The Yin and the Yang of it

[Sapphire_Flame]

- Good and evil are coexistent, and even codependent (one cannot exist without the other).

Definitely. Without the existance of evil, there can be no good, and without good, no evil. If there was nothing to tempt you otherwise, then you couldn't be good; you would just be, and therefore have no progression and not be able to improve yourself. Thinking of the applicability of this in Middle-earth, I came round to the issue of Eru and Melkor. Eru was probably fully aware that Melkor was going to be a prat and try to screw everything up; he created him after all, and would know more about him than Melkor knew about himself. Eru is the God of Middle-earth, and so would have no margin of error. He would know all that would occur and would be prepared for it, beating Melkor at every turn. (It would be my opinion that Melkor would get pretty irritated about this after a while as well...)

Therefore nothing can be considered good?

No, nothing can be considered perfect. People can be considered good if they are trying their best to do what's right.

Just on the note of good vs. evil, I think that it is very difficult to define these terms anyway. Those on each side believe that what they are doing is right, i.e. what is good, and that their opponent is wrong/evil. If I may draw something from a story I'm writing: my character, Emily, starts out the story on the "good" side, trying to prevent evil from overtaking the world. Approximately halfway through the story, she is kidnapped by the opposing side and brainwashed (that word isn't quite right for the situation, but the only one close enough to what I want). For the next few chapters, her point of view is completely reversed: she sees good as evil and evil as good, as far as her previous standards went. When she is rescued and healed, it takes some time for her to return to her former way of thinking about things, and still her perceptions are radically altered because of her experience.

I use this example only to show that the classification of right and wrong, good and evil can be a very touchy subject in some cases. Depending on which side you are watching from, the standard can be radically different.

Abedithon le,

~*~Aranel~*~