8. This system is open to a variety of objections, of which the principal are the following: —It being impossible to conceive of the Divinity without the infinitude of His perfections, how can a Perfect Whole be formed of parts so imperfect as we see them to be, and having so great a need of progression? These parts being subjected to the law of progress, it follows that God Himself must progress incessantly; and, if He has been progressing from all eternity, it also follows that He must formerly have been very imperfect. But how is it
possible that an imperfect being, made up of wills and ideas so widely divergent from one another, should have been able to conceive the harmonious laws, so admirable in their unity, wisdom, and forethought, that govern the universe? If all souls are portions of the Divinity, all of them must have concurred in establishing the laws of nature; how comes it, then that they are perpetually murmuring against those laws that which, according to this doctrine, are of their own inventing? No theory can be accepted as true unless it can both satisfy our reason and furnish a rational explanation of all the facts with which it deals; if it is belied by a single one of those facts, it
cannot be true.
9. Examined from the point of view of its moral consequences, Pantheism is seen to be as unsatisfactory as it is intellectually absurd. In the first place, the destiny of each soul, according to this system, is, as in the system previously examined, its absorption in a general Whole, with the consequent loss of its individuality. If, on the contrary, it were admitted, according to the opinion of certain pantheists, that souls preserve their individuality, God can have no unitary will, but is an amalgam of myriads of divergent individualities. Besides, each soul being an integral part of the Divinity, no soul is subjected to the sway of any power superior to itself; consequently, no soul incurs any responsibility for its action, whether good or bad, no soul has any motive for doing right, and each soul is free to do all the wrong it pleases, with perfect impunity, seeing that each soul is the sovereign ruler of the universe.
10. The theories we have been examining not only fail to satisfy either the reason or the aspirations of mankind, but they present to the mind a succession of insurmountable difficulties, of questions in regard to matters of fact, which they are utterly incapable of answering. We have to choose between three theoretic alternatives: Annihilation, Absorption, and The individuality of the soul before and after death. It is to this last belief that we are led by reason; and it is this belief that has constituted the basis of all religions in all the ages of the world.
If reason leads us to the conviction of the persistence of the soul’s individuality, it also leads us to the admission of the consequence of that persistence, viz., that the fate of each soul must depend on its own personal qualities; for it would be irrational to assume that the backward soul of the savage and the evil-minded are at the same level as that of the scientific and the benevolent. Justice demands that each soul should be responsible for its own action; but, in order for souls to be thus responsible, they must be free to choose between good and evil.
Unless we admit the freedom of the will, we must necessarily assume the existence of fatality; and responsibility cannot co-exist with fatality.
(Book: Heaven and hell – Allan Kardec).
Nenhum comentário:
Postar um comentário