The problem of evil is closely related to the problem of redemption.
From eternity the idea of redemption is perpetually entering into the plan of
divine creation. For this reason, in the Holy Scripture, the Redeemer is named
“the Lamb, sacrificed from the beginning of the world.” The substance of the
idea of redemption is the presupposition from eternity that the voluntary Fall
of man, anticipated in the “council of the Holy Trinity,” would be redeemed by
the voluntary offering of the Son of God, thus reestablishing the blessed state
lost by man as a result of sin, and, in such a way, defeating evil at its very
root and reestablishing the harmony of the creation of the world, disrupted by
the free arbitrariness of man.
Besides,
the harmony of the world, after its reestablishment, not only becomes unimpaired,
but, on the contrary, acquires an even greater perfection. Lost Paradise not only returns, but
is transformed into the Kingdom of Heaven, more perfect than Paradise. According to the remarkable definition of Bishop Ignatius Brianchaninov, man’s state in Paradise was natural; after the
sinful fall, it became less than natural; but in the Kingdom of Heaven, it
will be supernatural. By this also is redeemed the suffering which appeared as
a result of sin and evil. The idea of redemption has meaning world-wide. The
feeling of a necessity for redemption comprises the common basis of all ancient
religions. The tendency to reinstate the lost union between God and man — the
tendency to make amends (to redeem) for the sin and to make peace with Heaven —
is a tendency common to all the pagan world. The universal expectation of
deliverance is a point of contact between these two worlds. That is the reason
why, in the Holy Scripture, the Redeemer is designated by an exalted
expression, “the expected hope of the peoples.”
From
deep antiquity, the thirst for redemption gave rise in the conscience of man to
the idea of sacrifice. Religious cults of all ancient peoples present to us
spectacles of bloody sacrifice. Among the bloody sacrifices which were
performed for the sins of man — standing out especially by their profound
tragedy — are human sacrifices. Among all the pagan peoples, through the
sensual form of these oblations can be observed a hazy sense of a profound
idea: that only the guiltless can make a satisfying sacrifice for the guilty
and that only in innocent blood shed does a conciliating power reside.
It
is remarkable that many ancient peoples possess myths about some sort of a
mysterious serpent, the cause of evil, and about a deliverer, obliged to defeat
this serpent. In these myths, one cannot but see traces of an actual promise
about the seed of a woman, obliged to obliterate the head of the serpent.
All
myths of natural religions represent but “dreams and divinations of the ancient
pagan world concerning the future redemption.” However, a clear and true idea
of the redemption of mankind begins to be apparent only in the light of
revealed biblical teaching. The amazing phenomenon of the universality of the
idea of redemption can in no way be explained by a “universal delusion,” for
delusions are never universal, and do not pass through a whole succession of
ages and a whole succession of peoples. However, faith in the propitiating and
redeeming force of a voluntary sacrifice, is found
everywhere and among all peoples. And sacrifice constitutes an implement of all
religious cults.
But
nowhere — not in any religion except the biblical one — is the teaching about redemption
so completely unfolded. The New Testament religion is the unfolded teaching
about redemption, filled with the vital content of the purest religious
experience: communion with the Personality of the Savior Himself, the Redeemer
of the world.