Sin is normally described and overcome at the functional level of behavior and results. This level of analysis doesn't explain why sin should not exist and what harm it does at the spiritual level. Without this knowledge, there is a tendency to assume there is something arbitrary about morality and it can be compromised for some purposes. Not so. The purpose here is to describe the deeper meaning of morality and the harm that results from sin. This analysis also explains why all sorts of inhumane treatments such as torture and slavery are not excusable under any circumstances.

The depth of this subject is almost too abstract and complex for words. So we must first describe crude and superficial concepts and then refine them.

For crude concepts, examples could be stealing from the stores or robbing a bank and shooting the teller. The most obvious reason for writing laws against such behavior is that lives and procedures get messed up without orderly existence. It's important to focus on this point, because it must extend into the most abstract areas.

What happens when lives and procedures get messed up? If someone gets robbed, their books don't balance as well. The company might fold. Livelihoods might be sacrificed. Difficulties result.

What do difficulties do to minds and souls? If it were just man against nature, it would not be sin; it might be a learning experience. The cavemen would have difficulties which were not a result of sin. So why not create the same difficulties through sin?

The sin element goes far beyond the difficulties and extends into a deep and complex abstract realm. The first difference between the natural difficulties and the sin results is that learning does no good in coping with the sin result. In fact, there is no method of coping with the sin result; you get whatever you get. Why then is sin not better than natural problems. With sin, you don't have to study or strive; you just tolerate whatever someone wants to do to you.

Why don't people just tolerate whatever someone wants to do to them? Don't martyrs? Some seem to; but most people cave in when being tortured. Avoiding pain seems to be relevant. But isn't pain a material phenomenon? It must be God's doing.

There's a lot of difference between directed pain and natural pain. Directed pain is designed to produce an outcome. The outcome can involve stimulus-response reactions which are not controlled. Psychologists in a laboratory can train an animal to kill itself responding to stimuli. Similarly, satan can use torment to destroy minds and souls. Usually, threat is all he needs, while he gets control over lives and destroys them.

Purpose is one of the most significant elements of morality. Morality is defined not by results but by intentions or motives. But this line of logic leads corrupters to claim the end justifies the means. Does not a noble purpose justify any method of achieving results? One problem is that ends and means cannot be separated. They have chicken-and-egg relationships. Ends create means, and means create ends.

For a purpose to be moral, all elements must be moral, not just a rationalized end point, which may never be achieved. The means must be moral as well as the ends.

Even if a person could tolerate anything corrupters want to do to them, sin would destroy their minds and souls if not overcome. Eventually, this would apply to both victims and perpetrators. The effects upon perpetrators is obvious. Sin puts them in conflict with the universe. The effect upon the victims is less permanent, if the sin is limited and overcome. If sin is not limited and overcome, it will destroy the victims also. A large part of the purpose here is to explain how sin would destroy the victims, if allowed to.

One of the very illusive but important elements of this subject is that if sin is tolerated, it is unlimited; and those who tolerate it define it as acceptable, which results in it being unlimited. There is no such thing as perpetrators having limited purposes with sin. First they are brain dead if they cannot understand that every element of sin is wrong and destructive. Secondly, they do not have a discipline which would limit the sin, or they would not be sinning at all. It's like being a little bit pregnant. All elements of sin are interdependent. To sin a little requires endless sin.

Another very abstract and illusive element of this subject is that sin destroys the ability of the victims to not only create order in their lives but to create order in their minds. None of the pieces fit together where there is sin. This is why material life was created. objective, unified reality was needed to create order in lives and minds. To create disorder in minds is to destroy minds.

This point is one of the most basic facts about morality which is missed whenever sin is being perpetrated. Corrupters assume that the disorder of sin is just as good as the order of unified reality. Is a disordered automobile just as good as an ordered automobile? Autos are repaired when disordered, if not junked out, because they cannot be used in a disordered condition. Minds are more complex than autos, and disorder doesn't get corrected as easily.

Torture and related cruelties disorder minds in a very visible way. In fact, the promoters of such techniques describe procedures for dismantling minds, such as sensory deprivation and unlimited stress.

At the extremes of morality, one might have to argue why minds should not be destroyed. Why do people have a right to exist? The U.S. Constitution say rights are self evident and inalienable. Some people don't accept such facts. The truth of this subject is about justice. Justice is defined in terms of what people expect for themselves.