Usually goes something
like this: “There are two forces at work in the world, in
competition, in constant struggle. Both trying to get the upper hand.
You are needed!” Or the main character, or some random prophecy
making you the dude/chick who will unbalance/save everything. There's
a new wave of stories helping teens feel special. The teen in the
stories is odd, stands out in a society of conformity. And they don't
know why! Turns out, they are special! They are the special son of a
Greek god. Or the only one who is not part of one group but all
three. Or has a special taste for vampires. Or whatever. It puts them
into the conflict: world vs. this group, and this group equals me.
Makes me very important.
I digress.
Because it's not the
teen stories that I'm thinking of, but the dichotomy. Good vs. evil,
light vs. dark, cold vs. heat. But what is often said of these
things? That one is in existence, and the other is a void. Evil is
not an entity in and of itself, some say, because then we'd have a
counter point to the Creator. Instead, Evil is an absence of Good.
Just as cold does not exist on it's own, but rather is an absence of
heat. And dark simply means there is no light there. You can't shine
a dark light, or make a darkness, all you can do is block light. You
don't make cold, you remove heat until things freeze. So it seems
evil does not create, but rather is what happens when goodness goes
away.
So what does it mean
then to say that there are two forces at work in the world? If evil
is just an absence of good, how can it be a side in the ultimate
struggle of whatever? Perhaps we mean that on one side are those who
are filled with good, and on the other are those who lack it. But
then it is a spectrum, so how good or un-good do you need to be to be
on a side?
Or perhaps we're wrong
to say that evil/cold/dark do not exist on their own. Yes, we can
only make them by removing good/heat/light, but we do measure those
things. Light has lumen, heat has temperature. If we say it is only 1
kelvin, we are not saying we removed X kelvins of heat. Because there
is no absolute heat or light or goodness measure. So how much have
removed? Or how much have we prevented? Perhaps we can only conceive
of these elements coming into existence by removal, but perhaps their
existence is there already, since we measure them not as a removal,
but on a scale.
Or perhaps we're
thinking of the wrong dichotomy. If indeed each of these dichotomies
exist of one thing, and the absence of that thing, then perhaps the
ultimate This vs. That is Existence vs. Non-existence. Powered by
entropy, shown itself in conflict. So the states of being could be
measure as Tranquility vs. Conflict. We can measure both of these
separately. The more tranquil, the less conflict. The more conflict,
the less tranquil. But unlike light and dark, we can have both at the
same time. I can be tranquil in my mind, as I ponder my wife and our
relationship, while also stress and in conflict with the morons who
are making me late for my flight home. I can have both.
I have heard it said
often “peace is more than the absence of war.” War exists. It is
not a lack of peace. For I can have lacks of peace that do not make
war. Additionally lack of war does not make peace, for I can have an
oppressive government, or people starving, or people struggling to
live, even with no war.
Into the formless void,
the Creator, who was ever in tranquil, peaceful communion and
relationship with the triune self, spoke Stuff. Earth, water and
land, stars, light and dark, sun and moon, night and day, animals,
plants, people. Into the chaos of Entropy and the Nothing, the always
existent Someone spoke and made Something. And the Nothing has been
trying to get even ever sense, injecting conflict where there should
be tranquility, motivating us to uncreate the creation.
