Did God create evil?

Answer

At first, it might seem that if God created all things, then evil must have been created by God. However, evil is not a “thing” like a rock or electricity. You cannot have a jar of evil. Evil has no existence of its own; it is really the absence of good. For example, holes are real, but they only exist in something else. We call the absence of dirt a hole, but it cannot be separated from the dirt. So when God created, it is true that all He created was good. One of the good things God made was creatures who had the freedom to choose good. In order to have a real choice, God had to allow there to be something besides good to choose. So, God allowed these free angels and humans to choose good or reject good (evil). When a bad relationship exists between two good things, we call that evil, but it does not become a “thing” that required God to create it.

Perhaps a further illustration will help. If a person is asked, “Does cold exist?” the answer would likely be “yes.” However, this is incorrect. Cold does not exist. Cold is the absence of heat. Similarly, darkness does not exist; it is the absence of light. Evil is the absence of good, or better, evil is the absence of God. God did not have to create evil, but rather only allow for the absence of good.

God did not create evil, but He does allow evil. If God had not allowed for the possibility of evil, both mankind and angels would be serving God out of obligation, not choice. He did not want “robots” that simply did what He wanted them to do because of their “programming.” God allowed for the possibility of evil so that we could genuinely have free will and choose whether or not we wanted to serve Him.

As finite human beings, we can never fully understand the ways of God, but we can trust in His wisdom and goodness.

Understand an infinite God (Romans 11:33-34). Sometimes we believe we comprehend why God is acting in a certain way, only to discover later that it was for a different purpose than we initially thought. God perceives things from a holy, eternal viewpoint. We, on the other hand, view things from a sinful, earthly, and temporary perspective. Why did God place humanity on earth, knowing that Adam and Eve would sin, thus introducing evil, death, and suffering to all mankind? Why didn’t He simply create us all and keep us in heaven, where we would be flawless and free from suffering? These inquiries cannot be adequately addressed in this life. What we can understand is that whatever God does is holy and flawless, and ultimately will bring glory to Him. God permitted the existence of evil to allow us a genuine choice in whether we choose to worship Him. God did not originate evil, but He permitted it. If He had not allowed evil, we would be worshiping Him out of duty, not out of our own volition.