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“Joy is at the end of it, after all. Astonishment and joy are what our faith finally points to, and even Paul … after he had come through his years of suffering, and at the end, licking his wounds in a Roman lock-up wrote: “Rejoice in the Lord always. Again I will say, rejoice” (Phil. 4:4). But it is at the end that he wrote it. Rejoice is the last word and can be spoken only after the first word.” – Frederick Buechner

 

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The Torah teaches that a personal, all-powerful, and all-loving God exists and solely created the universe “yesh me’ayin” (יֵשׁ מְאַיִן), or out of nothing. As his crowning creative achievement, God created free moral agents – both angels and man – who could choose to do what is good or what is evil. For reasons that are not entirely clear, however, some of the angels chose to rebel against God (chief among them Lucifer, later renamed Satan), and these angels, in turn, conspired to seduce human beings to do likewise. When Adam and Eve disobeyed God’s moral law, they effectively joined the angelic rebellion. The consequence of this was catastrophic, and the mankind “fell” away from God as their King into a state of alienation and exile called “spiritual death.”

Since God had created man to exercise lawful dominion over the earth (שׁגח), however, as the steward and “federal head” of creation, the effect of his apostasy affected not only his life, but also that of the entire created order itself, as Satan then usurped the authority given to man and began his reign of terror upon the earth. With the spiritual and moral order usurped, mankind was under the hegemony of Satan, and anarchy resulted. The natural order likewise broke down and dissipated. The original transgression of man therefore affected not only his relationship with God but also that of the entire created order itself. Natural evils and chaos erupted as the earth became a rebel outpost from the original Kingdom of God. Satan enthroned himself as the “god of this world” (ὁ θεὸς τοῦ αἰῶνος τούτου) and humanity has subsequently suffered under his tyranny of deception and malice ever since.

Now this general account of the origin of evil may be considered philosophically, and indeed it is often discussed in such terms, since the main objection to the idea that an all-powerful and all-loving Creator exists is the concurrent existence of evil, and in particular, pain and suffering that seems to be omnipresent in the world. How could such a God allow evil in his creation? And doesn’t the prevalence of such evil impugn faith in God?

The contrary challenge being made here is that the following four propositions: 1) God exists; 2) God is all-powerful, 3) God is all-loving, and 4) evil exists are together logically incompatible and therefore one (or more) of them must be false. So the first order of business regarding this critical challenge is to consider each proposition (and its negation) to determine its credibility (or lack thereof), and then, after better understanding the meaning of the propositions, to decide if they are really inconsistent or not.

As for the first proposition, namely, that God “exists,” we need to consider various rational arguments for the existence of God, for instance, the cosmological argument (argument from cause), the teleological argument (argument from design), the ontological argument (the a priori argument), the argument from intuitions of beauty, morality, and logic, the argument from mystical experiences, arguments from fulfilled prophecies, evidences for the historical reliability of the Scriptures, and so on. Working through these arguments is beyond the scope of this short article, since my goal here is to briefly explore how “evil” and the existence of God are not only compatible, but are in indeed complementary to sound theology.

Regarding the second premise that God is all-powerful, we must consider the definition of “God” and then the definition of “omnipotence.” First we can define God as “that being than which no greater can be conceived,” which implies that God is maximal in all perfections, and that includes the idea that God is unlimited in his power and capabilities. God’s omnipotence means that no other being can thwart or surpass his will or desire. Moreover, whereas other forms of being are “contingent,” that is, they can pass out of existence, God is a “necessary” being that cannot not exist, since existence itself is an inherent good.

The truth that God is almighty or all-powerful is further attested by the witness of the Jewish Scriptures which collectively affirm that the LORD alone is the Sovereign Creator over all that exists (Gen. 1:1). God is regarded as the “potentate” or owner of reality (1 Chron. 29:11; 1 Tim. 6:15) and that nothing is beyond his power to accomplish (Psalm 115:3; Jer. 32:17; Luke 1:37). God is also omniscient, or all-knowing (Psalm 139; 147:5; 1 John 3:20) and omnipresent, or everywhere present and fully conscious (Psalm 139:7; Jer. 23:24; Isa. 6:3; Matt. 28:20). These attributes imply that God is one, and that there is no other god or power apart from the LORD (אֵין עוֹד מִלְבַדּו), who alone is the Master of the universe (ריבונו של עולם), the peerless and supreme authority over all (Deut. 4:35; 4:39; 32:39; Isa. 43:10; 44:6; 45:18, etc.).

Furthermore, God is rationally understood (or defined) to be “that being than which no greater can be conceived,” that is, the Supreme Being, the Source of all that exists, and the consummate power that originated the universe. By definition this implies that God is “maximal” in his perfections, unlimited in his capabilities and designs, and utterly sacred, that is, entirely unique and without rival. Therefore God’s omnipotence, omniscience, omnipresence, and other attributes, are intrinsic to his essence (מַהוּת אֱלהִים) and cannot be separated or diminished. God is therefore YHVH (יהוה), the LORD who is ehyeh (אהיה), the great “I am” whose consciousness transcends all of space-time and sustains it by the word of his power.

The third premise is that God is all-loving or “omnibenevolent.” This again follows from the axiom that the Supreme Being is maximal in his perfections, and that includes all the moral perfections intuited by the human heart. Affirming that God is all-loving implies his agency as the source and meaning of goodness and love. As we will consider later, it is possible for the universe to exist without evil, but it is impossible for evil to exist without goodness, since goodness is intrinsic to being in itself. A perfect being includes the attribute of being good.

The Torah describes the LORD as morally perfect and upright in all his ways: The LORD is “the Rock, his work is perfect, for all his ways are justice. A God of faithfulness and without iniquity, just and upright is he” (Deut. 32:4). Moreover, again rationally understood, if God is not all-good, then there must be some limitation of his being, something that constrains his will, some defect or deficiency in his character, which violates the condition that God is than which no greater can be conceived.

Some atheistic philosophers, such as Friedrich Nietzsche, have made the claim that God is “beyond good and evil,” a sort of “pantheistic” promiscuity that transcends limiting categories of consciousness. God is likened to a cosmic force that cannot be defined using any analogy to human experience. This implies that moral truths are relative and, in an absolute sense, illusory. The Scriptures attest, to the contrary, that God is good, and that we can know what is good (and what is evil) because we have intuitions of conscience and the logic of transcendental values as part of being created in God’s “image” and likeness.

The last premise is that evil exists, which is considered self-evident to common sense. Pain, suffering, and loss cannot be rationalized as some sort of an illusion or theologically justified as part of the “will of God.” To say that evil is only “apparently” so, or that what we call “evil” is a misinterpretation of a “deeper” reality, is an affront to human pathos, suppressing the voice of suffering and pain and relegating it to meaninglessness. On the contrary, with common sense we affirm that evil exists, and indeed its reality is the essential objection that God is all-powerful and all-loving. After all, if God is all-powerful, then he can do anything, and if he is all-good, then he will do what is best. Why, then, does evil exist?

The problem for the skeptic or unbeliever is nevertheless defining what evil is, and perhaps more tellingly, defining what “good” means. If God is “beyond good and evil,” or an impersonal cosmic force that is indifferent to moral values, then on what grounds can the objection be made that God is not good? The skeptic might just as well take up the argument with brute nature and its “evolutionary carnage” than with God… No, the unbeliever wants to blame God for creating (or allowing) evil by appealing to some sort of “super-transcendental” value of cosmic justice, yet this is another appeal to a standard that is esteemed as “good.” C.S. Lewis addressed this problem for the skeptic this way: “My argument against God was that the universe seemed so cruel and unjust. But how had I got this idea of just and unjust? A man does not call a line crooked unless he has some idea of a straight line. What was I comparing this universe with when I called it unjust?”

I might add here that those theologies that emphasize God’s power over his other attributes of goodness, justice, and so on, regard him as an “impassive” and unstoppable power or mind that foreordains and predestines all things — both good and bad — without compassionate regard to the will and welfare of his creatures. This Stoic idea ultimately makes God into a form of “Fate,” an irresistible force that decrees all things. A theology that stresses divine sovereignty over his other attributes (such as empathetic awareness) violates the unity of God’s perfections. While it is true that God is sovereign and omnipotent, he “empties himself” to allow human choice and responsibility to have a real influence in his providential designs.

So, in light of the forgoing considerations it seems evident that we can rationally affirm that: 1) God exists; 2) God is all-powerful, 3) God is all-loving, and 4) evil exists, and that there is no logical inconsistency in affirming all four propositions together.

That said, the existence of evil is still problematic, though not in a way that impugns or questions God’s existence, power, or goodness, and it is this problematic tension that evokes the mystery or “riddle” of life, since it rejects both a fatuous optimism that regards this to be the “best of all possible worlds” as it also rejects a dejected pessimism that regards life as a senseless nightmare. To paraphrase Chesterton, neither extreme aligns well with reality, since it is evident that “not everything is right; not everything is wrong, and not everything is both right and wrong, but what is wrong has no right to be so” (Everlasting Man).

If we know what ought to be, if we have some intuition of goodness, beauty, justice, truth, and so on, yet we live to the contrary, then the more fundamental problem comes from our disregard of the moral order of reality, and not from the consequences of such disobedience. If “what ought to be” should constrain “what is,” and “what is” does not conform to the ideal, the inner contradiction is a problem of the will.

Evil, then, is not intrinsic to reality, but is an “invasion” and a perversion of what is real. The world is “fallen” and infected with evil because of the sin of Adam and Eve, and before that, the sin of Satan who turned away from God to become the “prince of darkness.” Satan seeks to “devour” the souls of people by blinding their eyes through deception “so they will not receive the love of the truth in order that they might be saved” (2 Thess. 2:10). Apparently it is Satan’s great desire to enslave people and consign them to partake of his own dreadful fate. As it is written: “If the gospel is veiled, it is veiled to those who are perishing, whose minds the god of this age has blinded, who do not believe, lest the light of the gospel of the glory of Messiah, who is the image of God, should shine on them (2 Cor. 4:3-4).

In this connection we note that there is another category of person who both willfully does what is evil and disregards the existence of God as his Creator and moral Lawgiver. This is a person who does not care about morality and who has abandoned himself to pursuing selfish pleasure as his “highest good.” For such a pragmatically debased soul, evil becomes a “lifestyle choice” (or a demand, as it is usually expressed), and defiance of God is its “religion” and existential posture. The evil person calls good evil and evil good; he is so lost to moral truth that he no longer cares to know the difference between what is right and what is wrong. Everything is “excused” as he casts himself away from the light of the divine Presence…

The subject of what is evil is complex, of course. It should be noted that those who most often complain against evil in the world are often oblivious of their own moral failures and evil actions. People tend to overlook their own evil because they want to deny their sinful condition and ignore their responsibility to do what is good. This “oversight” is the work of the devil who lures people into passivity and blaming others. The devil seeks to instill a sense of hopelessness over the evil and injustice that he incites, hardening people’s hearts so that they feel powerless to protest. The devil also provides ready-made excuses for suppressing the voice of conscience by offering historical, impersonal, and “scientific” explanations for their bad behavior, often using a medical model that is decidedly naturalistic in its biases.

As people listen to the devil’s lies, they grow numb inside, slowly drifting away from what is real. Perversions are tolerated as “normal”; values are vitiated and disregarded. Everything is “relative” and any truth claim is cynically regarded with suspicion. Anarchy and nihilism fill the void of God’s direction and love. The devil “loves” people and has a plan for their lives… And this is why we must fight against evil – resisting it with all our heart, soul, mind, and strength. Passivity in the face of evil makes us accomplices of it presence.

We overcome evil by loving the truth and doing good (Rom. 12:21). The truth here refers to knowledge of moral and spiritual reality, not merely empirical descriptions. The truth includes the language of “oughtness” and the pursuit of ideals, not just a report of the supposed “facts.” “When evil things have become evil, good things really become good. There are some men who are dreary because they do not believe in God but there are many others who are dreary because they do not believe in the devil” (Chesterton).

Ironically enough, the real danger is not just unbelief in God, but unbelief in the devil as well. The two go together, for without consciousness of evil and its existential threat, most people will never look for the truth of goodness and the realm of the divine. Indeed evil jolts us awake to the reality of the devil and turns our hearts to God for deliverance. As Yeshua taught us to pray: “Our Father in Heaven … deliver us from the evil one” (Matt. 6:13).

The blind spot of the devil is that his wickedness indirectly testifies to the goodness, glory, and salvation of God. And undoubtedly this is by God’s own design as he takes hold of the tongue of the “dumb donkey” to make him confess God’s truth (Num. 22:28-ff). Like the evil fool Haman the Agagite, the devil will be hung on the gallows of his own making (Esther 7:10). “The LORD has made everything for a purpose; even the wicked for the day of evil” (Prov. 16:4). As the LORD said to Pharaoh: “For this purpose I have raised you up, to show you my power, so that my name may be proclaimed in all the earth” (Exod. 9:16). The judgment of God upon evil vindicates his righteousness and truth. As Louis Berkoff once wrote: “God is holy in everything that reveals Him, in His goodness and grace as well as in His justice and wrath.”

But again, evil is not necessary but accidental (and parasitical) to reality. The world can happily exist without evil, though it cannot exist at all without the good. A divided house shall not stand, and therefore God allows the envy and malice of Satan to bring about his own destruction. And indeed, the day is coming when evil will finally be separated and removed from God’s creation like chaff that is threshed from the wheat.

This world is not our home, and God’s salvation is vast in its scope. Not only does Yeshua save us from our blindness of heart and our slavery to sin, not only does he free us from the verdict of the law, from the “legal” argument of the devil, he liberates us so that we belong to God and he promises us a future that will be eternally free from the very presence of evil itself. In this life we may still sometimes sin as we learn to “put on the new nature” that comes from above (Eph. 4:21-24), but our essential spiritual identity has radically changed, and we made partakers of eternal life. The day draws near when our redemption will be complete and the lost paradise of Eden will be forever restored: “For, behold, I create new heavens and a new earth: and the former shall not be remembered, nor come into mind” (Isa. 65:17). Amen, therefore “according to his promise we are waiting for new heavens and a new earth in which righteousness dwells” (2 Pet. 3:13). Halevai. May that come speedily, and in our days.

 

Hebrew Lesson:

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• Isa. 65:17 Hebrew page (pdf)