Evil, Who Knows It And How? Pt. 1

Gen. 3:4-5 ~ "4-And the serpent said unto the woman, Ye shall not surely die: 5-For God doth know that in the day ye eat thereof, then your eyes shall be opened, and ye shall be as gods, knowing good and evil."

The Atheist Bus Campaign proudly hails that humanity doesn't need to worry because there is" probably no God". The American Humanists claim that we don't need God to be good and that individuals can just "be good for goodness sake". These statements assume that belief in God is nonessential to life and that an individual can discern and know what is good on their own. The problem is that in order to be good one must also know what is bad or evil and be able to distinguish the difference.

The focus of this article is to examine the human epistemology of good and evil. This is better stated as how and on what basis do individuals know what is good or bad. This article will look specifically at the knowledge of "evil" and how evil is discerned both in the life of the Christian and in the life of the unsaved or atheist.

I intend to ask and answer the following questions in this article:

1- What is evil and where does it come from?

2- How does one come to identify what is evil?

3- Can them that are lost confidently know what evil really is?

4- How is the Christian concept of evil superior to the atheistic concept of evil?

I: What Is Evil And Where Does It Come From?

In many philosophical circles, evil is defined as morally objectionable behavior or that which causes harm destruction and/or misfortune. For many, it is said that evil emanates from immorality which is the quality of not being in accord with standards of right. Evil is equivalent to being wicked or possessing iniquity.

Throughout history, it has been thought that unpleasurable things are evil. In fact the Plato's (428-347 B.C.E.) view of evil which was gained from his teacher Socrates (470-399 B.C.E.) he stated that the only reason why the pleasures of food and drink seem to be evil is that they result in pain and deprive us of future pleasures. {Plato Progaras, 353e}

Socrates (in Plato's early work) argued, that which we call evil is merely ignorance and that good is that which everyone desires. Benedict de Spinoza said that the difference between good and evil is merely one of personal inclinations:

"So everyone, by the highest right of Nature, judges what is good and what is evil, considers his own advantage according to his own temperament... ."

If you are careful to notice, the term "evil" is normally used as a descriptive based on concepts of relativistic or subjective thought. In other words "evil" according to most, is only "evil' as it relates to its relative position to an individual, culturally acceptable standards of the community or personal moral assessments. In other words "evil' as it is described in modern society is nothing more than a figment of the imagination.

Philosophically Speaking:

There are generally three types of evil pointed to in most circles:

1- Moral Evil ~ Evil as a result of choice of moral agents

2- Natural Evil ~ Evil that occurs as a result of natural circumstance beyond our control

3- Non moral Evil~ Evil that occurs as a result of accident or neglect.

Augustine To The Rescue:

St. Augustine, in his defense of the faith "On The Morals Of The Manichaens, [5.7]" set forth the concept that evil is not the absence of good, as is commonly taught in philosophical circles, but the corruption of good. His argument is summarized as follows:

1- Corruption is a general definition of evil.

2- Corruption, which is not a substance, does not exist by itself but in what it corrupts.

3- Corruption is only identified when whatever is corrupted by it looses integrity and purity.

4- That which has no integrity or purity cannot be corrupted.

5- Therefore for anything to suffer corruption or perversion implies the presence of integrity, purity and ultimately good.

In the Christian worldview evil is better stated as being the corruption of good or of what has integrity and purity, not the absence of good. In other words evil cannot be identified unless it is set against a standard that is not corrupted to begin with.

In some cases evil is the lack of an appropriate relationship between good things. Example, Boots are good, a persons face can be and is generally good, but a boot on a face is an inappropriate relationship especially when there was nothing done to deserve it.

Evil can also be the lack of something that should be there in relationship between good things. For example, the husband that mistreats his wife or father that abuses his children. He does so because he lack the love that he should have for his spouse and children, while at the same time he may either love someone else or love some other activity that assists him eliminating or lowering his love for his family. The problem is not that there is no love, love exists, but there is a serious lack of love or maybe even hatred for what should be loved.

II: How Does One Come To Identify Evil?

The Philosophical Dilemma

I point out yet another philosophical dilemma regarding evil. This deals with both the ethical view of evil and the epistemological understanding or awareness of evil. That epistemological understanding of evil simply asks or seeks to find out how one knows or identifies evil.

Views on the nature of evil tend to fall into one of four opposed camps:

Moral absolutism holds that good and evil are fixed concepts established by a deity or deities, nature, morality, common sense, or some other source.

Amoralism claims that good and evil are meaningless, as there are no deities, no moral ingredient in nature. Amoralists tend to apply a homo economicus style of making decisions in their lives.

Moral relativism holds that standards of good and evil are only products of local culture, custom, or prejudice.

Moral universalism is the attempt to find a compromise between the absolutist sense of morality, and the relativist view; universalism claims that morality is only flexible to a degree, and that what is truly good or evil can be determined by examining what is commonly considered to be evil amongst all humans.

Value Statements

The view that something is either good or bad of itself is called intrinsicism. Intrinsic values are nonderivative values. In other words something is either good or bad without regard to who or what it is good or bad to or for. There is a problem with intricism. Anything good on its own has nothing to compare itself to. In other words there is no contrast offered by which something that is truly good without respect to whom it's good to can really be assessed as being good. Therefore intrinsic worth is a circular argument in many cases.

This is where it gets interesting. For one to identify evil, one would also have to assign or have assigned a set of values as a contrast to the assessment being made. Those values may be based on subjective or objective means, but there is a value relationship and value assertion nonetheless, otherwise there can be no identification of anything evil or corrupt. Current philosophical understandings of intricism do not address this particular issue and fail to account for initial value judgements and assertions. This is done primarily due to the belief that community in many cases, is responsible for value judgements. This thought is probably one of the worst of all arguments and certainly has shown not to be the case. Why? First, because nearly all cultures, varying as they may be, and in some cases not in touch with either at all, hold to certain standards and values in high esteem that are seemingly universal, such as charity, selflessness, nurturing of others etc. These standards are always held out as being virtuous from culture to culture without having been derived from any particular culture or social setting.

Secondly, value assessments and judgements are made regularly regarding these matters outside of community from culture to culture and third, if one says that good values are learned from family and maternal "passings on", then one is right back where we started asking for the first cause of the value judgement ie: where did your mommas, mommas, momma get that from and then where did they get it from. A trail of infinite regression that leads back to a beginning either way where a standard was set forth.

Fourth, the bible accords that God is the only intrinsically good being. For something to have intrinsic value means that it can be valuable or not, good or bad, without reference to who it is good or bad for, and without reference to the reason it is good or bad. Although this statement for a philosopher is a self-defeating, in our current condition, we can identify good when we identify evil since evil is the corruption of what is good. In the case of God he is self-ascribed as the self-existent one who is good.

Exodus 3:14 ~ "And God said unto Moses, I AM THAT I AM: and he said, Thus shalt thou say unto the children of Israel, I AM hath sent me unto you."

Blessed!