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Did you read my posts?

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If a criminal kills a lot of people, the policeman (supposedly good) doesn't kill the criminal. Because that wouldn't make the policeman any good than the criminal.

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And no, pride is a flaw, and completely being proud of yourself leads to selfishness --> sin. God doesn't want to be called 'great', he isn't a tyran.

In my opinion really, I think the Devil wants to show to God that humans fall easily under his will due to their pride and flaws. Thus wants to prove most people are evil.

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EDIT: Like I said in a different topic, Fighting Fire with Fire makes you Fire.

So fighting criminals with crime (killing them) makes you a criminal.
Fighting against something by using their methods (like torturing) will make you something like that as well.

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Can we find Tolkien's Ring in the real world?

The writer JRR Tolkien has been called an "environmentalist" ahead of his time, and it was partly the love of nature shining through his writing that helped to make him a cult figure in the 1960s. The hippies recognised in the obscure Oxford don who had written The Lord of the Rings a prophet after their own heart. He had created a myth, not just for England (as he had originally intended) but for the whole modern world, as it seeks to recover something that had almost been lost to our civilisation: a sense of respect for the living whole to which we belong.

In his letters, Tolkien refers to the "tragedy and despair" of modern reliance on technology. In the novel, this tragedy is vividly illustrated in many ways, not least by the corrupted wizard Saruman, with his "mind of metal and wheels". In the modern world, with its ecological disasters and its factory farms, we have seen the devastating and dehumanising effects of Saruman's purely pragmatic approach to nature. The English Romantic movement, from Blake and Coleridge to the Inklings, believed there must be an alternative. At the end of his wonderful essay The Abolition of Man, CS Lewis writes of a "regenerate science" of the future that "would not do even to minerals and vegetables what modern science threatens to do to man himself. When it explained it would not explain away. When it spoke of the parts it would remember the whole".

For modern science, as for black magic, the goal is power over the forces of nature. But the "magician's bargain" tells us the price of such power: our own souls. For, says Lewis, the conquest of nature turns out to be our conquest by nature, that is to say by our own desires or those of others; and the Master becomes, in the end, a puppet.

Tolkien explores two different types of technology, two different understandings of science, through the contrast in his story between the Elves and the Enemy: the goal of the former is Art, whereas the aim of the latter is "domination and tyrannous re-forming of Creation". The science (or "magic") of the Elves has not been separated from art as it is in our day; indeed, it is a form of art. The devices of the Elves are benign. They work with the grain of nature, not against it.

The science of the Enemy, in Tolkien's world, is very different. It issues from a mentality of control. The desire for power, he writes, "leads to the Machine": by which he means the use of our talents or devices to bulldoze other wills. The Ring of Power, the "One Ring to bring them all and in the darkness bind them", is a symbol or example of this kind of technology: the ultimate Machine.

And so the Ring - which in The Return of the King is cast back into the Fire - is still with us. The task of unmaking it remains as a quest for us to undertake, if we have the courage for it. We must form a new Fellowship, and take the path that the Evil One will least expect: the path of foolishness and humility.

Tolkien always insisted that his fantasy was not an allegory. Mordor was not Nazi Germany or Soviet Russia (or Saddam's Iraq). "To ask if the orcs 'are' communists is to me as sensible as asking if communists are orcs," he once wrote. But at the same time he did not deny that the story was "applicable" to contemporary affairs, indeed he affirmed this. It is applicable not merely in providing a parable to illustrate the danger of the machine, but in showing the reasons for that danger: sloth and stupidity, pride, greed, folly and lust for power, all exemplified in the various races of Middle-earth.

Against these vices he set courage and courtesy, kindness and humility, generosity and wisdom, in those same hearts. There is a universal moral law, but it is not the law of a tyrant. It is the law that makes it possible for us to be free. These are lessons and instincts that Tolkien learned from his Catholic upbringing. He attended daily Mass, and the worldview of Christianity underlies everything he wrote.

What he could see so clearly, but which the mentality of our age so often fails to recognise, is that in making devices like the Ring to increase our domination of our enemies and of nature, we inevitably make ourselves weaker by becoming dependent on the devices themselves. They magnify our power but also externalise it, so that we ourselves wither by their use. When they are destroyed, that weakness is exposed. Thus Sauron, when the Ring is destroyed, literally blows away on the wind.

The search for worldly control - power over nature and over others, which is to say "technological" and "psychological" power - is in the end self-defeating. The only true power is spiritual, and is exercised primarily over oneself. Aragorn, who becomes King Elessar, illustrates Tolkien's understanding of true authority. The ruler who first rules himself is also able genuinely to represent his people. He is not a man isolated and alone, but a man loved and supported by others. If he does not impose his own will upon others, thereby dissipating it, the will of his subordinates will flourish and support him. In the long run, a society built on respect and mutual support is always going to be stronger than a pseudo-society built on fear and self-interest.

Tolkien was always conscious of the temptation that besets the righteous: to employ an evil means in a good cause. This was how the great had fallen, how Denethor and his son Boromir were deceived, how Gandalf and Galadriel might easily have fallen, and how we ourselves can still fall. Aragorn triumphs over this temptation. Evil must not be done for the sake of the good. This has many important implications, in
Middle England and the Middle East as much as in Middle-earth. Even the orcs, who appear utterly evil and "must be fought with the utmost severity", Tolkien writes in one of his notebooks, "must not be dealt with in their own terms of cruelty and treachery. Captives must not be tormented, not even to discover information for the defence of the homes of Elves and Men. If any Orcs surrendered and asked for mercy, they must be granted it, even at a cost".

The world Tolkien describes is our own, though he does so in the mode of fantasy, and the story he tells us is one that continues in our own day. The world of nature and the soul of man are still under attack. We too need the King to take his throne, in his "great stone castle away down south". For then we can go back to our own polluted landscape, with its mean brick houses and its small-minded officials, its devastated orchards and missing avenues of trees. We can return there endowed with the authority of servants and friends of the King, to commence our own task, the task which awaits us at home: the scouring of the Shire.

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About the criminal thing:

First of all, you stop evil, is that correct? But you should do so without doing evil things (killing) for you will be the same.

What makes you different than a criminal if you kill him? Where's the difference? What gives you the right to live and him not? Aren't you both killing?

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About the criminal thing:

First of all, you stop evil, is that correct? But you should do so without doing evil things (killing) for you will be the same.

What makes you different than a criminal if you kill him? Where's the difference? What gives you the right to live and him not? Aren't you both killing? (and please don't start with laws or the jungle rules, those were 'implemented' by humans as well and not all agree with them).

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Just because you think you should live because he's doing evil doesn't make you any different, if you kill him.

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Self-defense is a different thing however, but even then you should resort to killing only when necessary. If a policeman watches a criminal killing, then he is ignorant, not evil at all, just neutral so to speak.

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Now I found out the article I was talking about earlier, which has some information about this 'fire with fire' thing (I bolded it, read only that, you can skip the rest).

Sorry for including the whole text, but I felt it might be necessary to understand what's going on. Most of the stuff may not be relevant for this thread, the bolded part is about that policeman stuff.

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He gives humans free will. If they want to commit evil, he won't stop them. Besides, people who die end up with God (unless they go to hell) so dying is just the next step.

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God doesn't have to torture the devil or whatever. He could just make him disappear. We'd still have our free will we just wouldn't have the evil influence.
But god wants the evil influence, obviously.

I'm just saying that if god wanted us to experience evil to grow morally and spiritually, then he could have kept our freedom yet still given us more empathy, less pain, made us better learners, made nature less cruel etc.

A god who has given us this world could not possibly be all-loving.

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God doesn't have to torture the devil or whatever. He could just make him disappear. We'd still have our free will we just wouldn't have the evil influence.
But god wants the evil influence, obviously.

I'm just saying that if god wanted us to experience evil to grow morally and spiritually, then he could have kept our freedom yet still given us more empathy, less pain, made us better learners, made nature less cruel etc.

A god who has given us this world could not possibly be all-loving.

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Yeah well it was that way before Adam and Eve ate from that tree

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God is not babysitting. He does not get rid of all evil just because humans are so blind to fall into it -- it's their own choice.

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God's laws were told to humans. But their curiosity and desire for power made them sin. God loves humans, but do humans really love God?

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The idea is, if your kid doesn't love you, spits you, does everything you told him not to, etc.. you can't possibly shield him from evil because he becomes it.

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Now about your scenario with the bomb, I've two 'versions' to explain it:

Here are two of versions: Firstly the terrorist with the bomb, is a human as well. He wants to, let's say, kill 1000 americans (the terrorist is Iraqian, for example).

Americans capture him and torture him to death to save their own people (those 1000 mentioned).

Sometime later, Iraqians invade an american town and torture the citizens. Americans will claim the Iraqians are evil because they do so. But americans are evil as well in this scenario. They did torture the iraqian terrorist.

The idea is that (I assume a war here) if you do the same things as the enemy, you are no different at all. Let's suppose americans want to save their 1000 people from the bomb. Of course in the meantime they also kill Iraqians, and further even torture them.

Iraqians want to kill those 1000 americans and torture and blabla..

Surprise, both are the same. Of course americans will want to save their own skin, as do the Iraqians. But none is better than another here.

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I know it's easy to choose: save 1000 people by torturing the terrorist or not? obviously you go straight for the former method.

but hey, it's easy to be 'evil' or the same as the enemy as well. In fact, saving your own skin is much easier than looking at the whole scenario and seeing that you are no better than any of your enemies.

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Of course you will call everything that is against you evil. And of course if you are underpowered you will be afraid, etc.. but once you are given the chance to take over the enemy, you do so, probably because you think that you deserve to live and they not. And you'll then to the same thing to them as they did to you.

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Note if you treat them otherwise different, like not enslaving them, and not do the same things to them as they did to you, you would perhaps be better. And perhaps you could reach the 'good' status. You would be different.

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Version 2:

(in this scenario, you can replace 'monkeys' with black people for example, and get a different more 'realistic' idea)

Suppose we humans enslave monkeys. If we are given the chance to save 100 people instead of 101 monkeys it's easy to choose the former one right?

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Suppose monkeys cry, they think we're evil, and WE ARE. We are the 'virus' and the 'evil' race, we do the same things as an evil race in fantasy games such as heroes would.

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Suppose now monkeys become intelligent and win the war and enslave us. Of course they easily choose to save 100 monkeys instead of 101 humans. Now this time we cry, we grief. We think the monkeys are evil, and THEY ARE as well.. They are the same as us. We would do the same to them.

Why is this so? Because they use the same methods. They enslave us, we enslave them.. there's no difference.

Same with the torture thing above. In that scenario, the Americans torture the Iraqians, and vice versa. Both are evil. But of course the winner will be 'good' right?

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And now finally the analogy to the Orcs in that quote:

If elves tortured orcs for vital information, and used the same methods as orcs did, then would they be elves anymore? They would be Orcs!

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What makes them different than orcs? Just their appearance? If they did torture orcs and used the same methods as orcs would do to elves, then that is just a "orcs vs orcs" fight.. both evil.

I hope you get it because I really don't know how to explain it better.

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     When you buy a male Hebrew slave, he shall serve for six years, but in the seventh he shall go out a free person, without debt. If he comes in single, he shall go out single; if he comes in married, then his wife shall go out with him. If his master gives him a wife and she bears him sons or daughters, the wife and her children shall be her master’s and he shall go out alone. But if the slave declares, ‘I love my master, my wife, and my children; I will not go out a free person’, then his master shall bring him before God. He shall be brought to the door or the doorpost; and his master shall pierce his ear with an awl; and he shall serve him for life.

     When a man sells his daughter as a slave, she shall not go out as the male slaves do. If she does not please her master, who designated her for himself, then he shall let her be redeemed; he shall have no right to sell her to a foreign people, since he has dealt unfairly with her. If he designates her for his son, he shall deal with her as with a daughter. If he takes another wife to himself, he shall not diminish the food, clothing, or marital rights of the first wife. And if he does not do these three things for her, she shall go out without debt, without payment of money.

     Whoever strikes a person mortally shall be put to death. If it was not premeditated, but came about by an act of God, then I will appoint for you a place to which the killer may flee. But if someone wilfully attacks and kills another by treachery, you shall take the killer from my altar for execution.

     Whoever strikes father or mother shall be put to death.

     Whoever kidnaps a person, whether that person has been sold or is still held in possession, shall be put to death. Whoever curses father or mother shall be put to death.

     When individuals quarrel and one strikes the other with a stone or fist so that the injured party, though not dead, is confined to bed, but recovers and walks around outside with the help of a staff, then the assailant shall be free of liability, except to pay for the loss of time, and to arrange for full recovery.

     When a slave-owner strikes a male or female slave with a rod and the slave dies immediately, the owner shall be punished. But if the slave survives for a day or two, there is no punishment; for the slave is the owner’s property. [Exodus, chapter 21]

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Deut 21:18-21

     If someone has a stubborn and rebellious son who will not obey his father and mother, who does not heed them when they discipline him, then his father and his mother shall take hold of him and bring him out to the elders of his town at the gate of that place. They shall say to the elders of his town, ‘This son of ours is stubborn and rebellious. He will not obey us. He is a glutton and a drunkard.’ Then all the men of the town shall stone him to death. So you shall purge the evil from your midst; and all Israel will hear, and be afraid.

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I desire, then, that in every place the men should pray, lifting up holy hands without anger or argument; also that the women should dress themselves modestly and decently in suitable clothing, not with their hair braided, or with gold, pearls, or expensive clothes, but with good works, as is proper for women who profess reverence for God. Let a woman learn in silence with full submission. I permit no woman to teach or to have authority over a man; she is to keep silent. For Adam was formed first, then Eve; and Adam was not deceived, but the woman was deceived and became a transgressor. Yet she will be saved through childbearing, provided they continue in faith and love and holiness, with modesty. [1 Timothy, chapter 2]

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Because more than half of the worlds population believes in an Abrahamic god

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