January 7
Is God the Creator of Good and
Evil? (Part Two)
I
form the light, and create darkness: I
make peace, and create evil: I the LORD do all these things. (Isa. 45:7)
Yesterday we learned that some theologians believe
that Isaiah 45:7 teaches us that God is the creator of “natural evil” (as
judgment). While it is a step away from making God the author of moral evil, further examination of this
passage vindicates God from authoring any
evil.
God is the source of only good (Psa. 85:12; 86:5; 106:1;
107:1; 118:1, 29; 135:3; 136:1). He is not the source of evil or its results. Evil produces evil (Matt.
7:15-20). The fruit of evil is death and destruction (Ps. 7:14-16; 34:15-21; Prov.
1:31; 22:8; Gal. 6:7-8; Hosea 8:7; 10:13; Jer. 12:13). God is not the giver of
evil fruit, but Satan is (John 8:44; 10:10).
In the context of Isa. 45:7, the Lord was at war
with Babylon and He was letting them know that as a part of His judgment upon
them He would allow calamity or
trouble to come their way. The calamities are the result of judgment upon
nations like Babylon that oppose God (Isa. 45:24) and who will reap what they
have sown (Ps. 7:14-16; Gal. 6:5-6).
So why does God say that He is the creator of
darkness and evil in Isa. 45:7? This is resolved as we learn the language of the Bible. To understand the
problem of evil we must understand the Hebrew language and its “permissive
idioms”. The language in Isa. 45:7 must be viewed as “permissive” rather than
“causative”. Dr. Walter C. Kaiser writes:
“Even though
much of the physical evil often comes through the hands of wicked men and
women, ultimately God permits it. Thus, the Hebrew way of speaking, which
ignores secondary causation in a way Western thought would never do, whatever
God permits may be directly attributed to him, often without noting that
secondary and sinful parties were the immediate causes of the disaster…. It is
God who must allow (and that is the proper term) these calamities to come.[1]
Evil is the result of people removing themselves
from God’s protection, thus receiving the consequences of their choices in a
morally ordered universe. God’s responsibility as far as evil is concerned is
only to the extent that He created laws of sowing and reaping.
[1]
Kaiser Jr., Walter C. Hard Sayings of
the Bible (Downers Grove, IL: Intervarsity Press, 1996), p. 306
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