The Problem of Evil

The problem of the existence of evil in the world has troubled philosophers for thousands of years. And, like most philosophical questions, an answer has never been proposed that will satisfy everyone. (And you may take that to imply my general opinion of Philosophy.)

The English poet William Blake gave us a partial answer. Or, more accurately perhaps, he showed that part of the question is a non-question. In his poem "The Tyger" (as I interpret it), he tells us that if the tiger attacks and eats us, he is just doing his tiger thing. He does not have it in for us (to continue to put it in pretty contemporary language), he has nothing against us, it is not personal. Therefore, this is not evil.

It can be a theological problem. The Biblical Book of Job addresses it. In "J.B.," Archibald MacLeish's dramatic retelling of the Job story, his character who represents Job says, "If God is good, God is not God. If God is God, God is not good." In other words—here again I paraphrase according to my own understanding—God cannot be both benevolent and omnipotent. If He were both, He would not allow evil in the world.

Certainly this idea has been a problem for the Jewish people who have believed that they are God's Chosen People. They ask, "Why did God permit the Holocaust?" And this difficult question has in fact made some Jews lose their faith.

Some theological views explain it all quite simply and handily by postulating the existence of a Devil. But possibly nowadays many people no longer believe in a (or the) Devil and find that too simplistic an explanation. There is also the doctrine in Christianity of Original Sin which holds that there is an evil core in all of us because we have inherited Adam and Eve's sin.

Personally, I have doubted that some people are evil; but I think I'm changing my mind on that. People who kill one or two or three people with no apparent motive—not to mention those who have recently committed mass killings with guns, or those who have committed genocide against tens or hundreds of thousands of people—might look like they are evil. (I hope that a more sophisticated view would not simply try to say, Well he has the Devil in him. I don't think it's been a successful defense in court to say, The Devil made me do it.)

There are all degrees of wrong, ranging from inconsiderateness through injustice to torture and killing and other sorts of violence that humans have committed upon others. And there's no shortage of examples. But if there's a spectrum of kinds of wrong, from mild to very severe, where do we say is the line beyond which we've got evil?

To take a comparatively banal example: Why do people write computer viruses? These viruses can cause enormous mischief and, at the very least, force you and me to spend time, trouble, and money scanning our computers for viruses.

Those who write computer viruses, we say, are mischievous. Is that the same as being evil? Is this brand of mischief a kind of evil, or some other sort of animal? I'm not sure.

Personally, I find it very difficult to believe in a god who involves himself in human affairs. I would think it would shake people's faith when lightning strikes a church and burns it down, or when a church is destroyed by an earthquake. Surely a god who can intervene is the physical laws and processes of the world would keep his own house from being destroyed. At least, that's what I think. I'm sure that many people have managed to dismiss, if not answer, that question.

Update. I write this shortly after the terrible explosions at the Boston Marathon. Of course once a suspect is arrested we will want to know his or her (or their) motivation. It certainly seems evil to kill and maim innocent people; but, if it was an act of domestic terrorism like the bombing of the Federal Building in Oklahoma City in the '90s, it was someone feeling he could "get back at" or "punish" someone for something he felt was wrong; so maybe such persons think they are doing a necessary or even good thing. Then we may say they are crazy rather than evil.

Copyright © 2013 by Richard Stein