The Root of All Evil
Earlier this week, a group of friends and I had gathered online to play a Star Wars tabletop RPG. However, not everyone was able to make it, so we started talking about random things. Somehow, the topics flowed to worldviews and the Origin and Reason for Evil.
One of the guys made an interesting claim: “When it comes to Evil, polytheism and dualism make more sense than monotheism.”
As a monotheist myself and a fan of the fantasy genre, which often utilizes polytheist or dualist religions, I was intrigued by where the dialogue was going. Unfortunately, one member had to bounce, which derailed the conversation before we could discuss it further.
I wanted to take some time to dissect this topic, because it is one that many people wrestle with. Evil is most certainly a part of our world, so where did it come from? Why is it here? Is there even a purpose to it? Polytheism, dualism, and monotheism each have their own explanations, but complications and hard questions come with them.
To keep things concise, we will exclude atheism (there is no god) and pantheism (god is/is in everything) because neither of these two have a justification for Evil. Evil is a moral issue, and because these two views don’t intrinsically support morals, they won’t need to be part of this discussion.
First, let’s look at polytheism. According to polytheism, multiple gods work in tandem to run the universe. Each god holds power over one or more domain. Some control the weather and the elements. Others, behaviors and emotions. Generally speaking, evil thoughts and acts sprouted from one particular event, whether by the gods’ doing or humanity’s, and spread throughout the world.
The main issue with polytheism’s standards for Evil, which some people also use as its justification, is the chaos that ensues from the contradicting values of the numerous gods and goddesses.
Each deity has his or her own behavior and standards. Some of these values are in open contradiction with their fellow god. What’s acceptable to one is detestable to another. There is no concrete standard for what is Good and what is Evil. Even for the gods of Evil acts, that Evil is technically Good to them. This creates a “truth is relative” conundrum, where what’s bad for you is totally fine for me. You may think stealing is wrong, but for me, stealing is good, so it’s still okay for me to take your stuff. Your truth isn’t the truth, so I’m not bound to it.
For humans caught in the middle of these cosmic spats, there are so many different standards to keep track of that one god’s values would inevitably fall through the cracks and get neglected. That, or people would willingly side with one god and reject the other. The neglected god would then grow angry and exact revenge on the people who slighted them (this is why polyamorous relationships fail: someone is always left out and neglected, regardless of what they claim). For a prime example, look no further than the Greek gods of Mount Olympus.
When I was in middle school, I studied Greek mythology extensively. All the tales of gods, demigods, monsters, and heroes fed my imagination. However, the more I read up, the more I realized the gods were simply glorified humans with immortal lifespans. They were fickle, impulsive at times. Every hundred years or so, one of them would get bored and do something to change things up. If a woman was told, “You have earned Zeus’s favor,” that didn’t mean she was going to earn heavenly blessings. It meant she was going to be raped (and then probably hunted down by Hera, Zeus’s jealous wife).
You could also tell that the members of the Greek pantheon were not consistent nor unified. You had Athena, the goddess of wisdom and justice, and Hermes, the god of messengers and thieves. Both held equal authority, yet they promoted contradicting actions. As I stated before, what was good for one god or goddess was disliked by another. If a human was caught obeying one god instead of another, even when things could not have been avoided, they received divine punishment.
One Greek myth that illustrates this is the origin of Medusa. She was one of the three Gorgon sisters, but she was not always the snake-haired abomination we know her as, and how she became that creature is far more tragic than people realize. Unlike her sisters, she was a beautiful woman who served in Athena’s temple as a priestess. A key thing to remember was that Athena required her priestesses to be celibate.
Unfortunately, Medusa’s beauty caught the eye of Poseidon, the god of the sea. Much like how Zeus showed “favor” on human women, Poseidon forced himself upon Medusa. In some versions, he assaulted her on the very steps of Athena’s temple. Medusa had no way of refusing or fighting off a god. And what was Athena’s reaction? Instead of confronting the perpetrator, she punished Medusa, the victim, by turning her into a monster.
I’m sure some of you may be thinking, “Of course Greek mythology shows the bad side of polytheism, Tim. It’s a dead religion for a reason.” In that case, let’s look at a modern form of polytheism: Hinduism.
Now, despite having that moniker, Hinduism is not a clear-cut polytheistic faith. While they do have 33 million gods, they are all considered a part of a universal, all-encompassing deity named Brahman. All the other deities are expressions or facets of Brahman. I’ve best heard it explained like how a government runs a country. The governing head (king, queen, president, etc.) delegates certain responsibilities to lords, mayors, and governors, who in turn delegate smaller responsibilities to people below them. This trickles down to companies that run the economy, first responders for emergencies, and other responsibilities of the common citizen. However, they are all considered of that country. If it requires that many people to make a country run smoothly, imagine how many would be needed for the entire universe.
However, Hinduism still suffers from the same inter-pantheon conflicts that Greek mythology did. Take the ongoing battle between the devas and the asuras. Devas are the deities that serve and promote Brahman, while the asuras are akin to demigods, or even anti-gods, that abide in evil and chaos. The problem here is that, not only are these two groups technically equal in their divine standings, they are all part of the all-encompassing Brahman. This means that Brahman is turning on himself, fighting within himself.
Because of all these differing, and sometimes conflicting, standards, Evil would become part of the norm. It would be considered necessary and acceptable. What was Evil to some would be Good to others, creating more disjointed chaos. If our world truly ran like that, it would have torn itself apart long ago.
A house divided cannot stand. It is doomed to fall.
Next, we come to dualism. Unlike polytheism, where the standards for Good and Evil are muddied and inconsistent, dualism creates a clear distinction between the two. Furthermore, it places Good and Evil on equal pedestals. You can see it in the classic Yin-Yang symbol, where the goodness of Yang shares an equal amount with the darkness of Yin.
Ironically, a good example of dualism is the thing that eventually led to this entire conversation: Star Wars. In the famous franchise, quality of life is dictated by an impersonal Force, which, in turn, is divided into two sides, the Light Side and the Dark Side. While the Jedi of the Light were flaunted as heroes and the Sith of the Dark were painted as villains, the Force seeks perfect equilibrium.
When Anakin Skywalker arrived as the prophesied chosen one, the Jedi believed he would eliminate the Sith. However, the chosen one was destined to bring balance to the Force. At the time, there were hundreds of Jedi, yet only two Sith. By slaughtering the Jedi and reducing their numbers as Darth Vader, he truly brought balance to the cosmic scales.
Even though this idea of balance creates a reason for Evil, why does this system still not work? Just like in polytheism, dualism makes Evil necessary and acceptable.
When you make Evil necessary and acceptable, you eliminate the possibility of true justice.
We’ve all had those moments where we wished someone would get their comeuppance. We hope the ex who cheated on us ends up with someone clearly worse than us and we revel with delight when the person who cut us off gets pulled over by a cop. However, in a world run by dualism, we wouldn’t be allowed to have those feelings. Why? Because Evil, great and small, would be necessary and acceptable. It’s all part of keeping the cosmic balance.
By making Evil not only necessary, but acceptable, too, true justice could never be realized. Injustices would never be rectified, whether in this life or the next. Evil would never truly be stamped out. In a dualistic system, it would thrive. We can’t celebrate when someone gets their just desserts because these “necessary injustices” don’t deserve comeuppance in the first place.
Some would argue that karma, the idea of “what goes around, comes around,” would fall under the balance of dualism, but it’s not as clean-cut as that. Yes, good acts are rewarded with good, and bad acts are returned to sender. That being said, few people would admit they accept the unwelcome consequences for their poor decisions. Get a speeding ticket for going 90 in a 35? Understandable. But if you make a living robbing people of their hard-earned money, do you accept it when someone robs you of all your money? Of course not. You don’t steal because you expect to be stolen from. You want to reap the benefits, not the consequences. Don’t believe me? Look at how Wall Street reacted when regular citizens bought up GameStop stock this past January.
Let’s be honest with ourselves: Evil, self-serving decisions are easier to make and satisfy us sooner than Good ones. In a society where Evil is acceptable, more people would pick Evil than Good, since Good rarely has immediate benefits. Eventually, we’d have more generally-agreed-upon Evil choices being made than Good, leading to anarchy and disorder. The very scales dualism tries to balance would tip too far to recover.
Finally, we come to monotheism. One God ruling over all. The three most prominent monotheistic worldviews today are Islam, which worships Allah, Judaism, which worships Adonai, and Christianity, an offshoot of Judaism.
The friend that sparked this discussion implied that an all-powerful, benevolent creator could not be the origin of all that causes suffering. This is why polytheistic and dualistic religions had some sort of evil entity, to justify everything that’s wrong in the world. In an offhand comment, he said that Christianity made its own form of dualism using the devil as the avatar of evil.
I want to break that notion down a bit. In Jewish and Christian scriptures, Lucifer was cast out of heaven for his rebellion against Adonai. He was later identified as Satan, the Hebrew word for “adversary.” In Islam, Iblis disobeyed Allah’s command to bow down to Adam, the first man, and was also cast out. He vowed to tempt humanity for eternity, soon becoming known as Shaytan. From the looks of it, these accounts seem to support the duality of monotheism.
However, the dualism argument falls short because of one key fact: Lucifer and Iblis are never portrayed as equal with God.
Lucifer was an angel, one of, if not the, highest and greatest amongst the heavenly host. He coveted the honor, power, and prestige that Adonai had, which was the only step above his own. In his rebellion, it was his fellow angels that defeated him and his forces. Adonai did not even need to lift a finger.
Iblis was a jinn, which was a type of spirit (also where we get djinn and genie). Unlike the angels, who obeyed Allah without hesitation, the jinn were able to choose between following Allah’s instructions and ignoring them. In his case, Iblis chose not to accept Allah’s command and suffered the consequences.
Unlike the devas and asuras of Hinduism, Lucifer and Iblis may have been divine beings, but they themselves were never considered gods themselves. They are tempters and symbols of Evil, but they cannot create Evil. All they can do is twist and destroy.
This brings a very important, and very uncomfortable, question to the forefront:
If Satan and Shaytan did not create Evil…does this mean the monotheistic, all-creating, benevolent God was the one who created Evil?
Simply put: Yes.
But, there is a reason for it.
In the Bible, Isaiah 45:7 says, “I form the light, and create darkness: I make peace, and create evil: I the Lord do all these things” (King James Version).
The Quran has a similar verse in An-Nisa’ 78: “If any good reaches them, they say, ‘This is from Allah,’ but if any evil befalls them, they say, ‘This happened because of you.’ Say: ‘All things are from Allah.’ What is wrong with these people that they do not understand any word?”
If God created evil, then what’s the reason for it? Basically, it boils down to the concept of Free Will. Adonai and Allah desire relationship with their creations, but you cannot have a genuine relationship unless both parties willingly choose to be in that relationship. If you love someone but they do not love you back, that isn’t a loving relationship. It’s a crush. You can say all you want about how much you love them, but if they don’t choose you, too, it’s just one-sided affection. Once both of you choose each other, instead of any other person in the world, then you know the love and relationship are true and genuine.
Adonai and Allah don’t want robots that only do as they’re programmed. They want humans to truly choose them, and for the choice to be genuine, other options need to be equally available. That is why Lucifer and Iblis tempt us towards Evil. They don’t want us to be in close relationship with God.
This implies that in monotheism, Evil is just as necessary as it is in polytheism and dualism. In order for actual devotion to be realized, the chance to choose against God must be just as viable as choosing for Him. However, there is still a key difference in how Evil is treated between monotheism and the other worldviews:
While Evil may be necessary, it is not acceptable.
A common misconception when it comes to religion is “evil equals sin.” That is not always the case. Sin is a term used to describe “missing the mark.” Think of archery, for example. If a bullseye is a perfect shot, anything else is a miss, a sin. Adonai and Allah desire relationship with their creations, but a standard of moral perfection is held. Whenever we make a choice that results in anything less than that standard, it’s a sin.
In the excerpts above, both sets of scriptures address this difference. In the Bible verse, the Hebrew word used for Evil is rah. This word shows up multiple times in the Bible, such as the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil. The word for Sin, however, is kattawaw. In the Quran verse, it implies that the Evil that befalls someone is a result of their sin. Christianity, Judaism, and Islam all agree that while God created Good and Evil, sin comes from humanity.
Therefore, while Evil may be necessary, we must not accept its existence as “part of the norm.” This is where monotheism’s benevolent deity comes in, albeit in a sort of roundabout, self-induced sort of way. Adonai and Allah both created ways to get past Evil and its repercussions. If they were not truly benevolent, they would have left us to our own devices and punished us for when we messed up on their high standards. They understood the problem they would have to create and provided solutions to them. This, in turn, allows for true justice to prevail. Good will ultimately triumph in the end, and the Evil that was once used to determine one’s allegiance would be no more.
In order to truly live good, moral lives, we must reject Evil, actively choose to avoid it. Polytheism sets no standards for it. Dualism accepts and normalizes it. Monotheism explains the Origin and Reason for Evil, and the remedies for it. Evil was created as a necessary way to determine genuine moral choices, but it is not to be accepted. It leads to separation from God and our fellow man.
Now, which monotheistic faith you should follow is a discussion for another day. Most of you probably know which I support. My point for this day is that when it comes to Evil, its Origin and Reason for existence, monotheism actually does make the most sense.