E11-005

          Lately, there has been vigorous debate on the question of whether the human being is a child of God or a child of sin. This is not a new topic. This is a question that has been around for thousands of years and there has been no resolution. I believe the question is not that difficult and can be answered easily. As in every other aspect of creation, there is a front and a back. The human being is a child of God and is also a child of sin.
     Because the human being possesses aspects of both the divine and the beast, with improvement, the human being can become like God, and with degeneracy, can become like an animal, so as with those that died protecting the nation who are enshrined as “protectors of the country,” improvements can lead to the level of divinity.
     In any case, that which has the role of seeking to prevent human beings from falling to the level of the beasts is religion, education, and morality.
     Materialism frequently has the tendency to lead human beings to brutality. Belief in spirit does have the power to guide human beings to divinity, but neither can this aspect be termed absolute, and rather, can also lead to reverse effects. For example, even materialism makes discoveries that lead to increasing the welfare of humanity, and those who make those discoveries are tremendous examples of a divine level. And, on the opposite side, are those on the spiritual side who, as a result of ignoring the material and overly leaning to the spiritual becoming losers and useless to society. Even though they speak of saving society, they cannot even save their own relatives or friends, a kind of inhuman reprobate.
     In other words, no matter how much debate is advanced, the conclusion is that “the human being is a child of God and is also a child of sin.” Thus, those of religion and education should work so that sin is not acquired, and also that even those who have fallen into sin can become children of God.
     More to the point, within a day, within an hour, even within a minute, the human being can become a child of God and can also become a child of sin. That is because when they think virtuously and perform virtuous acts, they are children of God, and when they think nonvirtuously and perform nonvirtuous acts, they are children of sin. Recently, a certain individual has started to boastfully preach in vague terms that he concludes that the human being is a child of God, a child of the Buddha, but this is a fallacious argument that covers only half and does not touch on the complete issue.
     In other words, to decide unilaterally whether the human being is a child of God or is a child of sin is to lead to fallacies.