Absolute Power

As an initial disclaimer, this post will be part of a series of relatively shorter posts that I believe are requisite to understanding future posts. They are, in a sense, the foundation for rational comprehension of my religion.

Years and years ago (I'm not even sure how old I was... no older than fifteen, I think), I was contemplating the nature of God, His power, and the concept of sin. This contemplation led me to think up a thought experiment that rejected the concept of power corrupting, and, more accurately, absolute power corrupting absolutely.

I started with a hypothesis of sorts: God is not corrupt, and he is all powerful. Thus, absolute power must not corrupt absolutely, or even at all. From this hypothesis, I came to decide I needed to start with a definition of power, and a definition of corrupt. The following are the definitions (roughly, anyway) I settled on.

Power: the ability to manipulate forces to carry out your will. I believe, in context, this is the most basic definition possible.

Corrupt: the tendency to perform selfish, greedy or abject acts. This is particularly done in the desire to gain more power or maintain current power regimes. This is definitely the more subjective of the two definitions, but I'm fairly certain we can all agree on a general definition implicitly.

I then crafted a hypothetical place to run my experiment in, and a hypothetical person to execute it. Coincidentally, this eventually grew into the setting and main character of a novel idea (no pun intended) I'm working on.

For the setting, I just let it be a world much like ours, with the same laws of consequences, and human behaviors. The test subject is a character who, compared to other forces on the world, is unbeatable. While he cannot control minds, almost all physical powers are within his grasp. Control of the weather, control of human life, control of kinematics, etc. He also possesses several intangible powers, such as political and economic control. Possessing such power, he soon gets it into his head to control the world. As he cannot be defeated, he doesn't truly have any physical difficulty doing so. In cliche fashion, he starts to follow the path to corruption, killing those who resist him, growing arrogant and spiteful.

At this point, several issues arise. First and foremost is, in order to say he has power, he must be able to manipulate forces to his will. Well, is this conscious or unconscious will? Meaning, he had some motivation to take over the world originally. The most probable candidates would be, to make it a better place in his eyes, or to become happier. Well, assuming he became 'corrupt' while obtaining this power, the world has not become a better place, by mass opinion. His opinion on the matter is irrelevant, because power is not subjective in this experiment. Thus, by becoming corrupt, he effectively became powerless, as he could not manipulate forces to do his will. If he desired to become happier in some way by doing these things, he will equally fail, as he will be decidedly alone and feared, and rarely loved. He cannot control thoughts or emotions, remember, so his happiness will be lessened, even if his pride conceals it. Thus he becomes powerless to truly do as he wished again, and simply becomes a slave of his very power he sought after, depending on it to smother his sorrow.

So, lets say he not only had this tangible, shallow power to manipulate the forces of the world, but also the wisdom to know what truly make the world a better place, and be happiest of all. This would, truly, be absolute power. In order to keep this power, though, he must not become corrupt, for the very act invalidates it. This is the power and wisdom of God. He is not corrupt because he has true power, and that cannot be corrupted, less it cease to exist.

This idea has been used several times already, and will continue to be used in later posts. This is a very brief version, as the full version will fill a novel or three, and as such certainly does not address all the minutiae of the issue. It does, I hope, present enough of the idea that you can work it through yourself. The argument rests in the definition of power being more than just conscious intent, but the consequences of that intent (sin).