1) Text-based and historical framework

Isaiah 45:7: “I am the light and create the darkness I make peace and I think the bad (הָרַע); I, the Lord, do all of this.” The passage belongs to the oracle on Cyrus as an instrument of God: the thesis is the absolute sovereignty of HaShem on the whole of reality, in a polemic against dualism (e.g., Persian).

2) Vocabulary: what“evil” (ra‘) = moral evil?

In biblical Hebrew, ra‘ it can mean “evil/calamity/misfortune” not necessarily moral evil. In Isaiah 45:7, the plain sense (peshat) —given the context of the political-historical— points to adverse events God brings judgment or correction, not that He “wants” the evil ethics. The reading classical going in that direction.

VIDEO PARASHAH BEREISHIT 2025 IN SPANISH

3) Exegesis classic (Targum, Rashi, medieval)

• Rashi it highlights the contrast sovereign: God has benefits and adversities; there is no other power which can compete with Him. The central idea is monotheistic and anti-dualistic; the “evil” is understood as misfortune/decree, not as a substance autonomous rival of God.
• The liturgy jewish softens the term to bless: “yotzer ohr u vorej choshej, oseh shalom u voreh et hakol” (...and creates all), not saying “and creates evil”, precisely for not ascribing to God “moral evil” in the prayer. It is a euphemism liturgical based in Isa 45:7.

4) Philosophy (Maimonides): the evil as privation

To Maimonidesthe bad it is not a created entity but a deprivation (defect, absence of good), derived from three sources: (a) the matter/contingency of the world, (b) the interaction between beings and (c) election of a human. God, as pure, it does not create “moral evil”; what the Tanakh called “ra‘” tends to be natural calamity or retributive.

VIDEO PARASHAH BEREISHIT 2025 IN ENGLISH

5) Free will and responsibility

The Talmud states: “Everything is in the hands of Heaven except the fear of Heaven” (that is to say, moral decision-making, human). With that, the tradition separates: God rules history, but the moral guilt for the evil act is human.

6) Ontology rabbinic of evil: Yetzer Ha-Ra, Satan, and death

The Scholars conceptualize the yetzer ha-ra (evil inclination) as internal force of temptation, identifiable —in a famous passage— with Satan and the Angel of Death: “are one in the same” (three functions, a root). The struggle ethics is real, but non-dualistic: there is not an anti-God.

Episodes:

• Yoma 69b: after fasting, Israel will “capture” the yetzer of idolatry; without it, the economic life/family comes to a standstill. Conclusion rabbinic: the yetzer is ambivalent; channeled and drives construction, and the life; runaway, it destroys.
• Berachot 5a (recipes to combat it: Torah, Shema, the memory of death) show that the ethical practice facing the evil as a challenge to education.

7) “Creations” linked to the evil in the pre-creation

Sources talmudic listed things “created” before of the world, among them Gehinom (as a framework of remuneration). This suggests that the justice and the possibility of sanction are provided in the architecture moral of the universe.

8) Cabal: tzimtzum, sitra ajrá and kelipot

The mystical luriana proposes that God “contracts” (tzimtzum) to give space to the other; in that “space” emerge worlds broken and shells (kelipot) that conceal the light; the domain of the evil called sitra ajrá (“the other side”). The evil is not a rival ontological God but distortion/concealment that allows you to freedom and merit; the spiritual task is to raising sparks and refine the reality.

9) doctrinal Synthesis (from Isaiah 45:7)

• Monotheism strong: Isaiah states that all (light/darkness, peace/calamity) is under God; there is no other absolute power. Rejection of dualism.
• Distinction semantics: “ra‘” in the passage = adversity (historic/natural) more than moral evil ontological. The liturgy reflects this reading.
• Human responsibility: the moral evil comes from elections (yetzer ha-ra + free will). God allows that margin, so that there is virtue authentic.
• Philosophy and mysticism converge: Maimonides understood it as deprivation; the Cabal, as concealment and shells refine. Both deny a “principle of evil” co-eternal with God.

10) ethical Implications and theological

1. Theodicy: the calamity may be trial or correction in the history (Isaiah), while the suffering “is not deserved,” he explains —in Maimonides— for the contingency of the world and for the evils caused by humans.
2. Practice: the Halachah and the avodah point to discipline the yetzer and “make Shalom” turning darkness into light (the recipe Berachot 5a is programmatic).
3. Narrative mystical: life is tikkún; to fight with the sitra ajrá dignifies the freedom and reveals more light.

Conclusion

From Isaiah 45:7, judaism teaches: God does not compete with an “anti-God”; it does not create “moral evil” as an end in itself, but yes governs even the adversity of the story. The moral evil emerges from the yetzer and the human choice; philosophically it is deprivation, cabalísticamente concealment that enables the tikkún. The task of religion is illuminate the darkness, convert the ra‘ in shalom and justice, under the sovereignty of the Single.