Definition of Evil
Evil is the immature choosing and
the unthinking misstep of those who are resistant to goodness, rejectful of
beauty, and disloyal to truth. Evil is only the misadaptation of immaturity or
the disruptive and distorting influence of ignorance. Evil is the inevitable
darkness which follows upon the heels of the unwise rejection of light. Evil is
that which is dark and untrue, and which, when consciously embraced and
willfully endorsed, becomes sin.
There are many ways of looking at
sin, but from the universe philosophic viewpoint
sin is the attitude of a personality who is knowingly resisting cosmic reality.
Error might be regarded as a misconception or distortion of reality. Evil is a
partial realization of, or maladjustment to, universe realities. But sin is a
purposeful resistance to divine reality – a conscious choosing to oppose
spiritual progress – while iniquity consists in an open and persistent defiance
of recognized reality and signifies such a degree of personality disintegration
as to border on cosmic insanity.
From this, we can see that:
1.
The heart of evil is selfish actions and
desires.
2.
The fundamental cause is either immaturity or
ignorance.
3.
The effect is losing sight of truth, beauty, and
goodness, which warps the mind’s perception of associated values.
The Evil of Rebellion
One of the major mediums of evil is
control, especially that over others. Controlling things to satiate the self is,
in a sense, taking control away from God or controlling things like God.
Controlling things like God is not a problem when following the will of God,
but the issue is that this is done while serving the self instead of others.
God’s will is linked with His values or ideals. They are inseparable. God is
love; therefore he must be good, and his goodness is so great and real that it
cannot contain the small and unreal things of evil. To turn away from that associated
will is essentially the same as turning away from truth, beauty, and goodness.
Taking these things into
consideration, for a spirit to rebel against God, they must alter their
previous moral code because it was built with God as the source. You basically
have to dismiss the morals existing as part of God’s will in order to dismiss
that will itself. For instance, rejecting an order from Deity means you either
do not wish to follow that will, or you are confused as to how such an order
reflects values of truth, beauty, and goodness inherent in Deity action. Such a
refusal likely results from the desire to pursue one’s own desires, or a
misunderstanding of what that will represents and leads to. Such issues of
rebellion erupt from the same causes of evil: immaturity and ignorance. In
other words, a lack of knowledge, experience, or wisdom leads one to make bad
choices. Such is true in both spiritual and human affairs, but the dynamics of
each can be very different given the context found within each group.
Experiencing Good and Evil
Good and evil are merely words
symbolizing relative levels of human comprehension of the observable universe.
If you are ethically lazy and socially indifferent, you can take as your
standard of good the current social usages. If you are spiritually indolent and
morally unprogressive, you may take as your standards of good the religious
practices and traditions of your contemporaries. But the soul that survives
time and emerges into eternity must make a living and personal choice between
good and evil as they are determined by the true values of the spiritual
standards established by the divine spirit which the Father in heaven has sent
to dwell within the heart of man. This indwelling spirit is the standard of personality
survival.
Goodness, like truth, is always
relative and unfailingly evil-contrasted. It is the perception of these
qualities of goodness and truth that enables the evolving souls of men to make
those personal decisions of choice which are essential to eternal survival. The
spiritually blind individual who logically follows scientific dictation, social
usage, and religious dogma stands in grave danger of sacrificing his moral
freedom and losing his spiritual liberty. Such a soul is destined to become an
intellectual parrot, a social automaton, and a slave to religious authority.
Goodness is always growing toward
new levels of the increasing liberty of moral self-realization and spiritual
personality attainment — the discovery of, and identification with, the
indwelling Adjuster. An experience is good when it heightens the appreciation
of beauty, augments the moral will, enhances the discernment of truth, enlarges
the capacity to love and serve one’s fellows, exalts the spiritual ideals, and unifies
the supreme human motives of time with the eternal plans of the indwelling
Adjuster, all of which lead directly to an increased desire to do the Father’s
will, thereby fostering the divine passion to find God and to be more like him.
As you ascend the universe scale of
creature development, you will find increasing goodness and diminishing evil in
perfect accordance with your capacity for goodness-experience and
truth-discernment. The ability to entertain error or experience evil will not
be fully lost until the ascending human soul achieves final spirit levels. Goodness
is living, relative, always progressing, invariably a personal experience, and everlastingly
correlated with the discernment of truth and beauty. Goodness is found in the
recognition of the positive truth-values of the spiritual level, which must, in
human experience, be contrasted with the negative counterpart — the shadows of
potential evil.
Until you attain Paradise levels,
goodness will always be more of a quest than a possession, more of a goal than
an experience of attainment. But even as you hunger and thirst for
righteousness, you experience increasing satisfaction in the partial attainment
of goodness. The presence of goodness and evil in the world is in itself
positive proof of the existence and reality of man’s moral will, the
personality, which thus identifies these values and is also able to choose
between them.
By the time of the attainment of
Paradise the ascending mortal’s capacity for identifying the self with true
spirit values has become so enlarged as to result in the attainment of the
perfection of the possession of the light of life. Such a perfected spirit
personality becomes so wholly, divinely, and spiritually unified with the
positive and supreme qualities of goodness, beauty, and truth that there
remains no possibility that such a righteous spirit would cast any negative
shadow of potential evil when exposed to the searching luminosity of the divine
light of the infinite Rulers of Paradise. In all such spirit personalities, goodness
is no longer partial, contrastive, and comparative; it has become divinely
complete and spiritually replete; it approaches the purity and perfection of
the Supreme.
The possibility of evil is
necessary to moral choosing, but not the actuality thereof. A shadow is only
relatively real. Actual evil is not necessary as a personal experience. Potential
evil acts equally well as a decision stimulus in the realms of moral progress
on the lower levels of spiritual development. Evil becomes a reality of
personal experience only when a moral mind makes evil its choice.
Forms of Evil
Your Father, by endowing you with
the power to choose between truth and error, created the potential negative of
the positive way of light and life; but such errors of evil are really nonexistent
until such a time as an intelligent creature wills their existence by
mischoosing the way of life. And then are such evils later exalted into sin by
the knowing and deliberate choice of such a willful and rebellious creature.
This is why our Father in heaven permits the good and the evil to go along together
until the end of life, just as nature allows the wheat and the tares to grow side
by side until the harvest.
Evil exists as an action or
activity, with its root existing within the personal goals of the being. The decision-making
process, or that of cause and effect, is what moves one from evil as a potential
to evil as an actuality. A person first needs the thoughts or goals that lead
up to the evil act, followed by the willful decision to continue. But without
the activity, a person is only evil in potential, though it is certainly
possible that some individuals are guaranteed to act in such a way if allowed
to do so.
What leads to the choice is either decay
in the moral standards of the individual, or the lack of learning such
standards in the first place. Evil is not necessarily seen in the changing of
personal ideals, but the consequences of that change. However, the selfishness
that can result from such a change in views leads one to allow the option of harming
others in the pursuit of goals. This is because there is a lack of love for
others compared to the love for the self, which means such love for others is
inferior to the goals the self creates. It is also possible that since the benefits
of selflessness are largely spiritual in nature, those who are not in touch
with their spiritual side are less likely to see or feel such benefits since they
are more intangible. In the end, there are two basic forms of evil born from action:
1.
Evil means – causing harm in order to reach a
goal or make reaching it an easier task
2.
Evil end – a personal goal that can cause harm
if achieved
Causing harm can be defined as:
1.
causing physical, mental, or spiritual injury
2.
killing, either physically or spiritually
3.
forcing one to regress or give up the benefits
of personal growth
4.
manipulating or controlling the will of others
5.
reducing the potentials of an individual
6.
decreasing the ability of others to benefit from
a situation
Mediums of Evil
1.
Power – The freedom to reach goals through the
utilization of personal strengths, resources, social influence, or authority.
Power is often exploited because it increases the likelihood of gaining reward
from personal action, which means selfish behavior can create better outcomes
for the individual.
2.
Control – A form of power initiated over a
situation, person, or environment in order to alter it. Similar to power,
control is used as a means to an end. It is absolutely worthless as an end
itself because its value exists in what it can help achieve.
3.
Fear – An unpleasant feeling caused by the
belief that someone or something is dangerous, likely to cause pain, or a
threat. Fear drives a person to act in abnormal ways, altering the perception
of values in a fight or flight response to stress. Because of this, fear is
able to get us to act in ways that often contradict our own moral code, and
works as an excuse to validate poor behavior.
4.
Anger – A strong feeling of annoyance,
displeasure, or hostility. Anger can lead us to doing terrible things to
others, even those we care for. It creates an inner stress in the body that has
to be released through either: eliminating the cause, venting frustrations
mentally, or physically relieving tension. Our pursuit of these things often
makes us blind to the consequences of our actions.
5.
Hatred – An intense dislike or ill will. Not
only does this require a serious lack of love for the subject in question, but it
can also be created by emotions like fear and anger. Hatred keeps us from
assessing the situation fairly, and leads to us being more judgmental –
especially toward the subject in question. It creates situations where we find
it okay to cross the line because we feel that others are deserving of the
consequences. It even makes future hardships we may take on in response to such
behavior more bearable, because we may feel validated for doing wrong against a
person we greatly dislike.
Examples of Evil
What is provided below is a list of the seven sins often
identified as sources of negative behavior. In the end, these are niche expressions of human thought, emotion, and action,
which ultimately increase the likelihood of future evil.
1.
Wrath – An extreme form of anger and whatever that happens to lead to.
This is more of an emotional imbalance for people who cannot cope with their
environment or situation, leading to disgust for others. The two parts of this
are what can trigger wrath, and how such anger is expressed through the
individual. Wrath is not technically evil if it does not lead to action,
although it can retard spiritual growth and acceptance.
2.
Greed – An intense selfish
desire for something, especially wealth, power, or basic resources. This is commonly known as the root of all evil, but such is not
really the case. Greed often comes about through many personal reasons, often
boiling down to either fear or misinterpreted needs. The desire in question can
also range from the tangible (wealth, food, property) to the intangible (power,
authority, social influence). It is very similar to both lust and gluttony.
3.
Lust – This often exists as an
unnaturally large craving for sexual pleasure, but the root of it is any sort
of unnecessarily large desire for something. Here, the thing in question does
not always matter. What is important is how much the desire twists the
personality. Lust is frequently categorized as a continual yearning for things
of a carnal nature, and in the worst case can lead to rape, but there are still
many sources of pleasure one could be uncontrollably striving for. At the end
of the day, it is one more example of a person devoting their attention to
something of little spiritual importance.
4.
Gluttony – This is defined as habitual
greed or an excess in eating, but its root is addiction.
Another way of looking at it is that you are being greedy over your food, and
that you are consuming more while reducing the amount other people can have. In
a lot of cases this isn’t exactly true, but it still remains an addiction to a physically
pleasing activity that offers no value for the soul.
5.
Pride – This is a feeling, deep
pleasure, or satisfaction derived from one's own achievements, the achievements
of those with whom one is associated with, or from qualities or possessions
that are widely admired by others. Pride can keep a person from being humble because
humbleness often keeps the traits associated with pride from being expressed. Pride
may even require someone to stand out among the crowd, or rise above others.
The method of which depends on the environment, but it undoubtedly requires the
use of corrupted power.
6.
Envy – A feeling of discontented
or resentful longing created by someone else's possessions, qualities, or luck. Envy is often driven by a lack of self-love. You want to be like
someone else because you don’t like who you are, or don’t see the value in your
current self. This usually indicates that a person already does not operate
with the eyes of spirit, because they do not know what is truly valuable. As for
wanting things other people own, this is more so a variant of greed.
7.
Sloth – A reluctance to work or make an effort. The
main problem with such laziness is that it keeps people from doing good, even
if it also means they may not be doing anything bad to others. It follows that
such personal idleness or apathy stops a person from improving situations they
come across. Also, laziness not only reduces the speed of growth and ascension,
but increases the likelihood of spiritual regression. It is ultimately the act
of allowing mediocrity in one’s life.
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