/lit/ - Literature

This Psalm is a genuine one of David, though supernumerary, composed when he fought in single combat with Goliad.

I was small among my brethren, and youngest in my father's house: I tended my father's sheep.
My hands formed a musical instrument, and my fingers tuned a psaltery.
And who shall tell my Lord? the Lord himself, he himself hears.
He sent forth his angel, and took me from my father's sheep, and he anointed me with the oil of his anointing.

My brothers were handsome and tall; but the Lord did not take pleasure in them.

I went forth to meet the Philistine; and he cursed me by his idols.
But I drew his own sword, and beheaded him, and removed reproach from the children of Israel."

>>18813990
>Thoughts "that are not good" have their own qualitative character and causal effect
Which qualities arise as a consequence of lacking a certain degree of goodness. Thought is good insofar as it has being, which is good. A thought which we would classify as "not good" is more accurately characterized as something good (a thought) which has a privation of goodness.
>evil is "privation of goodness", and then paradoxically argue evil does not exist
This is not a paradox. I said that evil is a privation of goodness, and thus, having no independent existence apart from being the descriptive quality of a lack of good, it does not exist.
>you can say evil does not exist, period
Yes, it does not exist.
>thus, even the privation of good doesn't produce evil.
I am only using the term because of the nature of the argument. It would be much more accurate to replace every instance of the word "evil" with "non-good" or "lack of good", but for the ease of conversation, I am using the term colloquially.
>The absence of things do not produce their opposites.
Agreed - the relative lack of goodness does not produce evil, it simply does not exist independently (is never "produced").
>First off, you haven't even defended how everything is good.
The essence of goodness consists in this, that it is in some way desirable - as Aristotle says in his Ethics: "Goodness is what all desire". A thing is desirable only in so far as it is perfect; for all things desire their own perfection. But everything is perfect so far as it is actual (potentiality cannot be perfect, because it being potential rather than actual implies there is some privation). Therefore it is clear that a thing is perfect so far as it exists; for it is existence that makes all things actual. Hence, it is clear that goodness and being are the same.

>>18814017
>implying the efficient cause of the human is the efficient cause of every action that human performs
Does that mean a mother is morally responsible for the rape her son commits? Why do we not then imprison her?
>There's your syllogism. Fuck you.
It falls apart on the second premise. Efficient cause of a human =/= efficient cause of its actions. The efficient cause of a rape is the human, not its creator.
>"why would man, endowed with most perfections of all God's creatures, be capable of the most radical Evil?"
Obviously, because it is the only creature which contains the ability (free-will) to choose to perform actions which we would consider "evil" (non-good). A thing without a rational mind cannot make a rational decision, which is why we do not condemn a wolf for eating a deer's liver while it is alive and bleeding out.

>>18814029
Because they perform actions according to their instinct (a part of their nature), and not all of the actions performed by an animal's nature are considered to be "evil" (non-good) from a human perspective.

>>18814038
Conclusion 3) is a non-sequitur.

>>18731297
>desire to experience pleasure over God, mortally sin
>die in a car crash on your way back from smugly rejecting the divine law
>spend eternity in Hell
nothing personnel, kid

"But understand this: If the homeowner had known in which watch of the night the thief was coming, he would have kept watch and would not have let his house be broken into." (Matthew 24:43)