NOTES for Luk 17:1-6
Jesus' words about occasions of stumbling are often split into two parts, and only the first is used: the part that says that such occasions inevitably exist in this world. Why exhaust ourselves and try to live by the law of love if these occasions of stumbling will catch up with us anyway? Taking this reasoning to its logical conclusion, some say that there is no reason to regard Judas' act as terrible if the Messiah would have been betrayed in any case. In a sense, this turns Christianity into fatalism: the advent of evil is predetermined, so why hate the fruits of evil in the world and try to renounce them? But what Jesus offers us contains no predetermination: occasions of stumbling will come, sin is present in the world, evil exists and acts, but this is no reason to become a conduit of evil and a source of stumbling ourselves.