“Where Did Evil Come From?”

One of the common questions and objections to the idea of the existence of God is summarized by the question “Where Did Evil Come From?” While the Bible says that the original creation was very good, yet today the world is permeated with evil. So where did evil come from if God did not create it?

However, before we can answer the question “Where did evil come from?” we first need to answer the question “What is evil?”. Evil is not something that has an existence all its own; you cannot go down to the local Wal-Mart and buy some evil. Instead, evil is a corruption of that which already exists. Evil is the absence or privation of something good. For example, tooth decay can exist only as long as the tooth exists.

While some will attempt to point to the existence of evil to prove that there is no God, the exact opposite is true. The reality is that it is impossible to distinguish evil from good unless one has an infinite reference point that is absolutely good. The infinite reference point for distinguishing good from evil can only be found in God, for God alone can exhaust the definition of “absolute good”. If God does not exist there are no moral absolutes by which one has the right to judge someone or something as being evil. Thus evil actually proves the existence of God.

With that in mind, we can then answer the question “where did evil come from”? Evil came about at the moment that Adam and Eve used their God-given free will to choose to disobey God in Genesis 3:1:

Now the serpent was more crafty than any beast of the field which the LORD God had made. And he said to the woman, "Indeed, has God said, 'You shall not eat from any tree of the garden '?" The woman said to the serpent, "From the fruit of the trees of the garden we may eat; but from the fruit of the tree which is in the middle of the garden, God has said, 'You shall not eat from it or touch it, or you will die.'" The serpent said to the woman, "You surely will not die! "For God knows that in the day you eat from it your eyes will be opened, and you will be like God, knowing good and evil." When the woman saw that the tree was good for food, and that it was a delight to the eyes, and that the tree was desirable to make one wise, she took from its fruit and ate; and she gave also to her husband with her, and he ate. Then the eyes of both of them were opened, and they knew that they were naked; and they sewed fig leaves together and made themselves loin coverings.

You see, for humans to be truly human requires the ability to choose and to freely love. By very definition, love is voluntary and must be freely expressed. Norman Geisler summarized this principle best when he said “forced love is rape and God is not a rapist”.

Freedom of choice, however, leaves the possibility of wrong choice. Evil is inherent in the risky gift of free choice. While God’s plan had the potential for evil when he gave humans the freedom of choice, the actual origin or evil came from man who directed his heart away from God and toward his own selfish desires. Thus, whereas God created the fact of freedom, man created the act of evil.

Ever since Adam and Eve made evil actual by their selfish rebellion, a sin nature has been passed on to all of humanity. And it is out of that sin nature that we continue to use our free choice to make evil actual. Even natural evil- earthquakes, Tsunamis, tornadoes etc. - is rooted in our wrong use of free choice, as we see in Romans 8:20-22:

For the creation was subjected to futility, not willingly, but because of Him who subjected it, in hope  that the creation itself also will be set free from its slavery to corruption into the freedom of the glory of the children of God. For we know that the whole creation groans and suffers the pains of childbirth together until now.

God responded to the evil that separates us from God by sending His Son Jesus to rescue us from the selfish and rebellious choices that separate us from God so that we can experience forgiveness and the relationship with God that we were created for. 

So with that in mind, here is a question to consider: How does that fact that God created freedom and man created the act of evil impact your responsibility for the choices that you make?