food has degraded so much it makes me want to laugh! Why do we think that processing it by man's methods will make it better than it grew under the Creator's Laws? If anything, the farther from the beginning we get, the less we should process the food, not more. You want to know why we do it? Because the Enemy, Satan, wants to remove the Almighty out of even the food we eat! Including, how we eat it! That, along with so much else stuff, all of which relating to sin, is why we eat both so much food and food of such low, processed quality. I'm not saying that eating a twinkie is a sin, per se, but the fact that we have so far removed food from the way it was created with purpose, and the fact that we eat much more than we need to, is the sin.

I realized another aspect of this when I was whittling down a secret stash of candy I had. I was eating a reese's egg, taking little bites and savoring the taste of each as long as I could. It took my probably three minutes to eat that one reese's, and it was very enjoyable. I was thinking of eating a second, when I realized if I did it would be gluttonous, selfish, and therefore sinful. I was shocked at that revalation, and decided not to have another. Then I thought over how everyone else eats. I realized it was very sinful as well. We eat far more than we need to, far more often, and we appreciate it very little.

The best part? If we ate our food the way the All Knowing, All Powerful, All Existing Creator meant us to, we would not eat to much, we would not eat to often, and what we ate would be the highest, undefiled quality we could get. Wait a minute... that sounds a lot like a few diets I've heard about; such as the Paleo diet, The Primal Blueprint, Spartan Health Regimen, ect... All of these encourage eating things in their natural state and not eating more than necessary. This philospy sounds very good to me. Eat as the Creator meant us to eat. But, why do so many people refuse to do this, or worse yet, even call this unhealthy!? Because, we have tried to remove the Creator out of everything He created. Including our diets.

If you have any questions, comments, anything, just leave a comment. I have more thoughts on several other things, so keep watching!