is the craving of their flesh. Anything that comes from that craving is
spiritually evil, however good it may appear from an earthly perspective.
People like this are evil in a theoretical way.
There are also people who are evil in a practical way. They are people
who have no use for the divine precepts that are summed up in the Ten
Commandments. These people live like outlaws. They too deny God at
heart (although many of them confess him with their lips), because God
and his commandments are united, which is why the Ten Command-
ments are called “Jehovah there” (Numbers 10 : 35 , 36 ; Psalms 132 : 7 , 8 ).
The following two propositions will make it more obvious that evil
people have no faith:
a. Evil people have no faith, because evil relates to hell and faith relates
to heaven.
b. All people in Christianity who are dismissive of the Lord and the
Word have no faith, no matter how morally they behave or how
rationally they speak, teach, or write, even if their subject is faith.
We will take these points up one at a time.383 (a) Evil people have no faith, because evil relates to hell and faith relates
to heaven.Evil relates to hell because everything evil comes from hell.
Faith relates to heaven because everything true that is related to faith
comes from heaven. As long as we are alive in the world, we are kept
walking midway between heaven and hell in the spiritual equilibrium
engendered by our own free choice. Hell is under our feet and heaven is
over our head. Whatever comes up from hell is evil and false. Whatever
comes down from heaven is good and true. Because we are between these
two opposites and in spiritual equilibrium, we are freely able to choose,
adopt, and incorporate into ourselves either the one or the other. If we
choose evil and falsity, we unite ourselves to hell. If we choose goodness
and truth, we unite ourselves to heaven.
The statements just made show not only that evil relates to hell and
faith relates to heaven but also that evil and faith cannot be together in one
object or one human being. If evil and faith were together, they would tear
us apart as if we had been bound with two ropes, one of which was
pulling us up and the other down. We would be like someone suspended
in the air. We would be flying like a blackbird, now up, now down; when
we were flying up, we would be worshiping God; when we were flying
down, we would be worshiping the Devil. Anyone can see that this