Opus 2014-95: Acknowledge Evil, Avoid Judgement

The problem of evil continues to plague us. 

One of the common mistakes people make is to try to place blame for misfortune that has no obvious cause.  Take a case in point. 

(Joh 9:1-2 KJV)  And as Jesus passed by, he saw a man which was blind from his birth.  And his disciples asked him, saying, Master, who did sin, this man, or his parents, that he was born blind?

The disciples saw a man who had a terrible physical curse.  He had been blind from birth.  Since they probably had some work they were supposed to be doing and didn’t want to do it, they asked Jesus a question.  Some things never change.

Notice their assumption.  They assumed that the physical condition was a result of someone committing sin.  In one sense they were right.  Think Adam and Eve.  Death and disease are the result of sin.  It is also possible that his parents committed some sin which caused this.  For instance consider a baby born with HIV because his parents did not honor their marriage vows.  Sin was the cause.  Some babies are born blind because the mother has a sexually transmitted disease, herpes.  Again, this is the result of sinful sex.  The one thing we should know is that since he was blind from birth it could not have been his sin.

We need to be careful in assuming that people are totally responsible for their situations.  We really can’t know if someone has diabetes because of behavior or unavoidable genetics.  In my case the genes had the dispensation but the behavior gave access.  Is someone blind because of playing around with drugs or because they got poked in the eye.  Are people using EBT cards because they are lazy or because they really have not been able to find work?  It is easy to judge but we are called to back off on the judgement.

homo unius libri