Is man naturally good or evil?
610931
When you say "naturally" you need to observe the fact that there was a "fall" into sin. Nature, as originally created by God was holy and upright. So, prior to the fall man was good by nature. After the fall our nature became corrupt and sinful, therefore, now, man is evil by nature.
1175690
Actually, this is of great debate. Some people say that human nature is good, possibly because of our tendency toward community and moral universalism (which is a debate among a few also). However, some people also say it is human nature to be evil and that is exploited in modern society with the loss of God as a societal focal point.  I actually believe that as humans, we are neutral because we have the ability to do great things on both sides of the spectrum.\n\nHowever, I noticed that you're comparing sins, murder and criminality (like stealing and lying) and saying stealing to live is not a sin. I agree with you! But the problem is that we live in a society built on capitalism, which demands that goods are made cheaply and sold for great profit. Workers are exploited, and there's a large mass of poor people to support the system. Capitalism cannot work any other way. It's not necessarily the rich people's fault.\n\nThe real problem is what we are taught growing up.  Everyone is told that if only they work hard enough, they all can earn lots of money and be happy, the American Dream to be middle class and middle management, if not higher. First of all, money doesn't bring happiness. And second of all, capitalism cannot function with a lot of people being more than the "poor" level, so people are forced to live in situations where they don't have enough food or money to pay rent. Surviving is not sinning.\n\nThat was addressing criminality as a sin part. Now you ask why god gave us evil. We, as people, are like the world and are neutral. The world creates many natural disasters which destroy and kill. This is part of its cycle. God is our guiding influence toward good, but since people are capable of evil and have free will, no one can stop someone from choosing destruction if that's their ultimate choice (what they would choose beyond others' talking to them, etc.)  Simply, God did not introduce evil. God introduced free will, which ran the risk of evil even though great things were possible through good. It was a risk factor and we have to learn through society to moderate those that are not choosing the best options, and this society does not best facilitate that.\n\nEDIT: And to respond to those that say evil is from Satan. The Bible stories are just that, stories to explain to ancient people why things are the way they are in the world.\n\nI do not believe in Satan. I believe it is a philosophical argument we examined from Anselm (a Christian philosopher if you must know.)  God is eternal, infinite, incorruptible. The only one.  God is also pure good. Evil is the absence of good, so everything has differing degrees of good and evil in them. Satan represents the entire lack of good, pure evil. But if Satan is pure evil, he is incorruptible (cannot be made more evil), but the only incorruptible thing, is God. So Satan does not exist at all because Satan cannot be the same as God.\n\nSatan does not tempt people to sin, people choose it of their own free will.
907879
Well, I suppose in the most basic of terms, "good" is what is beneficial and helpful to the object of the action (it is "good" of me to pet my dog, as he likes it).  "Evil" would then have to be the opposite of that, the absence of good; what is harmful to the object of the action (it is "evil" of me to hit my dog, as that would hurt him).  Those are, I think, the absolutely most simple definitions.
798827
Is man good? You are knowledgable. I have seen your questions and replies....you seem to have a head on your shoulders. So. Like law regarding entropy, is man born going from good to better, or is man born and molded, pushed, punished, terrorized, into beinf what we call morally acceptable? I, as an opinion, can not believe in an'inherent goodness' in man. I just look at a child who is becoming self aware, and the first things learned are "NO!", screaming for attention, taking toys from others...doing everything we have to teach them not to do. They do not come out and learn politeness and giving, first. They are changed into that.
542405
according to me god is just something our ancestors story. nature is god. a good soul is god. i can assure u there is not a single good soul in this world. v must try to b good.
859506
man kind is the original path of life.\nmoney is part of life only.
1006914
By DEFINTION, God is good. \nAnything He does is good, never bad.\nTherefore, if He does something that *seems* bad to us, there is a good reason for it.
1092979
If all things are from God, than what evil is there aside from what the human mind perceives. \n\nGood and Bad, are like positive and negative energy. In harmony and in balance, these entities are useful forces. When they become out of balance and one over shadows the other, we sometimes fail to understand and our perception becomes distorted and refer to it as, evil.
419670
Absolute goodness is impossible. Its logical corollary is absolute evil, and if absolute evil existed, these two powers would cancel each other out. (Just like the famous example of the irresistible force and the immovable object).\nThe main philosophical problem here is defining exactly what we mean by 'good' and 'bad'. Sunlight is good - very good, or life on our planet would consist of tube worms and anerobic bacteria. However, too much sun is dehydrating and destroys life. So it is clear that sunlight is morally neutral, or if you please, morally mixed. Gravitation likewise - without it we couldn't walk on the surface of our planet, but when you're in a plane that has dead engines, you might wish that gravity didn't exist. Everything in nature is like this.\nOne of the key errors in theology is asserting that God is beyond nature or outside of it. Since by definition God/dess is omnipresent (everywhere at once) and infinite, then it is plain that there can be no place and no thing in which the Divine is not present. This is the 'heresy' of Pantheism, but it can't be refuted with logic.
203193
Unfortunately, yes.  Good and Evil are human attributes, so an evil person is one of us, as much as we'd like to disown him.
370949
There's never an easy answer to questions like this. Except for rare examples (usually people with personality disorders, such as sociopaths), you cannot classify a person as good or evil.\n\nGengis Khan did lead his people in a brilliant campaign, militarily speaking. He also ordered the slaughter of thousands, the pilleage of hundreds of villages and settlements, and all sorts of actions that would be considered good by his own people and evil by his enemies.\n\nI'd say he's neither hero nor murderer. He was a great leader, and he took measures to rule with a strong fist, a necessity at his time to control his troops and to send a message to the other nations. \n\nGengis Khan had a project that can be read either as a wish to unite the world (under his rule) or as a desire to dominate it. It all depends on which side you're on.
473236
Evil is man made. God has given us free will. It is up to us to recognize evil and choose to do what is right. In the end, our good will be rewarded.
330496
I'd rather be good cause I believe in the thing called Karma. As they say: "what goes around comes around." So, when you do good, good comes back to you.\n\nHowever, there are times in a man's life when doing a bit of evil could bring much good. This is what I call, a sacrifice.
1165601
Good and evil are relative terms. What is good to one person may not be so to another, just as what is evil to one person may not be to another. For example, I think that eating meat and subjecting animals to cruel experiments are evil acts, though I am sure that most other people would disagree with me about that. Also, most of us would agree that the Holocaust is a prime example of evil, but you can be sure that the Nazis thought that their actions were perfectly acceptable. There is no universal concept of good and evil.
924722
you're not suppose to worry. everything is happening as it should. There's nothinig you can do about. so really, there is no "evil" because it's being done according to a divine destiny. "good" and "evil" are illusions, and heaven and hell in the after life are illusions too. the bible says god is the alpha and omega, the first and the last, so we are born from God and we go back to God, regardless of what others and we may think. FACT. do the resaerch and you will learn that hell was put into the bible by constantine and the church to control the masses. Live every moment as if it's your last.
595996
Here's another noodle-baker.  If God is all powerful and all-benevolent, why is there evil in the world at all?  Either he is not all powerful (if he were he would have no evil) or else is not all-benevolent. (He could wipe out evil but chooses to allow evil things to happen anyways, something a loving and good God would not allow.)\nTake your pick, either way God is not all-perfect.
1010301
Not really, because if we didn't know what is evil, how would we know what is good? There would be no comparison and therefore good would be just what everything is.