Evolutionism cannot allow this. It presupposes a certain, sufficiently long, time for the formation of each type, which is necessary for the emergence and consolidation of new qualitative characteristics. It was not instantly that the fish lost its gills, coming ashore and "turning" into a land animal!

4.3. Attitude to death

For the theory of evolution, the driving mechanism is the so-called natural selection, as a result of which the strongest individuals and species defeat the less adapted and protected. At the same time, it is considered a priori accepted that all individuals, both animals and humans, are mortal. This state of mortality is considered an integral part of our nature, since such observations are confirmed by everyday experience. In other words, death is proclaimed to be original and primary.

But the Orthodox worldview is completely different. "God did not create death, nor does He rejoice in the destruction of the living, for He created all things to come into being" (Wisdom 1:13-14). Adam was created immortal. He was given a warning: "From the tree, if you understand good and evil, you will not be taken away from it, but in the same day you take away from it, you will die" (Gen. 2:17). This is confirmed by the holy Apostle Paul: "By one man sin entered into the world, and by sin death, and so death entered into all men" (Romans 5:12). In the Holy Fathers, these thoughts are defined just as clearly. Here is what St. Gregory of Sinai writes: "Man was created incorruptible, as he will be resurrected, but not imperishable, nor perverted again, but having the power to be transformed by the desired disposition or not." [20]. "Corruption is the offspring of the flesh." [21].

The Fathers of the Church developed the idea of the incorruptibility of all creation before the fall of the first man. The same St. Gregory of Sinai wrote: "The creature that is now flowing was not created at first perishable, but afterwards fell into corruption, obeying vanity, according to the Scriptures, not willingly, but unwillingly, for obeying it, in the hope of the renewal of Adam, who was subjected to corruption (Romans 8:20). He who renewed Adam and sanctified also renewed creation, but he has not yet delivered them from corruption." [22]. St. John Chrysostom. "What does it mean, "Thou wilt obey the creature? It has become perishable. For what purpose and for what reason? It's your fault, man. Since you have received a mortal and suffering body, the earth has also been cursed, and has brought forth thorns and thistles" [23]. And further: "As the creature was made corruptible when thy body became corruptible, so also when thy body is incorruptible, and the creature shall follow it and become according to it" [24].

An attentive reader will find in the Bible itself a strict indication not that God did not create predators in the first place, but that carnivorous eating appeared only after the fall of Adam:

"And God said, Behold, I have given unto you every seed-sowing herb, which is upon the top of all the earth; and every tree that has in it the fruit of the seed of the seed shall be for your food. and to every beast of the earth, and to every fowl of the air, and to every creeping thing that creepeth upon the earth, which hath in it the life of life, and every green grass for food. And it was like that"

(Gen. 1:29-30).

Whoever is ready to show faith in the biblical testimony about the good beginning of God's creation will not doubt to hear the prophetic word about its good end in the kingdom of Christ the Reconciler.

"And the wolf and the lamb shall feed together, and the lynx shall rest with the goat, and the bullock, and the reaper, and the lion shall feed together, and I shall lead the child a little; and the ox and the bear shall feed together, and their children shall be together, and the lion shall eat the chaff as an ox."

(Isaiah 11:6-7).

The Bible and the entire patristic thought completely exclude the possibility of the existence of predation, the devouring of some animals by others, as well as disease and death in general in the world, from its creation to the fall of Adam, as well as in the coming age of Christ, "whose kingdom will have no end." The Fall as the beginning of death and the general resurrection as the end of death — these are the boundaries beyond which the natural scientific mind of man must not stretch. The law of the jungle, mortality, bloodshed, the struggle for survival and other manifestations of cruelty reign in our world by God's permission. Everyone sees it. But evolutionists believe that this has always been the case and cannot and will not be otherwise, while Christians, on the contrary, believe that this evil is not intrinsic and not eternal.