href="@public@vhost@g@gutenberg@html@files@34716@[email protected]#Page_109" tag="{http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml}a">109

XI. Maternity and the Evolution of Altruism 117 XII. The Omnipresent Ethical Trend 127
The Everlasting Reality of Religion I. Deo erexit Voltaire 133 II. The Reign of Law, and the Greek Idea of God 147 III. Weakness of Materialism 152 IV. Religion's First Postulate: the Quasi-Human God 163 V. Religion's Second Postulate: the undying Human Soul 168 VI. Religion's Third Postulate: the Ethical Significance of the Unseen World 171 VII. Is the Substance of Religion a Phantom, or an Eternal Reality? 174 VIII. The Fundamental Aspect of Life 177 IX. How the Evolution of Senses expands the World 182 X. Nature's Eternal Lesson is the Everlasting Reality of Religion 186

 

THE MYSTERY OF EVIL

I am the Lord, and there is none else. I form the light, and create darkness; I make peace, and create evil. I the Lord do all these things.—Isaiah, xiv. 6, 7.

Did not our God bring all this evil upon us?—Nehemiah, xiii. 18.

Οὐκ ἔοικε δ’ ἡ φύσις ἐπεισοδιώδης οὖσα ἐκ τῶν φαινομένων, ὥσπερ μοχθηρὰ τραγῳδία.—Aristotle, Metaphysica, xiii. 3.

 

I

The Serpent's Promise to the Woman

"Your eyes shall be opened, and ye shall be as gods, knowing good and evil." Genesis iii. 5.

The legend in which the serpent is represented as giving this counsel to the mother of mankind occurs at the beginning of the Pentateuch in the form which that collection of writings assumed after the return of the Jews from the captivity at Babylon, and there is good reason for believing that it was first placed there at that time. Allusions to Eden in the Old Testament literature are extremely scarce,[1] and the story of Eve's temptation first assumes prominence in the writings of St. Paul. The marks of Zoroastrian thought in it have often been pointed out. This garden of Eden is a true Persian paradise, situated somewhere in that remote wonderland of Aryana Vaëjo to which all Iranian tradition is so fond of pointing back. The wily serpent is a genuine Parsee serpent, and the spirit which animates him is that of the malicious and tricksome Ahriman, who takes delight in going about after the good creator Ormuzd and spoiling his handiwork. He is not yet identified with the terrible Satan, the accusing angel who finds out men's evil thoughts and deeds. He is simply a mischief-maker, and the punishment meted out to him for his mischief reminds one of many a curious passage in the beast epos of primitive peoples. As in the stories which tell why the mole is blind or why the fox has a bushy tail, the serpent's conduct is made to account for some of his peculiar attributes. As a punishment he is made to crawl upon his belly, and be forever an object of especial dread and loathing to all the children of Eve.

What, then, is the crime for which the serpent Ahriman thus makes bitter expiation? In what way has he spoiled Ormuzd's last and most wonderful creation? He has introduced the sense of sin: the man and the woman are afraid, and hide themselves from their Lord whom they have offended. Yet he has been not altogether a deceiving serpent. In one respect he had spoken profound truth. The man and the woman have become as gods. In the Hebrew story Jehovah says, "Behold the man is become as one of us;" that is to say, one of the Elohim or heavenly host, who know the good and the evil. Man has apparently become a creature against whom precautions need to be taken. It is hinted that by eating of the other tree and acquiring immortal life he would achieve some result not in accordance with Jehovah's