DEFINITIONS
Evil as a Mere Lack: Evil isn’t real on its own; it’s just the absence or corruption of good—a weakness or flaw that depends on good to exist.
Evil as a Real Substance: Evil is an actual, independent force that can act on its own and influence the world directly.
THE INCOHERENCE OF WICKEDNESS AND ITS OPPONENTS
What does religion say when you ask it what evil is?
It proposes two possible answers.
One - evil is not a reality in the sense that electricity or a brick is real. It is something failing to be as good as it can be. It is a lack or absence of a good that should be there. It is nothing at all in its own right and needs to feed off good like a parasite and corrupt it.
Two - evil is indeed a lack but also a substance. It is a lack in the way yellow paint lacks black. Evil then would have properties like strength, maybe height, weight, width and so on.
One says evil does and does not exist. Despite being unreal, it is just real in the sense that it is good in the wrong place and time. Two says that substantial evil exists.
Religion rejects two. It has to for if God makes only good then evil has to be good in the wrong place and time. Something that should be there is not. There is just nothing.
Many today worry that the idea of evil, no matter what you mean by evil, leads to harm and severity. They think that opposing it is evil in principle itself. Some say it leads to bad consequences and that is enough for condemning it. Others say it leads to bad consequences (perhaps supernatural, perhaps natural, perhaps uncanny) for it is bad in the first place. Many more shift back and forth without realising it.
But if you start condemning evil for that reason that is opposing it. If it is evil to oppose opposing evil ,you are still opposing evil.
As evil hides among good things and you only see what it wants you to see or what it accidently shows, it can easily look like it is beaten. It will want it to seem that way. It is a seed for worse. So you cannot confidently say, "Evil is a reality so all I can do is contain it. I can only make sure it does less harm than it might." Plus that would be a form of the end justifies the means. "I should steal from Lord Thorn to take my children on holiday for he will not miss the money. He is so rich."
You would surmise that this reasoning only applies if you are in camp two, that evil is a substance.
Wrong. It applies if you are in camp two. If evil is darker than a mere lack of good it will want you to think that it is a mere lack of good. Without an accurate diagnosis there can be no accurate or long-term solution.
Is evil as real as a brick or not? If it is then we can talk about substantial evil. Religion says that evil is not that. It says it is comparable to rust on iron – a parasite. This is jarring for we see the rust is there. The analogy does not work. You can imagine substantial evil feeding off something good. That does not make it any less a substance. Is human evil more than sin, more than missing the mark? Do people who say they believe evil is simply a lack really mean it? Then why do they treat some harmful people as literal temples of substantial evil?
So you cannot win. You should be agnostic with one and two, on what evil is. Be honest about it.
It is a fact that if you say there is no justice or love, you end up saying that those who disagree with you are unjust and unloving. So you cannot get away from moral values such as justice and love. You can only distort them. So if you throw out morality, it is for another version of morality.
Moralists want moral values such as justice to command themselves. For some this means they are part of God and he commands them. Others think they somehow command themselves and there is nothing more to be said. They can add that there is no point in going any further for nobody will understand it.
The latter camp are clearly wiser than the God camp. If God is not needed to ground morality then throw the God notion out as it is a distraction. A God who is not needed for morality can hardly be described as a God who is important for standing for moral values.
If the doctrine of evil as in a simple lack of a good that should be there is illogical, then evil has to be substantial. If you try to discard justice, respect, and love, you end up reinserting distorted versions of them. For example, if you say there is no justice you are saying it is unjust to say there is! And if you say you respect nothing you are respecting something after all - nothing. What does that imply about their role in our moral framework? You are treating evil as substantial even if you are saying you are not. If evil is indeed a simple lack of good, that does not mean we are made to see it that way. Our equipment may treat it as a substance despite us saying we do not. Our senses and memories are not about giving us accurate information but enough information. Nobody really can see evil as a mere absence of good. They see it as a thing and their feelings about it show that.
No matter what evil is, it is as good as true for us that we treat it as a thing.
Let us go back to the command discussion. Morality is seen as commanded.
Surely a person who helps a drowning baby not because of a command, but because of spontaneous goodness, is the best person? Yes. Morality is about the real world and not theology or commands. Morality then contradicts itself if you link it to commands. It is bad enough to say morality just commands itself but worse to bolster this with a divine commander.
We all have to consider the dilemma of whether a moral command is moral because God commands it or is moral whether he commands it or not.
Now we have another one. Is a moral SUGGESTION TO BE SPONTANEOUS moral because God suggests it or moral whether he suggests it or not?
We would have no need for God. Who cares where the suggestion comes from as long as it comes? So involving God in this is ridiculous. It should be about the baby not a theology or a supposed deity.
Religion says that God rewards obedience to his commandments and punishes violations. They say that justice and respect and love would not be serious matters otherwise. A law that is not rewarding or punishing is not a law at all.
But a command is on a spectrum. Here is an example of what we mean.
A law that prescribes a fine for murder.
A law that prescribes 10 years hard labour for murder.
A law that prescribes a life-sentence for murder.
If God gives us moral law that is not enough, in itself, to make him or his law really important. If God’s moral law is only meaningful because He enforces it, then morality becomes a system of reward and punishment—not a true guide to the good.
FINALLY
No matter what evil is, to us it is a substance.
Life is not about avoiding evil but about choosing evils that do not upset the social equilibrium too much.
True goodness is out of the blue and has nothing to do with moral commands.
APPENDIX
Evil whatever it is, is seen as terrible for what it does to us. It is up to experience to tell us if evil is a substance or not. We have no right to define evil for everybody for everybody has their own experience.
No argument for the notion that evil is not real works. Each one is just trying to lie. There is something open to evil in just assuming that substantial evil is not real when you don't even know. You don't want to be its blind friend.
The parasite doctrine, or the notion that evil is just good in the wrong place, could itself be a facet of substantial evil. Substantial evil will be and try to be a parasite anyway so anybody saying that evil is not real for it latches on to good is just guessing.
The excuses to avoid calling evil substantial are themselves evil. The insult is compounded by religion. It says that since all comes from the loving God then evil is only abused good and in that sense is not a real thing so there is no suggestion that God created evil. This is saying that evil is just an abuse of free will. Thus it tries to whitewash what may be substantial evil to blame us for evil in order to avoid saying God has anything to do with causing evil.
They go as far as to say that if Satan were completely evil he would not exist! The notion that evil is not real, that it is a parasite actually mistakes nothingness or non-existence for evil! That is absurd.
Religion is incoherent when it talks about evil. If evil is not the opposite of good then there is no evil only different levels of good. This amounts to religion being guilty of trying to slander and demonise when it says some person or action is evil. It will lead to passive aggressive rage and hate. Violence will erupt. Underneath all that, evil to religion is substantial evil or it is not evil.