god & evil

remember that everything i write is a wip, and this is still under the "thoughts" section, so this is simply a rough draft which i wrote all at once by merely pouring my thoughts out. eventually i will reconstruct it and place it under a different section

I've seen a specific line of arguing against the existence of God by pointing out how, if he were to exist, he would have to be evil because evil things happen to people sometimes and that's not very nice.

Firstly, to even begin to question the morality of God, one must acknowledge his existence in their minds, even if it just for the purpose of answering the question hypothetically. If there is no God, then the question cannot be answered. Acknowledge God for the purpose of answering the question, or else you will simply come away with the idea that "God isn't real, but he's evil"; a mistake commonly made by the more immature atheists who cannot even answer the question because they begin with the presumption that it is impossible for him to exist, but if he did he would be evil. This statement should be glaringly obvious in how it contradicts itself. After having agreed to accept the possiblity of God, even if merely for perspective on the question, the question then may be asked: Is God evil?. This question is one which I may confidently say no to.

Likewise to how an immature atheist cannot ask the question, an immature Christian cannot answer the question; the best they could simply do is, "Of course God can't be evil, because He is said to be Good. If to believe in Him, you must believe he is Good, then God is Good." This sort of thinking is just as foolish as the atheist, if not more stupid. This sort of reasoning is also the reason as to why atheists often avoid Christians, as this sort of reasoning makes Christianity appear to be some sort of an archaic cult wherein nobody may question anything. Though this sort of an answer is purely stupid, and is certain to never change the mind of anyone with even the slightest conviction in their beliefs, there are valid arguments against God being evil.

The first argument which comes to mind is a more simple one, which can be seen in the Old Testament, though I will explain later as to why the Old Testament ought not be relied upon for the teachings of God. This argument is that, when the snake convinces Eve, and Eve convinces Adam, to consume the fruit, that he says "ye shall be as gods". This would imply that they would have the knowledge of God, but the fruits are focused on the knowledge of discerning Good and Evil, meaning that to be God you must merely be able to understand Good and Evil, but not necessarily be entirely Good or entirely Evil. Again, this means that God would not be entirely evil, but it still leaves room for him to do evil, so this argument is not a very good one.

Before I continue, I would like to address the Old Testament. It is often pointed out by atheists that God in the Old Testament seems to take pleasure in the power of killing people and using plagues, floods, and wars to achieve His goals; yet most of the examples in the Old Testament did not seem to actually do anything, since people continued to build skyscrapers and take their lives for granted. In my opinion, there may be two interpretations of the Old Testament by a rational Christian; the Old Testament contains some of the most brilliant art ever presented, but is not reliable to understand God, as most of it was written solely by Man beyond the Ten Commandments and such. Additionally, as someone who does not believe in the supernatural elements of the New Testament, the floods and plagues may simply be the work of men; things they made up in their own mind to encourage a fear of God. The other idea, which may also coexist with the former, is that the Bible shows God's own journey. If you are to believe that God may not be omniscient (more on that later), then it is likely that God must have grown as humans do. God may have done what he has with Earth early in his life, and behaved immaturely initially. However, His more wise moments in the Old Testament seem to make this unlikely and not a very good idea, beyond mere fictional entertainment. My personal belief fits more with the former argument I had made, and that it must be acknowledged that, though the Bible contains the Old Testament, the Old Testament mostly comes from the Ancient Jews, who are not exactly the nicest or most likeable people in history. Many of the rational Christians simply ignore the Old Testament, as it was likely used to justify evil actions by men and then further used by Constantine's church to justify their evils.

For God to be evil, he would have to maliciously place suffering upon humans. Outside of the Old Testament, that does not seem to be the case. God must be omniscient and have intentionally placed suffering upon humans in bad faith for it to be possible that God is evil. Suffering is not inherently evil, and it is my belief that God presented it to us in the hopes of saving us; death, sickness, the need for food and water, and other such things for survival like temperature conditions were all provided by God to make us love each other more, not to make us afraid. We were supposed to nurse the sick and love them, not run from them in fear of getting sick from them. We were supposed to embrace those facing death, not push them into the grave or be disgusted by their condition. People weren't supposed to kill each other because it was possible, they were supposed to protect each other because it is possible. None of this suffering is evil, and in God's mind likely cannot be evil; humans created the evil for themselves. The things given to us by God were given to bring us together, not divide us. These things also are only existential to the atheist. A Christian, even one who does not believe in Heaven or Hell as the modern Christian professes, still believes in God and the contribution to the whole of God and His world. This sort of embracing of God allows for us to become whole with him after death, should we spend our lives living his wisdom. This goes beyond death, and therefore conquers it and make death appear to be small. The existential threat of death is only a threat to the atheist. Death on Earth may still be sad, but that does not mean that it is the end of road, and therefore should not be feared in the ways humans fear it.

"So God made death possible, and even if He did it without malintent, people can kill each other. This makes God evil." No. God's lack of direct control of humans is what excuses him from the acts of man when they go against His word, and also what makes him less evil. If God didn't allow for the possiblity of murder, then He would be evil for robbing us of free will. If God were to do anything other than let people be murdered, the claims by atheists of him being some sort of authoritarian dictator would be true. An atheist may then present that I said that God lacks direct control over humans, which would mean that he is not God. This is untrue, as I am not suggesting that it is outside of God's so-called powers. I am saying that the idea would be so repulsive to God, that it would never even be considered as a possiblity.

So, if God has never done anything with malicious intent or done anything evil himself, but allows for the existence of evil on Earth, then what is His plan that everyone talks about? This question, rather than coming from the atheist, is one that I ask myself. What sort of plan allows for evil in the first place? Firstly, it seems to me that it is likely that God did not create evil, nor good, but that they were created by humans to explain the two ends of the spectrum. The egoist may refute this spectrum, but I will not bother to. In the end, I believe that this spectrum, whether divine or man-made, can still apply to what I am saying or not apply, and my words should remain the same. Anyway, God did provide us the way to eradicate evil as we know it. Jesus, who many Chrstians claim to be God Himself in some confusing form, ought to be taken as the "most rational guy ever". This idea of him is all that it takes for someone to understand Jesus's teachings without drowning in semantics over his relationship with God. God was Jesus's father as He is ours. I would like to note here, as it just came to my mind, that though I am arguing about God, some of the things I cover here may be taken by the atheist as much as the Christian, especially with Jesus. Jesus's teachings are simply about pure rationality, which is why they provide guidance for an ideal life for all people, without needing to acknowledge a God. Even just the idea of God generally provides many people with certain assumptions and connotations which may polarize them or provide them with certain expectations. I ask that you wipe away any preconceptions you might have about God when you read this, to hopefully understand what I am desperately attempting to express with my own weak hands. Jesus teaches love and nonresistance/passive resistance as the way to unite everyone under happiness, essentially effacing human evil. Whether ot not God intentionally placed Jesus on Earth with this mission is questionable, but these teachings by Jesus are purely sensible. To learn more about them, I would suggest that you do more research of your own. I am not trying to write about everything Jesus does and teaches, merely showing how his teachings are what provide us an out the to the evils of man. Also, if evil suffering is simply suffering which is not necessary, then that does not make the suffering given to us by God evil. It was believed to be necessary by God, and may prove to have been, because humans were unappreciative of their lives and not behaving as they should. God provided humans with this suffering as a gift in hopes that they will develop an understanding of their purpose from it, but they did not.

At this point, the order in which I am writing makes no sense. I'll eventually refine this, but if you read the entire thing I hope you will have a bit of understanding as to what I am saying, and how foolish the arguments of an evil God are. Another thing which I recall hearing is how humans love to feel observed and judged, so they created God. This is less about God and evil and more about God generally, but I'll devote this short section to it anyway. I would first like to state that the preconception most people have is that God encourages guilt by people and wants for people to get on their hands and knees, screaming at some piece of wood for forgiveness. As I have already said, please forget these preconceptions of yours, as all of the common ones which paint God poorly or provide rebuttals to him are actually not present by God, Jesus, or the Bible; rather, they were created by your fellow man to corrupt the teachings of Jesus. There are no guilty people, and God does not judge people for their actions as humans do. If God did, He would be no better than humans who judge each other. Jesus teaches us not to judge. God knows we all have our problems, and the idea that everyone is guilty is stupid. There are no guilty people. People love to feel judged, true, but God does not judge in the ways humans do, nor does He judge in the ways humans wish he did. Humans want themselves as God. They see some old wise man, as they'd like to see themselves. The God-complex of people gets in the way of them truly understanding God and Jesus. I ask that you do not blindly follow my opinions on the matter, nor that you agree with me. I merely ask that you question everything, look into your own soul, and see what is there. Beyond the need to outdo others, beyond the need to save others, beyond the needs of yourself and the masturbation of the ego that society has given you. Look into your soul and find the true goodness that lies there, that does not want for you to be anything but good. The goodness that tells you not to submit to the evils of humanitarianism, nor the evils of murder. Jesus tries not to be a saviour to man, he merely teaches his disciples to adopt a particular lifestyle. This lifestyle is not what he asks for you, the reader, to do. He may tell his disciples to love all, to turn the other cheek when smited, but he does not say this to the reader who is not yet a disciple. ALl that he asks of you is to look inside of yourself, beyond all of the masks and fog. There you will find goodness, even if you do not "find God". You do not need to believe in God to understand that God cannot be evil, you just need to accept that God is real to ask the question. That probably makes no sense, but I am trying to say that you do not need to actually even ask if God is evil. Just ask yourself about yourself. When you find the truth, and trust yourself on it, you will end up working in the ways God has already hoped for. And when you begin to act this way, you will influence others to do the same. Jesus's teachings may be put into perspective with God, but God is not a necessary thing to admit to understand the teachings.

This is nowhere near complete, and half of this probably makes no sense. I'll continue working on it another time, and it'll probably turn into two separate articles. It's much harder to write a rebuttal to every possible line of questioning by an athetist than it is to just agree and say "god is evil cause mean things happen to me :(".

Trust yourself when your soul will not desire to outdo others, distinguish yourself from others, be powerful, famous, to be a savior of the people, rescuer from wrong order of life (such desires often substitute the desire for goodness), and trust yourself when the main desire of your soul is to be better – I won’t tell: to improve, because in self-improvement is something egotistical, satisfying pride, – but I’ll say: to become that what God who gave us life wants, to open in yourself that beginning, alike Him, which is engraved in us, to live godly, as people say.

Trust yourself and live to put all your strengths into one purpose: to manifest God in yourself, – and you’ll achieve everything you can do and for their own benefit and for the benefit of the whole world.

Leo Tolstoy, Trust Yourself: An Appeal to Young People