"One example would be the physical deterioration of our bodies. I don't think that would have happened, but for sin."
That may well be true. Mightn't it not also be true that physical death, while a "natural" result of sin, is allowed to occur as a benefice from God so that we need not exist in sin for an eternity in the flesh?
""Thus God did not create death, but we brought it upon ourselves out of an evil disposition. Nevertheless, He did not hinder the dissolution on account of the aforementioned causes, so that He would not make the infirmity immortal in us." +Basil the Great
In other words, is death an example of God's love? Certainly it was before the Incarnation. What about since?
"However, I would not take it so far as to say, for example, things like natural disasters are a result of man's sin. I see natural disasters as being the work of God's hand, for His own reasons."
Really? Might it not be better to say that these "evils" are imposed on us by the Evil One but allowed by God as "pedagogical punishments"? In this sense, sin distorts all of creation which was created perfect.
+Basil the Great puts it well:
" "Famines and droughts and floods are common plagues of cities and nations which check the excess of evil. Therefore, just as the physician is a benefactor even if he should cause pain or suffering to the body (for he strives with the disease, and not with the sufferer), so in the same manner God is good Who administers salvation to everyone through the means of particular chastisements. But you, not only do you not speak evilly of the physician who cuts some members, cauterizes others, and excises others again completely from the body, but you even give him money and address him as savior because he confines the disease to a small area before the infirmity can claim the whole body. However, when you see a city crushing its inhabitants in an earthquake, or a ship going down at sea with all hands, you do not shrink from wagging a blasphemous tongue against the true Physician and Savior."
and a few pages further on:
"And you may accept the phrase 'I kill and I will make to live' (Deut. 32:39) literally, if you wish, since fear edifies the more simple. 'I will smite and I will heal' (Deut. 32:39). It is profitable to also understand this phrase literally; for the smiting engenders fear, while the healing incites to love. It is permitted you, nonetheless, to attain to a loftier understanding of the utterance. I will slay through sin and make to live through righteousness. 'But though our outward man perish, yet the inward man is renewed day by day' (II Cor. 4:16). Therefore, He does not slay one, and give life to another, but through the means which He slays, He gives life to a man, and He heals a man with that which He smites him, according to the proverb which says, 'For thou shalt beat him with the rod, and shalt deliver his soul from death' (Prov. 23:14). So the flesh is chastised for the soul to be healed, and sin is put to death for righteousness to live.... When you hear 'There shall be no evil in a city which the Lord hath not wrought' (cf. Amos 3:6), understand by the noun 'evil' that the word intimates the tribulation brought upon sinners for the correction of offenses. For Scripture says, 'For I afflicted thee and straitened thee, to do good to thee' (cf. Deut. 8:3); so too is evil terminated before it spills out unhindered, as a strong dike or wall holds back a river.
"For these reasons, diseases of cities and nations, droughts, barrenness of the earth, and the more difficult conditions in the life of each, cut off the increase of wickedness. Thus, such evils come from God so as to uproot the true evils, for the tribulations of the body and all painful things from without have been devised for the restraining of sin. God, therefore, excises evil; never is evil from God.... The razing of cities, earthquakes and floods, the destruction of armies, shipwrecks and all catastrophes with many casualties which occur from earth or sea or air or fire or whatever cause, happen for the sobering of the survivors, because God chastises public evil with general scourges.
"The principal evil, therefore, which is sin, and which is especially worthy of the appellation of evil, depends upon our disposition; it depends upon us either to abstain from evil or to be in misery.
"Of the other evils, some are shown to be struggles for the proving of courage... while some are for the healing of sins... and some are for an example to make other men sober."
" K: Can one of the elect, by his very presence somewhere, change creation around him to its created state?
FK: I doubt it, but I may not be fully following you."
The Desert Fathers have left us countless stories of holy monastics around whom, by virtue of their advanced theosis, nature returned to a perfect and peaceful state, where the lion lays down with the lamb so to speak. many of these stories are told to Orthodox children to this very day. I was told them and I told them to my boys. Examples of these disruptions in the force of Evil in creation are evident especially at Mount Athos and at the great Monastery of St. Katherine at Sinai among other places. Just the other day another Freeper posted a part of a sermon by Bishop J.C. Ryle, a 19th century Anglican evangelical hierarch which recognized this. +Ryle is a sublimely Orthodox preacher, something which amazes me every time I read his sermons. Anyway, here's what he said:
"A zealous person in Christianity is preeminently a person of one thing. It is not enough to say that they are earnest, strong, uncompromising, meticulous, wholehearted, and fervent in spirit. They only see one thing, they care for one thing, they live for one thing, they are swallowed up in one thing; and that one thing is to please God. Whether they live, or whether they die-whether they are healthy, or whether they are sick-whether they are rich, or whether they are poor-whether they please man, or whether they give offense-whether the are thought wise, or whether they are thought foolish-whether they are accused, or whether they are praised-whether they get honor, or whether they get shame-for all this the zealous person cares nothing at all. They have a passion for one thing, and that one thing is to please God and to advance God’s glory. If they are consumed in the very burning of their passion for God, they don’t care-they are content. They feel that, like a candle, they were made to burn; and if they are consumed in the burning, then they have only done the work for which God has appointed them. Such a person will always find a sphere for their zeal. If they cannot work, or give money, or a man cannot preach, then they will cry out and sigh, and pray. Yes: if they are extremely poor, on a perpetual bed of sickness, they will make the activity of sin around him slow to a standstill, by continually interceding against it."
I guess I feel if I'm doing it right, I SHOULD be predictable. :)
FK: "One example [of sin corrupting creation] would be the physical deterioration of our bodies. I don't think that would have happened, but for sin."
That may well be true. Mightn't it not also be true that physical death, while a "natural" result of sin, is allowed to occur as a benefice from God so that we need not exist in sin for an eternity in the flesh?
In all honesty I've never thought about that. But I wouldn't think it was also true. Were I a reprobate existing in sin and I had the option of spending eternity sinning in the flesh versus rotting in the flaming pit of hell, I believe I would choose the former. :)
However, if you refer to the Godly living in a sinful world, even our own remnant of sin, then I fully agree with seeing physical death as a benefit to those who are saved. We will be better off. This is one reason why I think that God directly causes physical death. For the saved, if we cause the time of our death, then it is always bad because it violates the Law. But if God chooses the time, then it is always a blessing.
In other words, is death an example of God's love? Certainly it was before the Incarnation. What about since?
I certainly think it CAN be, especially in a case where God ends a life in order to prevent an elect from sinning his way out of his salvation. I do note that +Basil seems to acknowledge that God does cause the deaths of individuals.
Really? Might it not be better to say that these "evils" [natural disasters] are imposed on us by the Evil One but allowed by God as "pedagogical punishments"? In this sense, sin distorts all of creation which was created perfect.
Even of the first level, I don't think "natural disasters" are always evil at all. Sometimes they redirect rivers and more people have water, etc. Plus, the Bible is so very clear that they are the work of God. How could this be considered an evil from satan:
Matt 27:51-52 : 51 At that moment the curtain of the temple was torn in two from top to bottom. The earth shook and the rocks split. 52 The tombs broke open and the bodies of many holy people who had died were raised to life.
There is also the example of the parting of the Red Sea. I doubt that it was satan who worked so hard to save God's people while wiping out Pharaoh's army, who served him. :)
[+Basil:] Therefore, He does not slay one, and give life to another, but through the means which He slays, He gives life to a man, and He heals a man with that which He smites him, according to the proverb which says, 'For thou shalt beat him with the rod, and shalt deliver his soul from death' (Prov. 23:14).
Is he saying that all the unrighteous who were put to death were somehow saved? Are the residents of Sodom and Gomorrah now in Heaven? If so, then what would +Basil's answer be to this:
Jude 7 : In a similar way, Sodom and Gomorrah and the surrounding towns gave themselves up to sexual immorality and perversion. They serve as an example of those who suffer the punishment of eternal fire.
They are serving the punishment of eternal fire.
The Desert Fathers have left us countless stories of holy monastics around whom, by virtue of their advanced theosis, nature returned to a perfect and peaceful state, where the lion lays down with the lamb so to speak. many of these stories are told to Orthodox children to this very day.
Thanks for the quote from +Ryle. In these stories, is the hero the one who achieved advanced theosis? That is to say, what role does God play in these stories? I ask because it seems like it is the monastic who is able to alter nature through his decision to achieve advanced theosis. But regardless of the answer, off of the top of my head I can't think of any similar stories that I have ever heard. Sounds interesting though.