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A comment on the Virginia Tech tragedy

A brief comment on last week's incident at Virgina Tech:

Many are rightly stating that Cho Seung-hui's condition can not be brushed off merely as illness that proper intervention could've fixed. At the same time, it cannot be chalked completely up to evil in the heart of man, either.

I think the Fall of man had two results: the curse (creation's fall), and human evil. Illness and mistake are examples of fallenness. Evil takes advantage of fallenness and ruthlessly exploits it. This evil is both within and without.

In Cho's case there were certainly these three: illness, evil inflicted upon him, and evil within him. These things influence one another and may be intertwined but I don't think it can be said that any cause the others. It is erroneous to assume that evil itself causes illness, or that illness itself causes evil.

Comments

I had this same take on the Andrea Yates murders a few years ago ---which took place only a few blocks from my home. My diagnosis didn't make anyone happy, but I thought and still think that she was very ill and that she allowed evil to have a place in her thoughts and actions. Both of those things together caused the horrible deaths of her five children.

Posted by: Sherry at April 24, 2007 2:55 PM
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