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Evil, as a concept, is usually defined as profoundly immoral behavior, and it is related to acts that cause unnecessary Suffering to others.
Evil is commonly seen as the opposite, or sometimes absence, of good. It can be an extremely broad concept, although in everyday usage it is often more narrowly used to talk about profound wickedness and against common good. It is generally seen as taking multiple possible forms, such as the form of personal moral evil commonly associated with the word, or impersonal natural evil (as in the case of natural disasters or illnesses), and in Religion, the form of the Demon or supernatural/eternal. While some religions, Worldview, and philosophies focus on "good versus evil", others deny evil's existence and usefulness in describing people.
Evil can denote profound immorality, but typically not without some basis in the understanding of the human condition, where and suffering (cf. Hinduism) are the true roots of evil. In certain religious contexts, evil has been described as a supernatural force. Definitions of evil vary, as does the analysis of its motives.Ervin Staub. Overcoming evil: genocide, violent conflict, and terrorism. New York: Oxford University Press, p. 32. Elements that are commonly associated with personal forms of evil involve unbalanced behavior, including anger, revenge, hatred, injustice, psychological trauma, , selfishness, pride, ignorance, jealousy, prejudice, , and neglect. (2026). 9780892810918, Simon & Schuster. ISBN 9780892810918
In some forms of thought, evil is also sometimes perceived in absolute terms as the dualistic antagonistic binary opposite to good, in which good should prevail and evil should be defeated. (1986). 9781556353819, University of Hawaii Press. ISBN 9781556353819 In cultures with Buddhism spiritual influence, both good and evil are perceived as part of an antagonistic duality that itself must be overcome through achieving Nirvana. The ethics questions regarding good and evil are subsumed into three major areas of study: Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy meta-ethics, concerning the nature of good and evil; normative ethics, concerning how we ought to behave; and applied ethics, concerning particular moral issues. While the term is applied to events and conditions without agency, the forms of evil addressed in this article presume one or more evildoers.
The nature of good and evil was also ascertainable by natural faculties without the need for revelation—"one will not achieve a perfect perception of good and evil if one has not exactly examined the nature and reason of things."
Offenses against the Three Bonds and the Five Constants
Chinese cosmology, moral philosophy and law regard offenses against the Five Constants with particular abhorrence—anything that diminished the proper relationship between ruler and subject, father and son, husband and wife, elder and younger, and between mutual friends was a violation of the cosmic order and heinous. Anything that went against the Way embedded in the order of human relationships was considered vile, and invited the displeasure of Heaven and ghosts, who were seen as inflicting retribution through the instrumentality of legal punishments on earth. Chinese moral and legal philosophy views the violation of family and kinship order with particular abhorrence, considering it especially heinous. In assessing the degree of evil, not only the severity of the effect against the life, health or dignity of a person is considered, but also the relational distance.
Ten Abominations ("十惡")
The Ming Legal Code identified Ten Abominations—categories of prohibited conduct so abhorrent and heinous that the usual considerations of pardon would not apply—these include plotting rebellion, great sedition, treason, parricide, depravity (the murder of three or more innocent persons or the use of magical curses), great irreverence ( lèse-majesté), lack of filial piety, discord, unrighteousness and incest (fornication with relatives of fourth degree of mourning or less, or relationships with one's father's wife and concubines).
Other views
As with Buddhism, in Confucianism or Taoism there is no direct analogue to the way good and evil are opposed although reference to demonic influence is common in Chinese folk religion. Confucianism's primary concern is with correct social relationships and the behavior appropriate to the learned or superior man. Thus evil would correspond to wrong behavior. Still less does it map into Taoism, in spite of the centrality of dualism in that system, but the opposite of the cardinal virtues of Taoism, compassion, moderation, and humility can be inferred to be the analogue of evil in it.
Spinoza assumes a formal system style and states these further propositions which he purports to prove or demonstrate from the above definitions in part IV of his Ethics:
A 2014 re-assessment of Milgram's work argued that the results should be interpreted with the "engaged followership" model: that people are not simply obeying the orders of a leader, but instead are willing to continue the experiment because of their desire to support the scientific goals of the leader and because of a lack of identification with the learner. Thomas Blass argues that the experiment explains how people can be Complicity in roles such as "the dispassionate bureaucrat who may have shipped Jews to Auschwitz with the same degree of routinization as potatoes to Bremerhaven". However, like James Waller, he argues that it cannot explain an event like the Holocaust. Unlike the perpetrators of the Holocaust, the participants in Milgram's experiment were reassured that their actions would cause little harm and had little time to contemplate their actions.
Thus, evil does not exist and is relative to man. ʻAbdu'l-Bahá, son of the founder of the religion, in Some Answered Questions states:
A typical understanding of evil is reflected by Al-Ash'ari, founder of Ash'arism. Accordingly, qualifying something as evil depends on the circumstances of the observer. An event or an action itself is neutral, but it receives its qualification by God. Since God is omnipotent and nothing can exist outside of God's power, God determines whether or not something is evil.P. Koslowski (2013). The Origin and the Overcoming of Evil and Suffering in the World Religions Springer Science & Business Media p. 37
Practically this can refer to 1) the three selfish emotions—desire, hate and delusion; and 2) to their expression in physical and verbal actions. Specifically, evil means whatever harms or obstructs the causes for happiness in this life, a better rebirth, liberation from samsara, and the true and complete enlightenment of a buddha ( samyaksambodhi).
"What is evil? Killing is evil, lying is evil, slandering is evil, abuse is evil, gossip is evil: envy is evil, hatred is evil, to cling to false doctrine is evil; all these things are evil. And what is the root of evil? Desire is the root of evil, illusion is the root of evil." The Buddha, the founder of Buddhism, 563–483 BC.
Sikhism, like many other religions, does incorporate a list of "vices" from which suffering, corruption, and abject negativity arise. These are known as the Five Thieves, called such due to their propensity to cloud the mind and lead one astray from the prosecution of righteous action. These are:
Defining evil is complicated by its multiple, often ambiguous, common usages: evil is used to describe the whole range of suffering, including that caused by nature, and it is also used to describe the full range of human immorality from the "evil of genocide to the evil of malicious gossip". It is sometimes thought of as the generic opposite of good. Marcus Singer asserts that these common connotations must be set aside as overgeneralized ideas that do not sufficiently describe the nature of evil.
In contemporary philosophy, there are two basic concepts of evil: a broad concept and a narrow concept. A broad concept defines evil simply as any and all pain and suffering: "any bad state of affairs, wrongful action, or character flaw". Yet, it is also asserted that evil cannot be correctly understood "(as some of the utilitarians once thought) on a simple hedonic scale on which pleasure appears as a plus, and pain as a minus". This is because pain is necessary for survival. Renowned orthopedist and missionary to lepers, Dr. Paul Brand explains that leprosy attacks the nerve cells that feel pain resulting in no more pain for the leper, which leads to ever increasing, often catastrophic, damage to the body of the leper.
The narrow concept of evil involves moral condemnation, therefore it is ascribed only to moral agents and their actions. This eliminates natural disasters and animal suffering from consideration as evil: according to Claudia Card, "When not guided by moral agents, forces of nature are neither "goods" nor "evils". They just are. Their "agency" routinely produces consequences vital to some forms of life and lethal to others".
Those who support the usefulness of the term, such as Eve Garrard and David McNaughton, argue that the term evil "captures a distinct part of our moral phenomenology, specifically, 'collecting together those wrongful actions to which we have ... a response of moral horror'." Claudia Card asserts it is only by understanding the nature of evil that we can preserve humanitarian values and prevent evil in the future.
One school of thought holds that no person is evil and that only acts may be properly considered evil. Some theorists define an evil action simply as a kind of action an evil person performs, but just as many theorists believe that an evil character is one who is inclined toward evil acts.
American psychiatrist M. Scott Peck describes evil as a kind of personal "militant ignorance".Peck, M. Scott. (1983, 1988). People of the Lie: The hope for healing human evil. Century Hutchinson. According to Peck, an evil person is consistently self-deceiving, deceives others, psychologically projects his or her evil onto very specific targets,Peck, 1983/1988, p. 105 hates, abuses power, and lies incessantly.Peck, M. Scott. (1978, 1992), The Road Less Travelled. Arrow. Evil people are unable to think from the viewpoint of their victim. Peck considers those he calls evil to be attempting to escape and hide from their own conscience (through self-deception) and views this as being quite distinct from the apparent absence of conscience evident in Psychopathy. He also considers that certain institutions may be evil, using the My Lai massacre to illustrate. By this definition, acts of terrorism and state terrorism would also be considered evil.
According to the "realist" schools of political philosophy, leaders should sometimes be able to switch from good to evil, taking actions based only upon advantage to the state; this approach to politics was put forth most famously by Niccolò Machiavelli, a 16th-century Florentine writer who advised autocrats that they should be able to engage in political immorality. He also wrote that "one should not care about incurring the fame of those vices without which it is difficult to save one's state; for if one considers everything well, one will find something appears to be virtue, which if pursued would be one's ruin, and something else appears to be vice, which if pursued results in one's security and well-being."
Notes
Further reading
Religions
Abrahamic
Baháʼí Faith
The Baháʼí Faith asserts that evil is non-existent and that it is a concept reflecting lack of good, just as cold is the state of no heat, darkness is the state of no light, forgetfulness the lacking of memory, ignorance the lacking of knowledge. All of these are states of lacking and have no real existence.
Nevertheless, a doubt occurs to the mind—that is, scorpions and serpents are poisonous. Are they good or evil, for they are existing beings? Yes, a scorpion is evil in relation to man; a serpent is evil in relation to man; but in relation to themselves they are not evil, for their poison is their weapon, and by their sting they defend themselves.
Thus, evil is more of an intellectual concept than a true reality. Since God is good, and upon creating creation he confirmed it by saying it is Good (Genesis 1:31) evil cannot have a true reality.
Christianity
Christian theology draws its concept of evil from the Old Testament and . The Christian Bible exercises "the dominant influence upon ideas about God and evil in the Western world." In the Old Testament, evil is understood to be an opposition to God as well as something unsuitable or inferior such as the leader of the Satan.Hans Schwarz, Evil: A Historical and Theological Perspective (Lima, Ohio: Academic Renewal Press, 2001): 42–43. In the New Testament the Greek language word poneros is used to indicate unsuitability, while kakos is used to refer to opposition to God in the human realm.Schwarz, Evil, 75. Officially, the Catholic Church extracts its understanding of evil from its canonical antiquity and the Dominican Order theologian, Thomas Aquinas, who in Summa Theologica defines evil as the absence or privation of good.Thomas Aquinas, Summa Theologica, translated by the Fathers of the English Dominican Province (New York: Benziger Brothers, 1947) Volume 3, q. 72, a. 1, p. 902. French-American theologian Henri Blocher describes evil, when viewed as a theological concept, as an "unjustifiable reality. In common parlance, evil is 'something' that occurs in the experience that ought not to be."Henri Blocher, Evil and the Cross (Downers Grove: InterVarsity Press, 1994): 10.
Islam
There is no concept of absolute evil in Islam, as a fundamental universal principle that is independent from and equal with good in a dualistic sense.Jane Dammen McAuliffe Encyclopaedia of the Qurʼān Brill 2001 p. 335 Although the Quran mentions the biblical forbidden tree, it never refers to it as the 'tree of knowledge of good and evil'. Within Islam, it is considered essential to believe that all comes from God, whether it is perceived as good or bad by individuals; and things that are perceived as evil or bad are either natural events (natural disasters or illnesses) or caused by humanity's free will. Much more the behavior of beings with free will, then they disobey God's orders, harming others or putting themselves over God or others, is considered to be evil.B. Silverstein Islam and Modernity in Turkey Springer 2011 p. 124 Evil does not necessarily refer to evil as an ontological or moral category, but often to harm or as the intention and consequence of an action, but also to unlawful actions. Unproductive actions or those who do not produce benefits are also thought of as evil.Jane Dammen McAuliffe Encyclopaedia of the Qurʼān Brill 2001 p. 338
Rabbinic Judaism
In Judaism and Jewish theology, the existence of evil is presented as part of the idea of free will: if humans were created to be perfect, always and only doing good, being good would not mean much. For Jewish theology, it is important for humans to have the ability to choose the path of goodness, even in the face of temptation and yetzer hara (the inclination to do evil).
Ancient Egyptian
Evil in the religion of ancient Egypt is known as Isfet, "disorder/violence". It is the opposite of Maat, "order", and embodied by the serpent god Apep, who routinely attempts to kill the sun god Ra and is stopped by nearly every other deity. Isfet is not a primordial force, but the consequence of free will and an individual's struggle against the non-existence embodied by Apep, as evidenced by the fact that it was born from Ra's umbilical cord instead of being recorded in the religion's creation myths.Kemboly, Mpay (2010). The Question of Evil in Ancient Egypt. London: Golden House Publications.
Indian
Buddhism
The primal duality in Buddhism is between suffering and enlightenment, so the good vs. evil splitting has no direct analogue in it. One may infer from the general teachings of the Buddha that the Dukkha of suffering are what correspond in this belief system to 'evil'. Philosophy of Religion Charles Taliaferro, Paul J. Griffiths, eds. Ch. 35, Buddhism and Evil Martin Southwold p. 424 Lay Outreach and the Meaning of 'Evil Person' Taitetsu Unno
Hinduism
In Hinduism, the concept of Dharma or righteousness clearly divides the world into good and evil, and clearly explains that wars have to be waged sometimes to establish and protect Dharma, this war is called Dharmayuddha. This division of good and evil is of major importance in both the Hindu epics of Ramayana and Mahabharata. The main emphasis in Hinduism is on bad action, rather than bad people. The Hindu holy text, the Bhagavad Gita, speaks of the balance of good and evil. When this balance goes off, divine incarnations come to help to restore this balance.
Sikhism
In adherence to the core principle of spiritual evolution, the Sikhism idea of evil changes depending on one's position on the path to liberation. At the beginning stages of spiritual growth, good and evil may seem neatly separated. Once one's spirit evolves to the point where it sees most clearly, the idea of evil vanishes and the truth is revealed. In his writings Guru Arjan explains that, because God is the source of all things, what we believe to be evil must too come from God. And because God is ultimately a source of absolute good, nothing truly evil can originate from God.
Question of a universal definition
A fundamental question is whether there is a universal, transcendent definition of evil, or whether one's definition of evil is determined by one's social or cultural background. C. S. Lewis, in The Abolition of Man, maintained that there are certain acts that are universally considered evil, such as rape and murder. However, the rape of women, by men, is found in every society, and there are more societies that see at least some versions of it, such as marital rape or punitive rape, as normative than there are societies that see all rape as non-normative (a crime). (2026). 9781134026395, Taylor & Francis. ISBN 9781134026395 In nearly all societies, killing except for defense or duty is seen as murder. Yet the definition of defense and duty varies from one society to another. (2026). 9781489905833, Springer US. ISBN 9781489905833 Social deviance is not uniformly defined across different cultures, and is not, in all circumstances, necessarily an aspect of evil. (2026). 9781597450065 ISBN 9781597450065 (2026). 9780062803405, Harper Perennial. ISBN 9780062803405
(2026). 9780310861997, Zondervan. ISBN 9780310861997 Congenital insensitivity to pain (CIP), also known as congenital analgesia, is a neurological disorder that prevents feeling pain. It "leads to ... bone fractures, multiple scars, osteomyelitis, joint deformities, and limb amputation ... Mental retardation is common. Death from hyperpyrexia occurs within the first 3 years of life in almost 20% of the patients." Few with the disorder are able to live into adulthood. Evil cannot be simply defined as all pain and its connected suffering because, as Marcus Singer says: "If something is really evil, it can't be necessary, and if it is really necessary, it can't be evil".
(2026). 9780195181265, Oxford University Press. ISBN 9780195181265 The narrow definition of evil "picks out only the most morally despicable sorts of actions, characters, events, etc. Evil in ... is the worst possible term of opprobrium imaginable". Eve Garrard suggests that evil describes "particularly horrifying kinds of action which we feel are to be contrasted with more ordinary kinds of wrongdoing, as when for example we might say 'that action wasn't just wrong, it was positively evil'. The implication is that there is a qualitative, and not merely quantitative, difference between evil acts and other wrongful ones; evil acts are not just very bad or wrongful acts, but rather ones possessing some specially horrific quality". In this context, the concept of evil is one element in a full nexus of moral concepts.
Philosophical questions
Approaches
Views on the nature of evil belong to the branch of philosophy known as ethics—which in modern philosophy is subsumed into three major areas of study:
Usefulness as a term
There is debate on how useful the term "evil" is, since it is often associated with spirits and the devil. Some see the term as useless because they say it lacks any real ability to explain what it names. There is also real danger of the harm that being labeled "evil" can do when used in moral, political, and legal contexts. Those who support the usefulness of the term say there is a secular view of evil that offers plausible analyses without reference to the supernatural. Garrard and Russell argue that evil is as useful an explanation as any moral concept. Garrard adds that evil actions result from a particular kind of motivation, such as taking pleasure in the suffering of others, and this distinctive motivation provides a partial explanation even if it does not provide a complete explanation. Most theorists agree use of the term evil can be harmful but disagree over what response that requires. Some argue it is "more dangerous to ignore evil than to try to understand it".
(2026). 9781139491709, Cambridge University Press. ISBN 9781139491709 If evils are the worst sorts of moral wrongs, social policy should focus limited energy and resources on reducing evil over other wrongs. (2026). 9780195181265, Oxford University Press. ISBN 9780195181265 Card asserts that by categorizing certain actions and practices as evil, we are better able to recognize and guard against responding to evil with more evil which will "interrupt cycles of hostility generated by past evils".
(2026). 9780801443688, Cornell University Press. ISBN 9780801443688
Luke Russell argues that both evil actions and evil feelings are necessary to identify a person as evil, while Daniel Haybron argues that evil feelings and evil motivations are necessary.
Necessity
Martin Luther argued that there are cases where a little evil is a positive good. He wrote, "Seek out the society of your boon companions, drink, play, talk bawdy, and amuse yourself. One must sometimes commit a sin out of hate and contempt for the Devil, so as not to give him the chance to make one scrupulous over mere nothings ..."Martin Luther, Werke, XX, p. 58
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