If we assume God is an all-powerful creator, then we have to assume that God created us as imperfect mortals, easily confused about what is good and what is evil.
I disagree. That rules 'free will', 'autonomy' and 'self determination' out of the equation.
We are created 'good', but we are not created 'perfect', nor can we be, in a finite world.
There is 'the human margin'.
People talk about the Big Bang, as some event that happened in the distant past, a one-time creation event, and here we are, billions of years latter, living in the afterglow ...
People used to believe in a geocentric cosmos, with earth in the middle, everything revolving around us ...
I would like to propose different theories:
Creation is not a one-off event, and its subsequent fall-out, it's an ongoing moment, a dynamic continuum of rising, becoming, falling away ... never beginning, never ending ...
Man's place is not in the centre of a 3D spherical model, man's place is not 'in here' but 'out there', on the liminal edge of
meaning or
knowing (the latter not to be confused with a pseudo-gnostic idea of 'the esoteric').
Man's place is the interface between the finite and the Infinite; our vocation is to manage that creative dynamic in its every happening moment.
This does not mean we all have to become wizards or mystics or mages or gnostics ... that's really not it at all. Often, it's actually contrary to what we should be.
We should be caring and compassionate ... everything else, as an old chum of mine used today, is toothpaste.
And we know that. We've known that from Day One. There is no way we can excuse ourselves by saying "I didn't know I was supposed to care" — it's in our nature, it
is our nature, Good God, animals do it.
We are free to make decisions. All this 'man is conditioned' is subsequent to that principle fact. If man were not free, we could not be conditioned one way or t'other. And it's not about whether or not we are actually 'free', it's about whether or not we actually 'think'. Nearly everyone thinks they think. They think thinking is natural. They confuse what passes through their minds with thinking.
It ain't. Most people don't think. Thinking is a skill, like any other.
I'm not accusing you of this, I think you're more reasoned than that, but if one pursues many of the 'God's at fault' arguments, they boil down to blaming God for not making me better than I am, they're rather childish 'it's not my fault' kind of complaint.
But then that seems to be human nature, and the sacred scribe knew that very well. The story of the Fall is everybody blaming everyone else, and no-one taking responsibility for themselves.
