Article June 29, 1912 Issue

An article entitled "Bible Sanity" raises the question as...

Alfred Farlow—Cincinnati, O.

American Israelite

An article entitled "Bible Sanity" raises the question as to whether the Scriptures teach that God is the creator or sender of evil. It is well to consider first the nature of God, which includes an understanding of the method and nature of His creation. Every question as to cause and effect should be answered according to such a fundamental proposition. St. John, assuming that God is infinite Spirit, Mind, declared that "all things were made by him; and without him was not any thing made that was made." In Genesis it is stated that God beheld His finished creation, "and, behold, it was very good," and that man was created "in his own image."

Thus the Scriptures harmonize with the generally accepted scientific truism that "like begets like;" that, since God, Spirit, Mind, good, created everything "after his kind," creation must be spiritual and good. The evidence of the material senses may discredit this proposition, but the fact still remains and we adhere steadfastly thereto, in keeping with the Scriptural teaching, "Yea; let God be true, but every man a liar," for the question in Science is not what seems but what is. Evil, being no part of the "very good" things of God, has no deific hence no accredited standing. It must therefore have only a seeming and not a real existence.

Christian Science does not deny that evil exists in erring human experience, in what Solomon called "the error of life," and that therefore it cannot be ignored but must be grappled with and overcome, even as a false belief must be destroyed by the exercising of one's understanding of the truth. This is in keeping with the Scriptural teaching, "Ye shall know the truth, and the truth shall make you free."

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