Page:History of Zoroastrianism.djvu/422

This page has been proofread, but needs to be validated.
389
EVIL

perish at his hands, the omnipotence of the Good Spirit may be considered to be intact.

Ormazd, the sovereign ruler, would not harass his earthly subjects by the creation of evil. If the divine being who is the eternal sovereign[1] keeps out distress, oppression, injustice from the world, and routs the enemies that threaten the peace and security of mankind, he is worthy of his divinity,[2] but if he rules as a tyrant occasioning eternal distress to mankind, he is unworthy of his divinity.[3] His title to divinity further demands that he cannot be a good and a bad sovereign, causing happiness as well as misery unto mankind, for that would make him of a mixed individuality.[4]

Again, he could not produce evil to injure his own creatures, unless he ceases to be their friend and turns out their enemy.[5] But the creator is the friend of creation and not its enemy. He is its best ruler. Evil is introduced into his earthly kingdom by an infernal sovereign who struggles to found the Kingdom of Wickedness on earth.

Unmerited harm could not emanate from a just God. Ormazd is just, and administers justice with exactitude unto all. Now, if he is the author of evil, crime, and sin, there is no justice in his thus creating these and then enjoining that mankind shall abstain from committing them, under penalty of incurring punishment.[6] Ormazd, the writer continues, is the emblem of truth and justice even as Ahrıman is the embodiment of falsehood and injustice It is, therefore, inconsistent for a true and just being to say, on the one hand, that he hates sin and sinners, and on the other hand to produce more sin and sinners than good deeds and doers of good deeds.[7] It is not justice, moreover, to inflict unlimited punishment for a limited sin, and to cause perpetual pain and distress to his creatures for indulging in the evil which he has himself produced.[8] But Ormazd is the embodiment of justice, whereas the existence of evil is a glaring injustice to innocent humanity. Hence evil, the writer concludes, is the creation of an unjust power, that is, of Ahriman.

God, the embodiment of mercy, could not inflict evil upon his own creatures. One of the essential traits of Ormazd is

  1. ↑ Sg. 12. 52.
  2. ↑ Ib., 11. 17–19, 222, 227–232.
  3. ↑ Ib., 233–238.
  4. ↑ Ib., 225, 226, 239–244.
  5. ↑ Ib., 217–221, 252.
  6. ↑ Sg. 11. 109, 110, 125–132, 260–263.
  7. ↑ Ib., 11. 30–33.
  8. ↑ Ib., 12. 41–50.
This article is issued from Wikisource. The text is available under Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 4.0 unless otherwise noted. Additional terms may apply for the media files.