The Knowledge of Good and Evil

I read an article yesterday that started me thinking about how we know good from evil. The article said that we do not need the Bible to tell us what is morally right and wrong, we already know without needing to read a Bible verse.

To see what the article was saying consider this statement, "Jesus was crucified because the Bible says so." Is the Bible saying so, the cause of Jesus being crucified, or was Jesus's crucifixion the reason the Bible says he was crucified?

So do I, as a Christian say, "murder is wrong because the Bible says it is?" Was murder wrong before the Bible said it was wrong? To answer that question, I was thinking of the first murder recorded in the Bible. It is the account in Genesis chapter 4 where Cain murders his brother Abel.

It says in verse 8 that Cain rose up against Abel his brother and killed him. Then the Lord said to Cain, "where is Abel your brother?" He said, "I do not know. Am I my brother's keeper?" 


Did Cain know where Abel was? Yes he surely did, he was laying dead in the field where Cain left him. So Cain lies to God. Why? If he didn't know what he just did was wrong, why would he lie? Why would he seek to cover up the murder?

As the account progresses, God curses him. And Cain never says to God, "I didn't know that is was wrong to murder, you never told me."

So where did Cain get the knowledge that murder was wrong? Well I think it came during the fall in Genesis chapter 3. There was a tree of the "knowledge of good and evil." Adam and Eve were forbidden to eat of it. They did as you know, and with that God cast them out of the Garden of Eden. In verse 22, God said "Behold man has become like Us, to know good and evil."


Man knows good from evil simply by being man. There are passages in the Bible that speak of children being to young to know the difference between good and evil. But as a child grows in maturity, he becomes able to tell the difference. Aware enough that God can judge the Tribesman in some remote place that will be born, live and die without ever hearing of God, Jesus or the Bible. Yet this Tribesman has an innate ability given him by God, to know the difference between killing someone, or promoting their life.

We are so blessed to have the Bible so freely available to us. Yet with that blessing, we will have more accountability before God because of our depth of understanding the difference between sin and righteousness.