The Wayside Pulpit No.49
Japhah, the Beautiful One
Several
times of recent months I have read in American Christian literature a statement
like the following - "The very word 'good' implies its opposite, and the awareness
of one demands the awareness of the other. This is the blackboard effect that
is seen all through creation. What is justice without injustice with which to
compare it? . . . What is beauty without ugliness? What is light without
darkness? What is peace without conflict?"
The
author of these words, by no means a 'lightweight', being a Doctor of Divinity,
and Doctor of Theology, argues persuasively that God had to create
evil, so that good could be understood. God had to allow Adam and Eve
to fall into sin, because otherwise they could never understand good. That was
the purpose of the Tree of Knowledge, designed to bring it about.
When my
wife and I first read these words, and similar ones from the pens of
others, we had revulsion in our spirits that wanted to cry out and
say, "No! No! No! That's horrible!" That was an initial reaction,
after which I set myself to consider the matter on the grounds of logic, and
realised that the whole concept was not only lacking in common sense and
universal human observation, but was an insult to the Creator.
Let
us take just one of these pairs of opposites, that of beauty and ugliness. We
are being told that in order for us to appreciate beauty, we need to be
presented with ugliness; otherwise we could never appreciate beauty for
its intrinsic worth. Andrew, my son-in-law is a highly acclaimed figurative and
landscape artist, and I put the matter to him. His initial reaction was to
utter the word "Rubbish!"
From
my own scientific background, and his, as a man with an honours degree in fine
art, we agree, though coming from different angles. I have written a booklet
entitled "Symmetry" in which I showed that man is geared to symmetry,
he simply will not buy things that are not symmetrical. He expects everything
to be symmetrical. He also has a finely tuned eye for detecting when things are
out of plumb, or not level. Furthermore, he finds that he has an inbuilt
faculty of 'right proportion', known to artists and architects as the Golden
Section. He cannot help himself. Even the animal creation has such inbuilt
faculties, which we call instinct. Just look at birds' nests as a single
example. Andrew knows all about this subject of 'right proportion' and uses it
in his work, more often than not by instinct than by design.
Whence
the origin of these inbuilt faculties, if not the God of Creation? He has given
us to know instinctively what is beautiful to the eye. We do not need to have
ugly things thrust at us to help us know what is beautiful. Ugly things are thrust
away from us without further thought or consideration, not because we are
consciously comparing them with those that are beautiful, but purely by a
built-in instinct. Paul, writing to the Romans, said that even God's eternal
power and godhead are clearly understood by the things that are made so that we
have no excuse. In other words the contemplation of the beauties of nature
naturally lead us into an awareness of the true nature and character of God the
Author of beauty.
I
do not need my ears to be assaulted by noise before I can understand and enjoy
good music. I do not need to see junkyards and landfill sites before I can
appreciate the beauty of the countryside. I do not need to live in the dark
before I can properly understand what light is. I do not need to suffer
violence in order to enjoy the meaning of justice. I do not need to be engulfed
in conflict to recognise the meaning of peace. I do not need to smell rotting
cabbages before I can appreciate the scent of roses. I do not need to taste sour
milk before I can enjoy honey. Neither do I need to experience evil before I
can understand good. And if that's how I feel, I know that Adam and Eve
must have felt it even more keenly, especially before the fall. It is an insult
to human intelligence to argue otherwise. "Only God is good" said our
Lord - did God then, need to have the awareness of evil within Himself to know
that He was good? God forbid.
The
error in all this teaching is to focus on good and evil. The event
of Genesis 3 is all about obedience and disobedience. Disobedience
brought death, which passed through to all mankind. "The knowledge of good
and evil" which Adam had after the fall (evil, that is, as we
know it today) was the product of his disobedience, not a God-designed tool to
comprehend the meaning of "good". Willing obedience is sought by God,
and is the subject of numerous passages in both Testaments. Likewise, God
frequently continued to tell His people that disobedience would end in death.
In
Ecclesiastes 3:10-11 there is a very interesting observation made by Solomon.
"I have seen the task which God has given to the sons of men to be humbled
by it. He has made everything beautiful in its time; also He has set eternity
in his heart, without which man cannot find out the work which God has made
from the beginning to the end."
But
as some ancient Hebrew Rabbis noticed, it would be more correct grammatically
to translate the middle portion as follows. "The Beautiful One has
made everything in its own season." The Beautiful One is Japhah in Hebrew.
I am greatly indebted to John Gill's "Expositor" for bringing this
gem to my notice.
How true! He is THE BEAUTIFUL ONE. May
His name be praised!
P.S.
For a detailed study on the subject of "Good and Evil" please refer to
Prophetic Telegraph No. 114.