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[First posted in 2012. What prompted this repost is the series of mass killings, all occurring in the “land of the free”, the great USA. After the mass murder during a concert in Las Vegas, and the vehicle rampage in New York, the latest tragedy has just occurred in a First Baptist church in a small town in Texas. Where in this ‘world-gone-mad’ is it safe to enjoy music, walk in a park, or worship in church? The question that’s in believers’ minds is usually: Where is God in all this? Why is He so quiet, not preventing, not interfering? And since the latest act of violence was against worshippers of God in the ‘house’ of worship, why did God not intervene to protect worshippers of Him?
Let us not forget that all the evil is perpetrated by who else? The only creature–
- endowed with brains for reasoning and logic,
- made in the “image” of the Creator,
- with free will to go against the laws for human relationships written in heart and conscience of the “I” in the “Image”;
- who follows instead, the “I-Me-Myself,” or simply the “I” in the “Idol”.
Here’s the original introduction in 2012:
When we look at the current state of affairs everywhere in the world today, we start wondering if God is “in control” as we often hear from the mouths of die-hard religionists. Nothing wrong with that, except we forget that the Giver of the gift of free will to humankind does not interfere with each individual’s use of that precious gift. What He has done is to give instructions and commandments that would direct the only creature made in “His Image” to properly use His gift of free will, to make responsible choices, those aligned with His will, those that benefit fellowmen and this world the most, for that is what the TORAH teaches.
So where does evil come from? For individuals to ‘make a choice’ there has to be not one, but at least two options to exercise that choice. To be human is to be self-conscious and actually self-centered first (observe children); we have to be taught to be other-centered.
Ultimately, the answer is the misuse of this God-given gift. Blame the Creator for giving humanity this gift? No, instead, look in the mirror. Enough people misusing the gift creates human-caused evil. As for natural calamities, well, that is part of the natural workings in this created world. Preventable? Sometimes. —Admin1.)
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If there is no evil being as a devil, and there are no demonic spirits wreaking havoc in our lives, then where is the evil coming from that we see in the world?
If it is caused by people, then we lay the blame there. If it is caused by natural forces, since we cannot control nature, we live with precaution and safety-consciousness in a world of earthquakes, tornadoes, hurricanes, landslides and other natural calamities; after all, these are simply part of nature adjusting itself to maintain the balance the Creator set from the beginning of His designed order. Everything else that does not fall under manmade causes and natural causes could ultimately be called, to borrow a phrase from insurance contracts, “an act of God.”
Many writers have seriously explored the problem of evil in the world and have arrived at different conclusions, depending on their system of belief. Prime examples:
Rabbi Harold Kushner’s When Bad Things Happen to Good People presents Reconstructionist Judaism’s point of view that horrible things do happen on a daily basis in this world, but gives a perspective that you would simply have to read in his book.
Atheist-turned-Christian C.S. Lewis struggled with the tension between belief and reality and a God who can allow so much suffering in his book The Problem of Pain; nevertheless, he never lost his faith in the Christian God.
In contrast, Bart Ehrman, NT scholar turned atheist because, as he explains in his book God’s Problem, the Bible fails to answer our most important question—why we suffer.
The worst thing you can tell relatives of a good person who was tortured and brutally murdered by strangers is— “it’s God’s will.” That would make anyone turn against God, because why should God–the source of all good–will evil in the lives of good people?
So what’s the answer? Where’s the answer? If one believes in God, turn to the Good Book and see what God Himself says.There are no simple answers but there is a verse that invites further exploration:
[NIV]: 7 I form the light and create darkness,
I bring prosperity and create disaster;
[KJV] I, the LORD, do all these things. 7I form the light, and create darkness: I make peace, and create evil: I the LORD do all these things.
[ESV] I form light and create darkness, I make well-being and create calamity, I am the LORD, who does all these things.
Isaiah 45:7 [I am the One] Who forms light and creates darkness; Who makes peace and creates evil; I am HaShem, Maker of all these.“ — [ArtScroll Tanach/AST]
Please read the whole chapter of Isaiah 45 to get the context; better yet, start reading the whole book of Isaiah to truly understand what chapter 45 is all about. As we keep reiterating, verses isolated from context, Context, CONTEXT are easily misinterpreted.
One attempt to explain this particular verse went to such lengths to find out how many times the original Hebrew word for evil– “rah” —was used in the Hebrew Bible, counting the times “rah” meant “evil” and the times it meant “calamity, adversity, affliction, trouble” etc. In this particular context of Isaiah 45, “evil” is used for trouble, calamity, and not moral evil which God by His nature, is never capable of causing. (If you’re thinking of the book of Job, that’s another story; please read the posts:
An even better explanation connects the verse to the religious historical context: the Persian king Cyrus is used by YHWH as His anointed, His messiah, His instrument to enable the Israelites in exile to return to Jerusalem and rebuild the Temple. The prevalent belief among the Persians and followers of the Magian religion is dualism –that there are two supreme, independent, co-existing and eternal causes always acting in opposition to each other: the author of good and the author of evil. Adonai Elohim YHWH unequivocally states that He alone is the sovereign God, there is no other power that exists in opposition to Him; in that sense, everything occurs under His providential direction, whether good or evil.
Add to Isaiah the following verse from Amos:
Amos 3:6 – “Shall a trumpet be blown in the city, and the people not be afraid? shall there be evil in a city, and the LORD hath not done it?”
Just as darkness is the absence of light, evil is the absence of good.
When God withdraws from this world or conceals Himself, goodness, righteousness, justice and many more are at risk. God is the source of Light in all its metaphorical implications [spiritual understanding, biblical comprehension, enlightenment, wisdom]. God is the source of all that is associated with good — kindness, charity, mercy, justice, love, order etc. Notice that those words reflect what is given in Commandments 5-10, all directed to levels of human relationship.
When people are ignorant of or are willfully violating God’s Torah, evil indeed triumphs. In that sense and only in that indirect sense is God the author of evil.
