Human Imperfection, Teboho Kibe [read a book .txt] 📗

an intelligent feminine counterpart. (Gen. 2:18-23) They both could well have sung to Jehovah, as did the Bible psalmist: “Rejoicing to satisfaction is with your face; there is pleasantness at your right hand forever.” (Ps. 16:8, 11) Having been the object of so much love, Adam and Eve should certainly have known that “God is love.”—1 John 4:16.

Most importantly, Jehovah God supplied man’s spiritual needs. He revealed himself to his human son Adam, communicating with him, giving him divine assignments of service, the obedient performance of which would constitute a major part of man’s worship. (Gen. 1:27-30; 2:15-17) Even when the first human pair rebelled against His law, Jehovah did not cease to exercise love.

Mercifully God made provision for Adam’s offspring to recover the forfeited human perfection and prospect of eternal life. The Bible explains: “God loved the world [of mankind] so much that he gave his only-begotten Son, in order that everyone exercising faith in him might not be destroyed but have everlasting life.” (John 3:16) Are you not grateful to Jehovah for this loving provision?

We can also be thankful to Jehovah for the stability he established in his creative works. The regular cycle of day and night, the steady downward course of rivers in response to the force of gravity, and countless other things give proof that earth’s Creator is a God, not of confusion, but of order. (1 Cor. 14:33) Man surely finds this helpful in carrying out his activities. He is thus able to plan and work with confidence, free from anxious uncertainty. How loving and thoughtful for Jehovah to provide such standardization in laws and works of creation!

Commenting on these standards The Encyclopædia Britannica makes these interesting comments:

“Man’s accomplishments [in establishing standards] . . . pale into insignificance when compared with standards in nature. The constellations, the orbits of the planets, the changeless normal properties of conductivity, ductility, elasticity, hardness, permeability, refractivity, strength, or viscosity in the materials of nature, the orbits of electrons within the atom or the structure of cells, are a few examples of the astounding standardization in nature.”

And showing the importance of such standardization, this reference goes on to say:

“Only through the standardization found in nature is it possible to recognize and classify . . . the many kinds of plants, fishes, birds or animals. Within these kinds, individuals resemble each other in minutest detail of structure, function and habits peculiar to each. If it were not for such standardization in the human body, physicians would not know whether an individual possesses certain organs, where to look for them . . . In fact, without nature’s standards there could be no organized society, no education and no physicians; each depends upon underlying, comparable similarities.”—Vol. 21, pp. 306, 307, 1959 edition.

In view of such standardization in Jehovah’s marvelous material creations, it should not seem strange to us that Jehovah should set standards governing man’s conduct and his relations with his Creator. Especially stressed as essential is the standard of obedience to God’s instructions. Such obedience to God is how we can return the love that Jehovah has shown us. His Word says: “This is what the love of God means, that we observe his commandments.”—1 John 5:3.

Do you think that such obedience to God may in some way restrict you, somehow interfering with your happiness and enjoyment of life? You can dismiss entirely any such ideas. For within the bounds of Jehovah’s requirements for his earthly creatures are limitless opportunities for pleasure. As the encyclopedia article on standards, mentioned earlier, observes regarding the material universe:

“Yet with this overwhelming evidence of standards none charges nature with monotony. Although a narrow band of spectral wave lengths forms the foundation, the available variations and combinations of colour to delight the eye of the observer are virtually without limit. Similarly, all the artistry of music comes to the ear through another small group of frequencies.”

Likewise, Jehovah’s requirements for human creatures allow them all the freedom that a righteous heart could desire. True, due to human imperfection and exposure to the degraded thinking and practices of this devilish world, it may not always be easy to conform to God’s requirements. (Ps. 51:5; 1 John 5:19) But when the effort is made and when one remains within the safe bounds that Jehovah has set to govern human conduct, genuine contentment, satisfaction and happiness are realized.

Truly there is every incentive for us to want to come to know better this great, awe-inspiring and yet loving God, Jehovah. Are you not further encouraged to study the Bible wherein Jehovah reveals himself to us? What a privilege Jehovah God has made available to us—to know and serve him!

Now friends, by way of review, let us try to answer the question: How did all men come from one man? Well, when the apostle Paul was talking to a group of philosophers in ancient Athens, he declared: “[God] made out of one man every nation of men, to dwell upon the entire surface of the earth.” (Acts 17:26) This harmonizes with the Genesis account of creation, which tells us that Adam and Eve were directly created by God, and were commanded to “become many and fill the earth.” (Gen. 1:28; 2:7, 20-22) Eve was to become “the mother of everyone living.” (Gen. 3:20) When we view the billions of persons on earth, with their striking differences in appearance and personality, we may say, ‘How could this be true?’

All over the earth we see a multiplicity of kinds of plant and animal life. By kinds we refer to created kinds, not what are commonly called varieties. The term “species,” originally referring to kinds, is sometimes loosely used with reference to varieties. These kinds are unrelated—for example, cats, dogs, horses. There are barriers that prevent their cross-mating or, more specifically, prevent their reproductive cells from uniting and functioning to bring forth a new kind. This is in harmony with the law that God established at the time of creation, that everything must reproduce “according to its kind.” (Gen. 1:11, 12, 21, 25) The Bible writer James, in an illustration, expressed the principle very simply, asking: “A fig tree cannot produce olives or a vine figs, can it?”—Jas. 3:12.

However, within the boundary of each kind, there is a great proliferation of variety. There are dogs and cats of all colours and sizes; and among flowers there is the begonia, which has so many varieties resembling other flowers that it is called the “mockingbird” flower. The orchid has some 4,000 varieties. These varieties have come about in the course of time because of the almost limitless number of combinations possible in plant life and among domestic animals, and many are brought about by human efforts through careful selection and mating. These humanly assisted types generally would not continue unless maintained under special conditions or in a greenhouse or a laboratory. None of these varieties is another kind; that is, it is not separated so far from the original that its reproductive cells are unable to combine with cells of other varieties within the same kind and produce offspring. However, difference in size among animal varieties may sometimes prevent mating naturally and may also cause difficulty in bringing the offspring to full term and birth. Nonetheless, such varieties are genetically of the same kind.

An illustration of what selective breeding may accomplish, and of its limitations, is found in cattle raising. In herds where high milk production is sought, cows with a good record of production are mated with a bull from a high-producing strain, often a bull from the same herd. The production is gradually raised from generation to generation. But eventually a serious weakness shows up, such as the cows’ beginning to lose their calves prematurely. The limit in selective breeding has been reached.

What is the basis for the producing of such a great variety within each kind? One of the first researchers to provide a partial answer was Gregor Mendel, an Austrian monk living in the 19th century. Biology was of absorbing interest to him. He discovered by experimentation that plants and animals had factors in their genetic makeup that passed on certain traits from parent to offspring. Some traits are formed in a relatively simple manner, only a few genetic factors being involved. Others require the interplay of many factors. But there is a mathematical exactness in the probability that certain traits will appear with a regular, fixed frequency in the offspring.

Further research by other men and women led to the knowledge that each body cell of animal or plant has, among its thousands of intricate parts, a nucleus that governs the activity of the cell. The nucleus of each cell in an individual’s body contains small entities called chromosomes. Half of these chromosomes came from each parent. Therefore the basic characteristics or traits of an individual are an inheritance from his ancestors.

To be more specific, the chromosomes can be compared to slender threads or “bead-necklaces” that contain DNA (deoxyribonucleic acid), along which lie the genes, which we could liken to the “beads.” The genes are chemical compounds that direct or “trigger off” the cell to build certain features. They are the carriers and transmitters of hereditary traits. One gene, or a group of them working together, may control eye color, or skin texture, or the making of a certain digestive juice, and so forth.

Mendel did not know all these things, but through his experiments came to the conclusion that all inherited characteristics are due to what he called “unit factors” or “elements” (now called “genes”) in the cells of all living things. He found that inheritance follows an orderly rule.

Mendel found that some characteristics seem to depend on only one factor, or gene, transmitted by each parent. For example, in the flower called the “four-o’clock” a mating of red and white parents brought forth a second generation of all pink flowers. Then, by cross-pollinating, or mating, this pink generation among themselves, he produced a third generation composed of 50 percent pink, 25 percent red and 25 percent white flowers.

In plants and animals, some traits are “dominant.” That is, if one parent possesses a genetic factor, or gene, that produces a given trait in the offspring, it dominates over or overshadows the factor, or gene, contributed by the other parent. The submerged or repressed gene is called “recessive.” In the body cell of every human, for example, there are two genes, or factors, for hair color. (It is not quite that simple, but the principle can be illustrated here in an understandable way.) The gene for dark hair is dominant; the one for blonde is recessive. If one parent contributes a gene for dark hair and the other parent one for blonde hair, the “dark” gene will dominate, according to the mathematical proportion shown in the diagram on page 20. If both genes in an individual’s body cell are for dark, the person himself will have dark hair. If one is a “dark” gene and the other is “blonde,” the person will have dark hair, though it may be somewhat lighter, or possibly red. To be blonde, the person would have to possess in his or her body cells two genes for blonde hair.

Now, while the body cells contain two genes for hair colour, in each parent’s reproductive cells one gene for hair colour will appear, because the reproductive cell is a half-cell. Each parent, therefore, contributes a half-cell with its gene for hair colour, to make up the baby’s body cell. There are four possible arrangements of the genes from the father and the mother: dark-dark, dark-blonde, blonde-dark and blonde-blonde. The child’s hair colour will be governed by the combination transmitted.

What a person is as to appearance, or display of certain traits, is called his “phenotype.” What he is as to the genetic or gene makeup in his cells is called his “genotype.” In the diagram, it is seen that the probability of producing dark-haired children, if each parent has a “dark” and a “blonde” gene in his body cells, is three out of