God and Evil

Abstract

In Jewish sources, paradigmatically in the Book of Job, the problem of evil centers on the suffering of innocents and the seeming prosperity of the wicked. Central to my response in Chapter 5 is the recognition that the very idea of evil is parasitic on that of the good, just as evil itself preys upon goodness. The rise of life and thought and love, and the triumph of their survival, are the earnest of God’s blessing—presence of the Holy in this world and the attainability of holiness in this life by finite beings in the varied ways by which they seek it.