Is Life a Kind of Test?

To answer that question with Yes is to assent to a certain cosmic model. God sets the creature a test—e.g., that tree in Paradise. Humanity fails. Humanity is expelled from the Garden. We’re now undergoing the second test. Succeed: heaven. Fail: hell.

No. I’m not trying to belittle the Judeo-Christian-Muslim faiths—or any other. The great myths can be (and are) understood in very sophisticated ways. A more sophisticated rendition of that model is to view God creating humans and giving them free will. Without it, surely, they would be little more than automata (as Descartes, for instance, described animals). Are animals undergoing some kind of test? Surely they are not. They do not have any kind of choice. Therefore free will is an integral element of the model, indeed sufficient to support a test-model. We don’t need paradises, forbidden fruit, temping snakes, expulsions, or any other of the vividly painted machinery of the creation myth. The mere presence of genuine agents, thus agents with consciousness and free will, is good enough. For that model to work we don’t even need a material realm. There are angels within these traditions, said to be pure spirits—but also endowed with freedom. And, sure enough, some of them rebelled. Let me introduce you to Lucifer. The only environment they require is that of Mind.

The more subtle aspects of that question begin to emerge at this point. The creation of free agents, as such, does not automatically mean that God intends to test them. The intention clearly is that the agents will have choice. And with that power of self-determination given, all that flows from it is, of course, necessarily known by an omniscient Creator. Therefore God gives his creatures freedom, and other necessary concomitant abilities, like consciousness—and the rest is up to the creature. Here also rises another ghost, the Problem of Evil. Does the gift of free agency mean that God approves all of the evil that such agency produces when it abuses its freedom? This conundrum creates another question: Is knowledge equivalent to approval? No. Obviously not. We create all kinds of new “freedoms” legislatively—knowing full well that some will abuse them; knowing that does not demand omniscience; therefore penalties are also put in place for abuse, or let’s just call them consequences. Acts have consequences. That is also inherent in the concept of choice.

Let’s look at that word more closely. Choices are directional—in a kind of higher dimension. Choosing the good leads to light, development, and greater powers; choosing the bad leads to darkness, deterioration, loss of powers. If all choices had the same consequences, freedom of will would lose all meaning.

Is Life a Kind of Consequence? Well, that question may be closer to the truth if we take life to mean life here on earth. If I make the wrong kind of choices and find myself in a desolate space—and an angel with a flaming sword blocks the way back—well, that’s a problem, isn’t it. But am I being tested? Not in the least. I’m just experiencing consequences, limits. I can make better choices the next time I act. If I experience this life as a test, one cause of it might well be that I, ah, volunteered, manner of speaking.