Contents
Free Choice. Is it possessed by God, Lucifer, the Angels, and Human beings? Are we at liberty to decide our ultimate pathway?
Free choice. Do humans possess it? What about God and Lucifer, as well as the angels? You decide, based on the Bible.
Free choice, the human mind, the duality of human nature. ALL very controversial subjects. Eminent scientists mostly reject the presence of spirituality in these entities. And theologians skirt around or avoid these issues for want of their complexity. Yet, they are the first keys to understanding HOW HUMANS FUNCTION.
(Agony of Humankind, chapter 1.5)
We discussed Lucifer’s transformation into the Serpent. This is ONLY possible through the plasticity of the mind coupled with decision-making capability to go up or down the behavioral scale; from good to bad, from bad to good, from righteousness to wickedness, from wickedness to righteousness.
The implications of free choice are many. It’s absence, meaning; you do NOT have any choice, implies that WHATEVER you do is PRE-determined for you. So, why bother?! Under those circumstances, there’s no need for trials, tests, training, rehabilitation, coaches, advertising, promotion of TV programs. Bye-bye facing obstacles and difficulties in life. It’s equivalent to total freedom to do whatever you want. Your experience and pathway are written in advance; whatever you do, you are predestined to do it anyway. You have no way out of your predicament, you can NOT change it, because you have no free choice.
That concept has been foisted on humankind, maybe inadvertently, maybe deliberately, by those who would have you believe you’re a pre-programmed machine. An algorithm is your motor; this is the whole idea behind artificial intelligence. Robots, computers do NOT have a choice. They calculate everything and take the best result. Whatever is TOP of the list is what they do. The second or third place is cast aside as just that, not being number one.
Algorithms and hence, artificial intelligence calculate they do NOT choose. No free choice.
Free Will and Corruption
Lucifer was the first to exercise its free choice to reject it Maker’s way. Think, if you had ALL the power and wanted to maintain both the control and peace that you had, wouldn’t you create something that would NOT oppose you? Something that could NOT do the opposite of what you have set as rules to follow? Yes, you would. But, God created Lucifer, giving it the POTENTIAL to take the opposite direction, to rebel against its very Creator. That possibility to rebel involves free choice.
The first aspect of Lucifer’s character was to understand its dual nature, that it was capable of good and evil, just like Adam and Eve, you and me. The second aspect to grasp here is the presence of free choice,
Your heart was lifted up because of your beauty, you have corrupted (H7843) your wisdom by reason of your brightness: I will cast you to the ground, I will lay you before kings, that they may behold you.
Focus on the YOU. You have corrupted your wisdom. Lucifer, itself, set its downward pathway; this is made crystal clear by “You were perfect in your ways from the day that you were created, till iniquity (H5766) was found in you” (Exek. 28:15). A definite process took place; it started with a mind of perfection that lasted over. I don’t know how long. This period of perfect in your ways ended. The word till exemplifies the breakpoint, when its virtuous mind swerved off course and plummeted into vice and evil. It’s like a skier on the peak or a mountain ridge who CHOOSES to fling his skis onto the steep downward slope, and he’s off.
This context in Ezekiel reveals some thought patterns, those hairpin curves, thuds, and jolts that transpired along the free-falling precipice to the hellish destination of this spirit being’s mind journey:
- Your heart was lifted up because of your beauty,
- You have corrupted your wisdom by reason of your brightness
Lucifer was both outwardly (its appearance) and inwardly (its mind) extraordinary, there’s no denying it, but both of these advantageous attributes got the better of its responsible reasoning. It thought that its innate abilities and skills were of its own doing, that of and by itself its qualities made it superior. We’d say vanity got the best of it. Look where this inappropriate FREE CHOICE of logic leads.
- For you have said in your heart, I will ascend into heaven,
- I will exalt my throne above the stars of God:
- I will sit also upon the mount of the congregation, in the sides of the north:
- I will ascend above the heights of the clouds; I will be like the most High.
This wrenched attitude, attained by its free choice, has now invaded and filled the depth of its being, its heart, its intelligence and reasoning have been so twisted that it feels its mental pre-eminence is better equipped to run the show than the One in charge, the One who created it. Notice the emphasis on “I will, I will, I will, I will… rise to the presidential penthouse, claim to be the ultimate leader, run the government of the universe, I can do just as well as God Himself we don’t need Him, I have the ability and can replace Him.”
Lucifer had no outside coercion. At that time, there was only good wisdom; Lucifer was the first to imagine these ideas of rebellion, treason, and bad wisdom. Nobody was lying to it. Nobody was harassing or influencing its reasoning process; this is an entirely free choice on its part. It developed this negative thought pattern, going from bad to worse, over, who knows how long. Little by little, this wrong wisdom takes hold of its mind and anchors its reasoning in this offensive state.
Having arrived at such absurd conclusions, Lucifer has no more remembrance (remember that zachar means: remember) neither of who God is, of his relationship to God, and his proper role and position. Instead of love God and govern with love, it’s love self and govern with hate. It’s self-importance and me first. My status ahead of my people for whom I’m responsible. It’s lost all contact with reality. Lucifer is in its world with its agenda and arguments. There’s nothing to do, to help, show and reveal to it that its thought pattern is off-kilter. It’s now at the bottom of the ski slope, all by the free choice to make that run.
שִׁחַ֥תָּ shachath (shaw-khath’); a primitive root; to decay, i.e. (causatively) ruin (literally or figuratively):
KJV – batter, cast off, corrupt (-er, thing), destroy (-er, -uction), lose, mar, perish, spill, spoiler, utterly, waste (-r).
Here’s the meaning of DECAY: (of organic matter) rot or decompose through the action of bacteria and fungi.
Spiritual decadence from righteousness into iniquity is decomposition through the action of one’s thoughts and actions. We have a free choice of thought. We can lead it positively or negatively. Here’s the basis of iniquity the Serpent chose.
עַוְלָ֖ `aval (aw-val’); a primitive root; to distort (morally):
KJV – deal unjustly, unrighteous.
Some readers, and certainly detractors, could read the Biblical Hebrew word iniquity and would be suspicious or even untrustworthy of Strong’s interpretation, distort, whereas The Explanation is not. Why? Because of Bible corroboration in the New Testament. The Serpent and distortion go hand-in-hand.
13 For such are false apostles, deceitful workers, transforming themselves into the apostles of Christ.
14 And no marvel; for Satan himself is transformed into an angel of light.
Lucifer distorted its pure character into darkness. Now, having become the Serpent, it continues to DISTORT the facts. Satan has become the master of transformation, giving the appearance of an angel of light. We will see what it illuminates. But the point here is its free choice both to distort its pristine character from light to dark and then to present itself as the angel of light. A 180-degree turnabout, an outright imposter. Strong’s distortion is right on the mark. It illustrates the Serpent’s free choice to present itself any way it wants to accomplish its horrendous objective.
Distortion is a personal FREE CHOICE.
Since the late 1800s and the scientific revolution, it has become scholarly to dissect the Bible, using computers, statistics, vocabulary to analyze it and figure out its supposed quirks. The Explanation is taking a fully internal approach; I have made a point of taking the Bible as a whole, one book with two complementary Testaments. I’ll point out even further why they have different perspectives and how the Old and the New fit together like hand and glove, inseparable.
For instance, take this episode of Adam and Eve in the Garden of Eden, basking in the truth. Then the appearance of this Serpent, corroborated by Jesus Christ Himself. There are all the details about Lucifer’s mind journey, its downward plunge: this is impossible to know, or even to confirm; only the 2 Testaments provide this information. A fundamental question arises.
Can we pick and choose what we want from the Bible account? More precisely, can we believe in God and reject the notion of an arch-evil-doer, even when God Himself talks openly about it?
Some might consider such an approach a philosophical discussion, but they are pieces of the puzzle, as we’ve seen, each locking into its single location. The Explanation hinges on all these pieces. Do we have the luxury of deciding which we keep and which we discard? I leave the answer up to your judgment.
Not only is the Serpent distorted, but its main effort is to distort others. The Serpent influences free choice.
The Serpent doesn’t MAKE a choice in place of anyone. But it can and does try to lead and even force you. That’s what it did with Eve… and with the rest of humanity. Understanding the EXTENT of this influencing of free choice is paramount to grasping the path humanity has taken.
This verse in John confirms the Serpent’s utter distortion of truth into a lie. Understand, the Serpent quoted God’s Word to Adam and Eve! Do you understand what this means? That quoting the Bible can be a lie. Because it’s twisted and wrongly motivated. We’ll return to this. But this verse addresses another skillful talent (oh yes, the Serpent is skilled and talented.
Remember, its subtlety, but it’s misdirected wisdom). Scripture calls the devil a father. It too has a family’. They are followers under its direction, in this context, the Pharisees (John 8:13). The Serpent is not and cannot be a progenitor (that’s why I’m referring to IT in the neuter, even though the Hebrew and Greek attribute the masculine gender), so it uses other covert methods to grow its group. The Serpent is a recruiter, par excellence, of supporters for its cause.
Its misguided wisdom has been used to develop every type of argumentation imaginable to bore into an individual’s free choice weaknesses and play on that until he or she capitulates. It developed its dexterous and devastating tactics and techniques long before this world ever existed. Here is a verse from the enigmatic book of Revelation revealing its recruiting prowess. It is not my intention to explain the full context as, at the moment, it would distract from this focus on its ability to influence free choice. Let’s stay focused:
And his (the Serpent. identified as the Dragon in verses 3 and 9) tail drew (G4951) the third part of the stars of heaven, and did cast them to the earth: and the dragon stood before the woman which was ready to be delivered, for to devour her child as soon as it was born.
Unimaginable, but it took place. In Lucifer’s freefall, it convinced one-third of God’s angels (the stars, see Rev. 1:20) to follow it. Check the Greek G4951 (drew). It means the Serpent hailed and pulled them away from God. These angels were part of God’s creation, His family. The Serpent didn’t draw them to its cause by brute force, but by convincing arguments and false promises. Maybe (but I have no evidence of this) even offering them top positions in the new heavenly government the Serpent would enact after it ousted God from His Throne. These angels had free choice. The Serpent is a methodical, streamlined, effective communicator and influencer. And it works.
With social media being so rampant, we know all about influencers. With lobbies being so powerful, we know their dominant position in the decision-making world. The art of hustle is big business today. Whether it’s right or wrong doesn’t matter. Its influencing free choice, drawing it to one’s cause. That’s the only thing that counts. That’s the Serpent’s game. If it can draw one-third of the angels who were close to God, who could see and converse with God, how much more can the Serpent impact the free choice of human beings? Tremendously, as The Explanation will show you.
This blog post is an excerpt from chapter 1.5 of the book Agony of Humankind.
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