OR “The Meaning of Life”

Foreword

This [apart from this Foreword] is a paper I presented in a seminar several decades ago.  Not only did no one there show any interest in it beyond sounding interested on the day, but since then… on the several occasions in which I have [in a moment of weakness] suggested to someone that they might like to read my paper, they have rejected it without ever knowing what the content was. Actually, that is the majority of cases; there were some cases in which the person did actually (purportedly) read it; in these remaining cases, the person rejected it on the basis of reading into it something it did not say — the same thing in every case, interestingly. … Actually, on second thoughts, there have been two people (that I can think of) who said that they would like me to send them a copy; in both cases I failed to do so; I suppose I should allow the theoretical possibility that one of those might have not rejected it on some irrational basis (unlike all of those who (purportedly) have actually read it).

Apart from some close friends, then… there has not ever been a single person who has presented a coherent reason for rejecting the material… nor a single person who has accepted it. After three decades, I consider myself to have won by forfeit, so to speak.

Since the original presenting of this paper, I have been working on expanding it into a book. This is not merely fleshing it out; the form presented herein is merely a description of an argument (or just a description of a position), as opposed to actually qualifying as argumentation of a thesis.  Repeating… the content herein is coherent [there is one non-significant mistake], but is not argued adequately.

Much more recently, I have written a book — a “Chapter 0” — in which I carefully explain that it is not reasonable for people to reject my work [even if they have not actually read it!] when it is internally and externally coherent, and other peoples’ [“mainstream Christianity”] world view is incoherent and consciously paradoxical.  [I argue the latter rigorously.] At the time of writing, I am hoping to publish that [“Chapter 0”] soon… although I am still balking at having a title that actually represents the content. The original book [of the content herein] is currently on the backburner, but I do hope to publish it some day (if I can get over the massive rejection).

p.s. I am beyond caring what anyone thinks of this any more.  If you disagree with it… exceptionless past instances say that you probably have not even bothered to read any of it, or that if you purportedly have you are probably being irrational.  If you think it is okay or wonderful, and/or it changes your life… that is what you would expect from exchanging incoherence and paradox for truth.  What do you want me to do?

Abstract

In this paper, I argue for some adjustments of the propositions constituting the Problem of Evil.  I argue that the existing explanations for the existence of evil fail, and offer an alternative resolution of it that is based on the tenet that the existence of evil was not explicitly intended by God.  I argue a position on how and why evil came into existence, and on the reason for the existence of the physical creation.  I then attempt to explicate evil’s appearance and defeat.

Introduction

The Problem of Evil admits of a number of subtle variations.  I shall be arguing the Moral Problem of Evil.  I shall be presenting a theodicy — an account of why evil exists.  The implications for the Logical Problem of Evil will be apparent.

Having concluded that the physical creation exists to address the existence of evil, I shall argue that Satan expected to succeed in defining a domain apart from God, and that God countered by extending His love to even His enemies.

I assume core Christian beliefs, and I assume a libertarian view of free will.

Part 1 — The Advent of Evil

The Problem of Evil

Our starting-point is the following premises.

• God exists.
• God is omnipotent (all-powerful).
• God is perfectly good.
• Evil exists.

The idea of the Problem of Evil is that the premise that evil exists is inconsistent with the other premises — if God is materially and morally able to prevent evil, and He desires to, then evil is excluded… and that the premises about God all express core Christian beliefs.

“God is Good.”

There is the question of whether the tenet that God is good implies that He is proactively opposed to evil.  It is generally accepted that it does not (see, e.g., Moreland and Craig 2003, p538, citing Plantinga, McCloskey 1974, p7, citing Plantinga) — that this would constitute an additional premise.

There are many things that God has done, that one might consider to be evil, at face value — such as instructing one of His prophets to marry a prostitute (Hosea 1: 2, 3: 1).  I venture that the Biblical view of such things is that they issue from God’s holiness.  This is strikingly different from how God would behave, if He was merely good, and not holy.

I shall short-circuit the above debate, then, by conceding that it is in the nature of God to be proactively opposed to evil — to be holy.  In turn, arguably, holy implies good, so I shall leave the latter as understood.

“God is Omnipotent”

The point of the premise, “God is omnipotent.”, is that God is definitely able to prevent evil, “physically” (so to speak).  However, this ignores an important dimension of the issue. If (hypothetically) God is “physically” able to prevent an evil being from doing evil, but does not have authority over that one, then arguably He is not able morally.

Of course, that is hypothetical, but the point remains, that the Problem of Evil requires also the premise that God does indeed have authority over all beings.

This, too, is accepted as true of God, by Christians.

The premises of The Problem of Evil — given the modifications for which I have argued — are thus as follows.

• God exists.
• God is absolutely sovereign over all that exists.
• God is omnipotent.
• God is holy.
• Evil exists.

Let us begin with the existing popular explanations for the existence of evil.

Accepted Theories

I venture that the standard Christian view is as follows.

I shall argue that this approach is untenable. There are two widely-accepted theories.

(1) The Free Will Defence

One theory runs as follows.

I present it as a theodicy, with an opening premise that I have heard from many lay Christians. Beyond that, it is the Free Will Defence (see Moreland and Craig 2003, p539-541, citing Plantinga).

• God desires to be loved.
• The capacity for genuine love requires free will.
• Free will, in turn, implies the possibility of evil.
• Thus, in creating beings with free will, so that they might love Him, God would run a risk that evil will result.
• God — desiring to be loved — chose to run this risk, and, unfortunately, evil did result.

I suggest that there is a difficulty with this line of thought, being that it fails to accommodate the next stage of human existence.  Heaven involves beings who have free will, and who love God, but who will never sin.

The position in question maintains simply that the existence of free will implies the possibility of evil.  I venture that the one difference that this theory entertains is that we will have been delivered from our sinful natures through death.  However — as I shall argue later — sin arose originally in the spiritual creation, through a being who (arguably) did not already have a sinful nature.  Also, Adam and Eve did not have sinful natures before the Fall.

Obviously there is, indeed, some systematic difference between Earth and Heaven.  However, the tenets that genuine love requires free will and that free will implies the possibility of evil seem to have the implication — arguably unacceptable — that evil might arise in Heaven.

(2) The Means-to-an-End View

The root premise in the other widely-known view is that God is absolutely sovereign over everything. It follows (it is argued) that, if evil is to exist, God must have explicitly intended it. The question, then, is why.

It is necessary to draw a distinction, here, between the concept that God intends that evil exist, in principle, and the concept that God explicitly wills any particular actual evil deed. The latter is unacceptable, as it implicates God in the evil deed, thus implying that He is evil. Free will is thus included in the picture, although it plays only an incidental rôle.

I shall treat C. S. Lewis’s defence, in The Problem of Pain, of this view.

We begin with a sinful human being. We observe that this person builds character through enduring suffering (Romans 5: 3-5). In other words, evil has a beneficial effect. However, if this is only that it purges one of evil (which seems to be argued by C. S. Lewis in The Problem of Pain — Lewis, pp95, pp105-107, 114, 115, p118), this would not explain why God brought evil into the picture in the first place.

In fact, the Bible tells us that even Jesus was made, “perfect through suffering” (Hebrews 2: 10). Thus, there is the intrinsic disvalue of evil, and there is the instrumental value of character-building. The latter must outweigh the former, if it is to be morally acceptable for God to intend that evil exist.

Consider, however: what does the work is not being evil oneself, but suffering the effects of evil. Actually, it is only suffering that is directly implicated.

The purpose was to explain evil. Suffering implies evil only if it is not theoretically possible for suffering to be inflicted on a person, except by an evil agency… or if suffering itself is intrinsically evil.

Let us assume the opposite of the latter alternative — that suffering is not intrinsically evil. If this obtained, a good agency could inflict suffering. This contradicts the former premise, which was that an evil agency was required. Rejecting the latter premise thus implies rejecting the other as well… which would imply rejecting the theory. Thus, the theory requires latter premise, which is that suffering is intrinsically evil.

Under this theory, then, there are two evils — the evil agency that it seeks to explain, and suffering. The instrumental value of these must outweigh both combined, if God is to be justified in allowing evil.

This represents an ethical conflict. The theory requires that God be right to intend both the evil and the good that results from it.

Consider, however: if the ethical calculus justifies the two evils — suffering and evil agency — then it would certainly justify only the suffering. Similarly to the above, God would be right to intend only the evil of suffering, and the good that results from it.

Since the outcome of the ethical calculus is that this is right, God would do no wrong in inflicting the suffering Himself. However, given this, no evil agency is required.

Since the point was to explain evil agency, the theory fails.

The Source of Evil

The position on the source of evil, that I present here, I have had to develop myself; if it exists elsewhere, I have never come across it.

I consider the other positions that I have heard to be consciously incoherent; I see no point in highlighting any inconsistencies, when their proponents are already well aware of them. I would like to make one point: if God explicitly intended that evil exist, creating persons with genuine free will is not a sure way of achieving this… and creating machines and pretending that they have free will not only is misleading, but also introduces a red herring.

As I understand it, the following points are widely accepted by Christians.

• God is holy — He is positively and adamantly opposed to evil.
• Human beings were created in God’s image, with this including being persons — which in turn means that they are not machines, and have personal projects.
• Evil exists.

I suggest that the tenet that God must not be behind the existence of evil is, not even a deduction, but merely the corollary of the premise that God is holy.

I suggest that — given that evil exists, and can not have come from God — there is only one viable alternative, being that it came from somewhere else.

I suggest that it is true by definition that being and doing evil requires that one be a person, by definition.

I suggest that it follows that evil came from a person other than God.  I suggest, further, that any person who exists, other than God, must have been created by God (or been created by a person created by God, etc.).

It would be possible to have a rich discussion about whether or not God should not have created personal beings, given the possibility of evil. However, my considered opinion is that, in the end, it boils down to one point. This is that the decision to create or not would have been a decision of the sort with which we are all familiar, where the outcome, once known, hypothetically would have made the decision simple, but, nonetheless, the original decision itself is a step into the dark. [Obviously, I do not subscribe to the view that God can both see the future and act, in the present, on the basis of what He sees, but there is not room to argue this.]

So we come to my theodicy.

When Did Evil Come into Existence?

The Bible tells us that things are running according to a plan of God that goes back to before the creation of this world (John 17: 24, Acts 2: 23, Rom 8: 29, 1 Cor. 2: 7–8, Eph 1: 4–5, Eph 3: 8–9, Eph 3: 10–11, 2 Tim 1: 9–10, 1 Pet 1: 20, [Rev 13: 8], Rev 17: 8).  This plan revolves around the Cross… and the Cross was the addressing of evil.

Thus, the chronology is as follows: • God created Satan, • Satan fell, • God formulated a Plan, • God created the world.

The Creation in a Context of Evil

We know that evil came into existence at some point, and will have been annihilated, a some later point. That is, the existence of evil is for a significant, but finite, period of time.

This gives rise to two questions: “Why did God not instantaneously destroy evil at the moment of its coming-into-existence?”, and (given that He did not, but would later), “Why did God create the world during the existence of evil?”.

The Timing Viewpoint

We will consider the possibility of a connection between evil and the creation from the point of view of when God might deal with evil.  There are three possibilities: • instantaneously, • never or
• something between those two.

Never is not an option, because God is holy, because He has declared that He most certainly will destroy evil, and because, in a sense, He already has.

The first option — instantaneously — does not obtain, but is the interesting one, because it is what we would have expected. In both the first and second cases, God annihilates evil; why did He not do so immediately?

The Reason

God is holy; His will is to annihilate evil… but He did not do so. We can be certain that this requires a Reason.

We can deduce something else, as well.

Failing Him being able to instantaneously annihilate evil, because of a certain Reason, His course is set: He must address the Reason.  When the Reason has been addressed, He will immediately annihilate evil. (We know that this is possible, since we know that evil will be destroyed.)

Reconciling the Plan and the Reason

Ephesians 1: 9-10 tells us that God’s purpose was a plan for the fullness of time, to unite all things in the Christ, things in heaven and things on earth.  Colossians 1: 20 says that, through the Christ (by the blood of His Cross), God has reconciled all things (on earth and in heaven) to Himself.

This creation was made through and for the Christ (John 1: 3, 1 Corinthians 8: 6, Colossians 1: 15 – 20, Hebrews 1: 2). All this is according to a Plan of God that was formulated before the foundation of the world.

However… the Cross is not, itself, the means by which God brings about the annihilation of evil. This follows from the fact that evil exists for a significant time both before and after the Cross; God’s holiness would require that there be no delay.

The Cross is certainly the centrepiece of the annihilation of evil. However, it is as a part of this creation that it achieves its purpose. Revelation 12: 11 tells us that the accuser is conquered by the saints, by the blood of the Lamb and by the word of their testimony. Ephesians 3: 1 – 12 talks about the mystery of Christ; we see in verses 9 – 11 that the hidden mystery of God’s plan was that His manifold wisdom, “might… be made known to the rulers and authorities in the heavenly places”, “through the church”. Verse 11 tells us that this was according to the eternal purpose which God has realised in Christ Jesus our Lord.

The reason that this physical world was created during the existence of evil is that it is to bring about the destruction of evil that we exist. (Hence Colossians 1: 24.)

Part 2 — The Conquest of Evil

Given the foregoing, I now seek to explicate the opening and closing scenarios in the existence of evil. We begin with Satan’s revolt.

The Nature of the Revolt

The fact that a number of angels Fell at the same time implies collusion.

There are three possible alternatives for the content of Satan’s intention in revolting. One is that he merely wanted to go his own way — to have complete free will, so to speak. (This implies rejecting morality, since conforming with morality would imply not rejecting God’s authority.) The second is as the first, plus with him wanting to be like God, in having his own domain and being sovereign over it. The third possibility is as the second, but with him seeking to take over God’s domain.

The first alternative fails to include the other angels. I suggest the third alternative, of open rebellion, would be simply unfeasible. Of course it is also not the Biblical picture. This leaves the middle alternative, in which Satan seeks his own domain, independent of God.

Note that the result would be that Satan would indeed have a domain, constituted by the other Fallen angels.

Satan’s Artifice

Since the revolt involves collusion among a number of angels, it is inescapable that they would have expected to get away with it (I venture). This accords with the point that in fact God was not (immediately) able to address Satan’s revolt.

Getting away with it implies not being punished. There is an apparent contradiction here — what Satan did clearly was morally wrong, and we know that he will be punished.

To explain this, I need to introduce briefly a concept that deserves a deep and detailed treatment. Morality is generally discussed as though it has two states — morally wrong, and not morally wrong. I submit that there is a third state, being what I call the “morally noble”. An example of this is a man offering a seat on a bus to a woman. I submit that there is a moral obligation to do what is morally noble, but not such that failing to is punishable in the same way as is (e.g.) murder. (Failing the former, there would be no reason at all to do good; failing the latter, one would incur punishments for an infinitude of omissions.) I shall call prohibitions against moral evil “negative”, and exhortations towards the morally noble “positive”.

The key point I wish to make is that Satan walking away from God represents (only) a violation of a positive moral principle… and it is thus that it is not punishable. Note that it would still result in a Fall, since it is a moral violation.

The general Christian view is that this is, indeed, a violation of a negative moral principle — that we are responsible to God’s authority, in virtue of having been created by Him. I shall seek to undermine this. I see three possible reasons for taking the moral principle as negative: God’s creatorhood, His authority and His absoluteness.

Authority

Let us begin with the concept of authority.

Suppose that I am a citizen of a country in which littering is illegal. Suppose that I move to another country in which littering is not illegal. If I now litter, the fact that this is illegal in the country to which I used to belong is irrelevant.; I have done nothing illegal

If, conversely, I were to litter while still living in the first country, and then move and transfer my citizenship to the second one, I will have been guilty of littering, by the first country’s laws, in spite of having moved.

The former is what I am claiming that Satan did; he revolted, not in the sense of open conflict, but in the sense of simply walking away from God. If walking away from an authority is morally wrong, it is not the fact itself of the authority that makes it so, nor its content, but because it is endorsed by some principle with moral weight.

Absoluteness

What, then, of the concept that God’s being absolute is what makes it morally wrong, particularly in the negative sense, to walk away from God (assuming the pertinent moral tenet)?

It is quite plausible that, in virtue of God being absolute, the concept is incoherent, of walking away from Him… where this means “physically” (that is, materially) removing oneself from God’s domain (at least before God created Hell). However, Satan’s purpose was “merely” to remove himself from God’s authority. The former is impossible, and (I have argued that) a group of angels would not collude to attempt the impossible.

Conversely, what Satan purposed was not theoretically impossible.

What we are interested in is the possibility that God’s being absolute implies some relevant moral difference between walking away from any other domain of authority, and walking away from His. In fact, we have been rather lax with our use of the term “absolute”. Does it mean that God’s authority has more force than other instances of authority? Does it mean that there is nothing that is not subject to God’s authority? I venture that the term does not do the required work of endorsing God’s
authority — and that we are forced to conclude that the term “absolute” represents no moral difference.

Creatorhood

What, then, of the tenet that the basis for God’s authority is His being the creator of the pertinent (viz., all) beings?

When a personal being creates something, the existence of that thing is a function of the intent, for it, of the creator. If it fails to serve this purpose, it fails to justify its existence. This principle (I venture) is universal — covering matter created from nothing, forms applied to matter (such as in art and engineering)… and personal creatures. I venture that this is what gives rise to the moral obligation (on the part of persons, at least) to fulfil God’s intention for them.

If God’s purpose for the persons whom He created was that they should mature and then step out from under His authority… then they would discharge their moral obligation to Him by doing that very thing, and the moral principle that it would be wrong to leave God’s authority would not obtain.

Consider, however: if indeed it were God’s purpose that His creatures walk away… if one of the creatures were to fail to do this, would this count as a negative or a positive moral evil (or something else again)? Because the creature is a person, and because the content of God’s intent, in creating it, has to do with the creature and its personhood, the moral calculus is a function of the creature, rather than of the Creator.

I suggest that God created spiritual persons, not for reasons to do with Himself, but because personal beings are intrinsically valuable. I submit that the point for Him must have been that they flourish as persons — that anything else would not fit with the nature and character of God.

Given all this… if there is a moral wrong in Satan walking away from God’s authority, its content has Satan as its subject, and it is of the positive type; it has to do with Satan violating his own
personhood — which walking away from God would certainly represent. Of course, this is not to say that God would not be offended and hurt by this. Note that the fact that this is a moral violation of a type I have called “positive” does not mean that it can not be profoundly bad.

The picture that emerges from what I have argued is that what Satan achieved (at least initially) was that he escaped from God’s responsibility and right to punish him.

Punishment, HLL and the Substantive Fall

It is generally accepted by Christians that Hell is constituted by separation from God. This separation, in turn, is regarded as the ultimate punishment, on the grounds that it constitutes separation from all good.

It is also generally accepted by Christians that the punishment for sin is Hell.

I have no objection to the concept that Hell as uniquely bad (although I do think that a possible world is coherent, in which a being who was not Fallen could be and do good independently of God). I shall present two arguments, however, that Hell is not definitively the punishment for sin. What exactly I mean by this will become clear; fundamental is the conceptual separation of the concept of being excluded from the (viz., God’s) universe, from the concept of being punished.

In the following discussion, I sometimes wish to refer to Hell as, definitively, separation from God,. To that end, I stipulate the term “HLL” to refer to separation from God, as instantiated in Hell, without the associated connotations of punishment.

Just Punishment

As I noted, Hell is generally regarded by Christians as the ultimate punishment. Over and above this, Hell is infinite in length.

The punishment for a given evil deed is a function of how evil it is. A punishment is unjust if it is too small or too great.

If the just penalty for (for instance) taking out someone’s eye is (say) to lose an eye, then a punishment different in its particulars would be unjust unless it were of commensurate severity. I submit that the just penalty for taking out someone’s eye is, indeed, not greater than receiving the same… and I venture that being subject to ultimate torment, for an infinite period of time, is not commensurate.

By the same token, any arbitrary, finite number of deeds that were evil, but not ultimately evil, would also deserve a punishment less than one that was ultimate in degree and infinite in length.

God, being just, would not punish unjustly.

Arguably, the obvious conclusion — that Hell is unjust — is not acceptable. I suggest the alternative: that HLL is not a punishment — meaning that HLL is imposed on persons for some reason or purpose other than as a punishment.

What Jesus Suffered

The other consideration is that, if Hell — HLL particularly — indeed were the punishment for sins, then Jesus would have had to suffer this penalty when He was paying for our sins, and He did not. [The following observation is not original with me, but I could not feasibly locate the source.] What the Bible teaches is that Jesus took on our sins, suffered pain and death for them, and died crying, “It is finished.” (John 19: 30). (See also Mark 15: 38.) It is His death, particularly, that the Bible regards as being full payment on our behalf (e.g. Rom 5: 6-10, see also (eg) Rom 6: 23).

One might argue, in response, that being “forsaken” (Mark 15: 34) by God (which happened to Jesus) is exactly the same thing as being excluded from God’s domain. However, Jesus was in that state only briefly, whereas Hell is temporally infinite. Of course, this counter-argument is plausible only if there is some other reason for God to forsake Him… and there is — being that He had been, “made… to be sin” (2 Cor 5: 21). One might object, in reply, that the fact that God forsook Jesus because He was made sin shows that that is how God reacts to sinners. Indeed, it is (as a principle)… but this is actually what makes it plausible that it is not a punishment for, particularly, their sins.

I argued that HLL is not a punishment for sins. I venture that, instead, it has to do with the person — that God created Hell because He will have nothing to do with those who are evil.

The purpose of God’s solution is not to win the right to punish evil persons. Failing the tenet that Satan has escaped punishment, there is the fact that we see God punishing people in the Old Testament.

Actually, there is an anomaly in the picture. Ostensibly, what Satan wanted was to go off by himself and be the god of a domain separate from that of God. Unfortunately, this was not possible — it was not possible to escape from God’s domain, as it was absolute. The situation, instead, was that Satan’s domain was present within that of God.

Thus, God has the purpose of casting Satan out of His presence and domain. To make this possible, God had to create Hell. (Note that Satan does not react by voluntarily leaving the presence of God and dwelling in Hell — clearly there is something about God’s domain that he prefers.)

Of course, God also had the purpose of saving any and every Fallen angel that He could.

God’s Artifice

The Nature of the Resolution

The resolution of the problem could not be theoretical. If it were, it would not take time. Thus, it must be practical.

There is not space to argue that a particular scenario is required; I shall leave this as what God actually did.

The difficulty is that, ostensibly, Satan could thwart any special scenario by simply declining to participate. It is arguably anomalous that Satan conceded to participate in the physical creation scenario (henceforth “PCS”). God must deploy a scenario with a hidden element, such that Satan unwittingly participates in bringing about the required change. This could not be by deception, as that would not be according to the nature of God; it would have to be simply something that Satan never saw coming. Indeed, it works only because Satan is already convinced that God can not win.

Theoretically, there is also the alternative that the participation of evil beings is not required. I actually think that this could obtain. I submit, tentatively, that there are two reasons that Satan is involved — neither being informed by universal principle. One is that the content of the scenario requires that Adam and Eve (and hence the whole of humanity) fall under Satan’s godhood… and that they Fall particularly by transgressing a command from God (as opposed to escaping from God’s authority as Satan did)… and that, through this transgression (that is, not without it) they achieve fully His image (that is, that they acquire the Knowledge of Good and Evil, although of course, conversely, they also Fall)… and, arguably, that Jesus die at the hand of those for whom He was dying… and other such details. The other is in order that Satan have the opportunity to defend his interests as best he can, in the name of fairness.

The Mystery

I venture that the point of the Old Testament period is simply that there is absolutely nothing that could induce God’s chosen people to serve Him.

This brings us to Jesus’s death and resurrection. 1 Cor 2: 6-8 says that, “None of the rulers of this age understood this; for if they had, they would not have crucified the Lord of glory.” [Killing Jesus was something that Satan would have refrained from if he had known its full implications; this would have thwarted the PCS.]

The Bible (Eph 3: 2-11) talks of a mystery, hidden for ages, and revealed in the Christ. I can not accept that Jesus’s death and resurrection to pay for sins would count as a mystery that would take Satan completely by surprise; I suggest that it is clearly prophesied throughout the Old Testament.

In fact, the Bible explicitly tells us that, “the mystery of Christ” (Eph 3: 4), is that, “the Gentiles are fellow heirs, members of the same body, and partakers of the promise in Christ Jesus through the gospel.” (Eph 3: 6).

Now, one might concede that that was a mystery, but the content does not sound especially significant. What is there, about the Gentiles being included in Israel, that is not already realised in the Israelites being members?

Revelation 12 tells of a war in heaven, temporally around the events of Jesus’s life. I have argued that Satan’s revolt was not explicitly conflict with God, because he could not hope to win. It seems to me, then, that outright war is a startling eventuality. It says in Rev 12: 12 that, “he [Satan] knows that his time is short.” It seems to me, then, that the above mystery [that is, some mystery, with the above being the only candidate] represents God’s winning move, and that Satan — realising that his defeat was now suddenly inevitable — took the desperate option of outright war with Heaven.

My interpretation of these points is that a mystery was a necessary move on God’s part, that the inclusion of the Gentiles into Israel is the only candidate, and that indeed it resulted in Satan’s defeat being inevitable.

This brings us back to the question of what the significance of this is. I suggest that there is a good clue in the fact that it was beyond Satan to work this out or think of it.

The Jews and the Gentiles

The picture that Satan expected — the one clearly expressed in the Old Testament — was that God would forgive the sins of His people, and transform their hearts. What Satan did not expect was that God would do this also for those who were not His people.

How is this so significant, if the point of the Old Covenant was to show that the Israelites were clearly not God‘s people, and irrecoverably so?

I suggest that the above is precisely the point. This is a major theme of Paul, in Romans: e.g., Romans 9: 8 “… it is not the children of the flesh who are the children of God, but the children of the promise are reckoned as descendants.” The point is that the concept of the people of God was never really about a geo-political group; the true Israel was always the children of the promise.

What it means, then, for the Gentiles to be included in Israel is that those who are not God’s people are counted as though they are — those who are God’s enemies will be reconciled to Him; those who have hearts of stone will be given hearts of flesh (Ezek 36: 26).

The reason that this never could, and never would, occur to Satan was that God does not have fellowship with evil — absolutely and incontrovertibly. This principle was now radically compromised, through what Jesus won on the Cross — those who were not God’s people now were. It was not merely that they were forgiven; God now took delight in dwelling inside of those whose hearts had been, were, and continued to be, irretrievably evil.

Satan had escaped from the authority of God, but he had not escaped from His love. God wanted him back, even as he was — vilely and irretrievably evil. Satan had committed the positive moral evil of severing his relationship with God by rejecting His authority. By the measure of making this irrelevant, through Jesus dying to pay for all violations of His authority, God had now undone this severing.

Now, if Satan or anyone else rejected God, they would be rejecting His person (including His goodness and love), particularly, not His position (including His authority). By the same token, it would now be perfectly appropriate for God to exclude them from His presence.

The Church

I have argued that the PCS is the means by which God addresses the existence of evil, and that, being holy, God must do this without delay. If, then, the existence of evil had been dealt with through the Cross, God certainly would not wait 2000 years or more before actually bringing evil to an end. Conversely, then, this period is a necessary part of the scenario.

The passage in Ephesians, that explicitly says what the mystery was, goes on as follows. “The plan of the mystery… [is that] through the church the manifold wisdom of God might now be made known to the principalities and powers in the heavenly places.” (Eph 3: 9-10). We see, also, in Rev 12: 11, that, “they [“our brethren” (v10)] have conquered him [“the accuser” (v10)] by the blood of the Lamb and by the word of their testimony, for they loved not their lives even unto death.”

Ultimately, that does not tell us why evil has not yet been brought to an end. Looking back at what God set out to achieve, there are two points: to secure casting Satan into Hell, and to save any and every Fallen angel that He can.

Given that the angels colluded in revolting, and given that, until after the death of Jesus, it appeared to them that they would get away with it… arguably, it follows that none of them would even consider repenting until that point. From this it would follow that, were God to wrap the scenario up the instant that Jesus was resurrected, He would fail completely in the latter of His two objectives. The corollary is that God would have to leave time, after that point, for any at all to repent.

Given this, in turn, it seems to me to be fairly likely that this is what Eph 3: 9-10 (quoted above) is about — that the principalities and powers in question are the ones who have Fallen.

Heaven

I have argued that Free Will is a sufficient condition for evil to be possible. The idea was that God could not deliberately bring evil into existence, and that Free Will was thus implicated.

Ostensibly, the situation in Heaven is the same as the situation before the first evil — there are beings with Free Will, and Free Will implies the possibility of evil. The fact that Heaven is guaranteed to be absolutely free of evil thus raises the question of just how this is to be achieved.

I suggest that the solution is surprisingly simple. I have argued that Satan and his followers revolted because they thought they could get away with it. I suggest that this is all that is necessary. Regardless of the particulars of how God might react, the simple fact is that anyone who revolted could not hope to get away with it. I venture that this, in concert with (what I would regard as) the very small appeal of swapping life under God for anything else, would be all that was necessary to ensure that evil never eventuated again.

Conclusion

I have argued that this present physical creation must exist within a context containing evil for a pertinent reason. I rejected other accounts of this, and concluded that indeed this creation is God’s method for dealing with the existence of evil.

I then sought to explicate Satan’s revolt, and God’s response to it, arguing that Satan thought to get away with it, and that God dealt with the existence of evil by rendering it possible for Himself to have relationship even with evil beings — thus making it just for Him to cast away from Himself any who rejected Him even on those terms.

I positioned the Old Testament period as showing that Fallen beings are incorrigibly evil, and the New Testament period as an effort to win back the Fallen angels.

Finally, I argued that the guarantee that Heaven will be free from sin arises from the fact that evil no longer holds sufficient attraction for those in Heaven.