The topic of evil is as old as human history. According to most major religions, evil has existed as long as there have been humans on this planet, and has been used to describe the worst of human behavior throughout every major age and civilization, representing one of the common, basic themes that unite humanity into a common existence. This article attempts to briefly address evil as a concept and offer an overview of what the main religions in the world say regarding its origins.
What is Evil?
Evil is defined by Random House Dictionary as “the force in nature that governs and gives rise to wickedness and sin; the wicked or immoral part of someone or something”. Generally speaking, evil is the opposite of good, or the presence of malevolent, harmful, and destructive acts, thoughts, and intentions. Naturally, evil is subjective; something is only evil, or immoral, if you believe that morals exist in the first place. An argument has been made that there exists within humanity a common morality, and therefore, logically, a common evil that represents acts that most people find despicable, vile, or immoral. Murder, for example, is almost universally seen as evil. So is robbery and rape. While there is a lot of subjectivity to the issue, for the sake of this article evil can be assumed to be in direct contrast to what most humans have found and find to be appropriate and righteous behavior.
Where Did Evil Come From?
Each major religion has its own explanation of how evil began. Christianity and Judaism both share a common beginning in which evil is the product of man’s conscious choice to disobey God and God’s divine commandments in the Garden of Eden. This choice represents free will, which is the beginning of sin. In Judeo-Christian thought, God did not create sin or evil; He merely created free will and therefore the potential for evil in the world. Satan (or Lucifer), the figure depicted in Judeo-Christian thought as the prime force of evil in the world, himself did not start out as evil yet became so when he rebelled against God. Thus, the tradition of evil represented by choice - thereby placing the responsibility of evil squarely on man, not God - has a solid foundation in Judeo-Christian theology.
Islam, however, has a separate explanation. In Islam, while Allah and the Judeo-Christian God have an assumed common identity, evil is not a product of evil choices by men but rather is controlled by Allah himself. The prime evils in the world are caused by Allah and therefore come from a divine source as a test or challenge to man. It is also a means of controlling and directing mankind and demonstrating how man is dependent wholly on Allah. This is similar to ancient religions such as Zoroastrianism, in which Ahriman, the force of evil, directly influences and impacts mankind through evil acts in contrast to Ahura Mazda, the good deity.
Buddhism and other Eastern religions have a less deistic approach and more of a mystic view of evil. Evil is not necessarily the result of a god, but is instead caused by man himself. This is actually similar to Judeo-Christian thought, but instead of being governed by an incarnate deity, evil is part of the natural order of the world and is balanced by good acts. The notion of karma, for example, is another way of explaining how evil exists due to the absence of good and is caused by bad acts (hence the phrase “What goes around comes around”). Evil is also characterized more generally as being out of touch or synch with nature and the natural order of life, rather than disobedience to a god and the morality that the god has created (as with Judaism and Christianity).
The bottom line is that evil has existed as an abstract notion for millienia, and has existed as a definitive part of human behavior since the beginning of human history. Its origins are varied and depend on what religion or belief system one has, but most in the world agree that evil is the result of decisions that unjustly harms and negatively affects others.
