In 1997, a strategic planning group at the CIA made a visit to my company in Washington. They brought with them a woman whose job and title were classified. I was not allowed to know them. She communicated throughout the meeting that she held my work and me in utter disdain. Upon listening to my presentation on how small business and communities in America could be strengthened, she looked at me and sneered, “You know what your problem is? You don’t understand where evil comes from.”
She was right. Forced by circumstances — arranged, I suspect, by her colleagues back at Langley — I spent the years after meeting her in a concerted effort to understand where evil comes from. Yet, here I sit many years later still not having an answer to this profoundly important question. Where does evil come from?
Our economic problems are symptoms of a problem we have with evil. So if we want to address our economic problems, we have to deal with the root problem — the ascendancy of evil and its effective use of invisible weaponry, including financial weaponry
How do we navigate in a world where it is impossible to obtain the information we need to see our way clearly? If the mathematics of time and money can not help me understand phenomenon, then I try to navigate through common sense and the human heart. I view events through a spiritual prism, trying to live with uncertainty — to know what I don’t know and embrace this ambiguity with faith and grace.
This is why I have always enjoyed Jeff Wells’ blog Rigorous Intuition. Wells has a masterful way of dealing with some of the darkest and weirdest aspects of life on planet earth. Here is a man whose search for truth is without censorship. There is little urge to seek a shallow certainty. There is courage here.
Wells just published a new book, Rigorous Intuition: What You Don’t Know Can’t Hurt Them. If you want to contemplate real life outside of any bubble, this book is recommended. In a series of short essays drawing from his blog, Wells gives you many more questions than answers, some profound insights, delightful laughs and the pleasure of spending time with a fine writer.
Wells can not yet answer the question, “Where does evil come from?” Rather, he invites us to explore with him and helps us to stare into the abyss of evil and unknown with integrity and humor.
I do so enjoy dropping by from time to time to catch up with the blogs and musings…As Catherine is a guest on ‘Coast to Coast AM’ late night radio from time to time, this may be an appropriate tidbit…
Some time ago, it may even have been George’s predecessor, had a ‘Technical Remote Viewer’ on as a guest.
The challenge to ‘find’ or ‘indentify’ the anti-Christ had been given on an earlier appearance. It seems the TRV group got together and worked on the topic. Interestingly enough, all the TRVs came up with sketches of ‘coins of the realm’ and different currency notes, as opposed to a face or a name of a person.
Hmm…kinda makes ya wonder, doesn’t it? Now, what’s the old saying? “Can’t serve two Masters”…
Keep up the great work. Thanks, db
The human mind knows by contrast.
We would not know good without evil.
Evil comes from good and good comes from
evil.
They arise mutually.
It is the duality of opposites that
are the principles of the universe.
Just as you can’t have light without dark
or life without death, male without female,
nothing without something so good and evil
go together as two sides of the same coin.
The trick is to find the balance between
the two.
Alan Watts on The Yin and the Yang
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S3LJ5HNfNEY
Alan Watts – Identical Differences
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gO9vJS2BScE
Why are people so evil and remorseless? They are likely to have psychopathic traits. Here is an excerpt from an article “Psychopaths in History”, written by John de Nugent, published in the Jan-Feb 2007 issue of The Barnes Review magazine:
What is a psychopath? Are psychopaths usually in prison—or are the vast majority of them moving among us, or lording it over us in society? Are they one in a million or 40,000 in a million? And what about “mattoids”—those dynamic and “gifted” psychopaths who rarely end up in prisons? Who are the most prominent and successful mattoids of today —and yesterday?
Alarming yet enlightening research in the last 15 years has concluded that full or partial psychopathy may be shockingly widespread— one American in 25, and far more in leadership positions. The key traits of the psychopath: he (usually a male) is radically self-centered, slick, lying, manipulative, ruthless, sadistic, focused and, sometimes, insanely fearless.
Here is a list of identifiers for psychopathy, compiled from several authorities. If an individual has at least any four of the below in a very pronounced form, there are grounds for concern. Many people have a touch of several of these traits, but few have a majority of them in full measure. They are:
1) Glib and superficial charm;
2) Grandiose sense of self-worth; narcissism; seeing the self as the center of the universe; feeling “no one else is human, only I”;
3) Focused self-advancement without losing any energy on others except as stepping-stones;
4) No moral taboos or inhibitions as to methods, aiding career success until caught;
5) Need for constant stimulation, action, and new ways to avoid boredom;
6) Lying as an art form to fine-tune and a source of pride;
7) Targeting and manipulation of the gullible;
8) Enticing people they do not love to naively love them;
9) Skill at faking emotions, including love, sincerity and regret;
10) Doing good work and good deeds solely to advance oneself;
11) Ruthlessness and “stopping at nothing”;
12) Enjoyment of the power to coldly end close relationships;
13) “Getting” others back as a peak experience;
14) Desire for vengeance when spurned;
15) Pleasure in firing or ruining people. In the U.S., where highly profitable firms routinely cut good employees to boost stock values, there are professional terminators who roam the country cutting staff and personally firing them;
16) Abuse and literal torture of living creatures;
17) Humiliating others physically, verbally, emotionally, psychologically or sexually;
18) Denigrating one’s own child or mate;
19) Callousness; lack of empathy and compassion;
20) Shallow or no feelings for others, even mates, children and friends;
21) No ability to feel remorse or undergo inner repentance;
22) Regret solely at being caught, embarrassed or punished;
23) Incomprehension of the angry reactions of those they hurt;
24) Underestimation of their own anger;
25) No sense of responsibility for one’s actions;
26) Parasitical world view: living by scams and not hard work;
27) Contempt for those who “play by the rules”;
28) Criminal talent, energy and innovativeness;
29) Warlike courage far above the norm;
30) Playing on the sympathy of others. To this one might add—in the purely subjective, non-scientific eye of many beholders—a curious dead look in the eyes of a psychopath, and that is the chilling part. Others speak of looking into such eyes and “having a feeling that nothing is there.”
Calling good, Bad. and Bad,Good.
http://www.lds.org/ldsorg/v/index.jsp?vgnextoid=2354fccf2b7db010VgnVCM1000004d82620aRCRD&locale=0&sourceId=c8e166dfc311c010VgnVCM1000004d82620a____&hideNav=1
Another thought:
David Friedman, in his book The Machinery of Freedom, notes that there are only three ways to get something: (1) by trading, (2) by receiving a gift (from love or friendship), or (3) by force (“do what I want or I’ll shoot you”). Honest, peaceful people operate in the first two ways. Criminals and the state operate by force, aggression, coercion.
that pretty much identifies – to steal a word from our former President Bush – THE “EVILDOERS”.
When the fine line between the art of persuasion (trade) gives way to any degree of coercion in all matters of human interaction – we are face to face with evil.
“If people believe all is connected yet not fated. That ‘choice’ is the real deal. Then every choice is an opportunity to create good. Every choice is important no matter how small. And hope and energy flow from this.”
this is the nuts and bolts of the entire matter.
Mises stated in “Human Action” that “All human action springs from the notion that what IS – is determined to be less desirable than what OUGHT be”.
When we correctly perceive our actual spiritual being – and that we share this quality equally – with all other living beings – and understand that this eternal spiritual existence has been in fact, gifted to us – then we will recognize the impact of our choices in all actions that affect all of us equally.
Hazlitt described the Art of Economics as “The art of economics consists in looking not merely at the immediate but at the longer effects of any act or policy; it consists in tracing the consequences of that policy not merely for one group but for all groups.”
“tracing the consequences of that policy not merely for one group but for all groups.”
That is the key right there. If we are all eternal spiritual beings – obliged to both endure as individuals and as a group – the long term consequences of all our “actions” and these “actions” are compelled by our conviction that what is – can be “improved” by those “selected” acts – then we will naturally choose that which is BEST FOR ALL instead of what is merely BEST FOR ME.
EVIL is merely choosing for ME as opposed to choosing for US without realizing that in so doing we act against both our own short term as well as long term interest.
Pressed for time, I can’t really do justice to this discussion- but the author of the book The Caged Virgin, Ayaan Hirsi Ali, has a very powerful argument for naming activity and behavior that is universally evil. The lion in the forest argument doesn’t explain things like female circumcision- human parents mutilating their own female offspring as means of control or the nasty stories that come out of the Mind Control community. They may kill their weakest, but a lioness or tigress fiercely protects their healthy male AND female offspring. It is when overly inflated humans act against even the instinctual law of Nature to PROTECT THEIR OWN CHILDREN that the Man as Powerful Animal argument breaks down. Nature is not merely RED in truth and claw, but far more nuanced and multi-faceted than the eat-or-be-eaten mentality of the depraved elite MOTU, or more appropriately, MoFo’s as they say in the Hood. If Nature wasn’t also sustaining and cooperative, they wouldn’t be so hell-bent on controlling the very seeds that have fed us since we walked Upright. Or suppressing the technology that could heal their own children’s cancer or autism (that their own vaccines created). They delude their own selves- the price is very high and the delusion they force us to share and participate in is EVIL.
I am so very grateful to Catherine, Elaine Supkis at Culture of Life blog, Cynthis McKinney telling Obama-like-it-IS-about Afghanistan- women like these shine the light on the Hubris and Folly of our Phallocratic State. They nail it with amazing, brilliant precision and help me to garner the means to come clean and resist the pervasive, stinking, odious influence of those who lie and swear to it.
What we actually have is not plutocracy, but PSYCHOPATHCRACY.
Some of it is documented by a noted Psychologist, Dr. Robert Hare: http://www.hare.org/
It would explain why we have so much evil, and why our psychopathic leaders don’t have conscious we normal people have.
THOU SHALT NOT KILL.” The mormon scriptures adds a bit to that (which I like) when it says “or do anything like unto it (killing that is).” An additional piece from the mormon scriptures (the book of Moses) is the secrets of Cain which was thru a blood bound oath and covenant of a conspiracy to kill secretly to make a profit and become financially free through the theft of his brothers life and property. Joseph Smith was a high ranking mason, so maybe this is how he came to know of these conspiracies which he said ruled the world today.
I believe monotheism is a source of alot of the evil in this world. Whoever came up with the idea of one supreme god must have had a mental illness. As soon as you have one supreme god, all other gods are inferior and competitors. The followers of these gods are the enemy and must be eliminated for the glory of the supreme god and the extablishment of his kingdom.
It leads to genocide of the followers of the lesser gods by the righteous followers of the supreme god. The semitic religions (Judiasm, Islam, and Christianity) are aggressive religions that will kill others for the sake of rightousness.
In A WARNING TO HINDUS BY Savitri Devi, she warns the Hindus that Islam is an agressive religion that they must oppose if their culture is to survive. The first few pages of the book hit me when she said that the first principle of a decent religion was the principle “
In the matter of “evil”, what is “it”, how to isolate it and confront it, the matter is actually simple – but MUST be understood as an aspect of Absolute Truth. In order for this to happen – Absolute Truth must be acknowledged as the very essence of all that in fact exists; both as a perceived “good” and a perceived “evil”. Without an absolute and “transcendant” criteria – establishing something as in fact objective evil is not possible. The notion that something is evil – as opposed to simply “undesirable” by the majority – is merely a fanciful conception. What is touted as ‘savage” or “ferocious” actions by a brute predator in the animal kingdom – is hardly assigned the qualification of “evil”. Such behaviour – is taken as merely “nature” in all its glory – just doing what nature does. Science ascertains that such behaviour is dependably predictable as it is expressly determined that all life forms BUT for the human – are in fact working under the influence of the dictations of nature, with such “natural” actions described as “instinctual” and though they appear to include some degree of “choice” or individual volition – DO NOT exhibit a reliance on any sort “value” or “moral” basis save but the service of the basic functions that generate, sustain and protect that “life” for as long as is possible. Thus no beast is held “accountable” for any action which would be unacceptable within human society, were it excercised by a human being in full control of their wits and senses! In short then – the lion is not described as “evil” though it technically sustains its life and the lives of the entire pride(mates and offspring)by ferocious acts of theft and murder – on a daily basis!
If man is to held accountable for his actions – when they are at odds with the legitimate ambitions of even a single other human – then an agreed upon set of criteria are needed to establish – without doubt – what is not just undesirable behaviour by the majority – but in fact is firmly and demonstrably behviour that is PROHIBITED by the ultimate source of NATURE itself.
Without understanding our actual origin: who and what we are, where we come from, to whom we owe are very existence, and the obvious shared purpose of our obviously “shared” sojourn here within the temporary world of matter – establshing any action as “evil” is not possible. Sure we may assert with great emotional conviction or even our own personal sense of “logic” or reason. However – that is as far as it goes and I would venture a guess, that the very men who have ALWAYS employed the “law of the jungle” in matters economic with – inter alia – confiscation of the wealth of others via fraud and murder – did and do not recognize any “tuth” but their own subjective version of it and thus do not allow other’s vision of desirable or not so – to interfere with their acts of murder and theft; no matter how loudly they claim such actions to “wrong” or “evil”.
Common sense tells us that man has basic needs in order to sustain his life and the lives of his offspring. Nature is so designed that such needs are in fact easy to meet. He can meet these needs with a modest amount of work. He can – in a natural society – exchange his labor – for the sum total of his basic necessities. Nature demonstrates that all life forms accumulate just enough to sustain themselves via what in human society would term “theft” and/or “murder” and not a fraction more. And this “animal” existence operates under stringent “laws” that are only rarely violated.
Man only – demonstrates an insatiable impulse to accumulate more than his quota AND if possible – without the normal necessity of working himself to acquire those necessities – if he can find a method of “capital”izing on the efforts of others to acquire them. He can do this “legitimately” via the simple system of trade – OR he can do this “illegitimately” via theft, fraud and murder – using the arts of persusion, then coercion and finally murder(war).
“Evil” is merely acting in the interest of oneself or one’s “extensions” ie family or friends – to secure one’s necessities and beyond – by means of any form of fraudulent coercion and when necessary – murder.
Though one so engaged is really doing what the lion does in nature – sustain his life with the sacrifice of another beast’s life – he has both the means and wisdom – the volition – to refrain from so doing – but he does not.
ONLY when he can be correctly persuaded to see that it is precisely because he is not merely a material body – but in fact a spiritual living being – and that his existence is a gift WITH attendant obligations – to the origin of his existence – can he or she realize that any attempt to live as an only slightly more capable “beast” at the “expense” of the life of even a single other living being – save but in the manner prescribed by the Origin of this entire system – is NOT defined as merely “undesirable” by the majority – and thus as “Evil” – but is in fact – UNDESIRABLE by the Supreme ORIGIN; God as it is referred to throughout history and the world – and it is PRECISELY because all such fraudulent extravagance and the murder needed to sustain it ARE so utterly displeasing to our Creator – so unwanted and so unecessary by Him – that such actions can be defined as “Evil”.
Evil is merely wanting more than one’s prescribed quota needed to adequately sustain ourselves and employing any and all forms of coercion (fraud and murder) to acquire it.
“Some humans ain’t human
Some people ain’t kind
You open up their hearts
And here’s what you’ll find
A few frozen pizzas
Some ice cubes with hair
A broken Popsicle
You don’t want to go there”
Song : Some humans ain’t human
Artist : John Prine
1) I very much agree with Daniel Sauerborn: “It is very abstract to say evil. … Highly abstract words lead to confusion and lend themselves to long unresolved conflicts too.” Not only is “evil” a highly abstract word (a lot like “crime”), it has become highly politically and emotionally charged (though political and religious and leaders who act and talk with the assurance of God himself–this is often a wicked twist in itself). This latter situation makes it a bad word to convey meaning under many circumstances.
2) When one uses an abstract word one risks a serious category error: “Mistaking the map for the territory” (Alfred Korzybski, see also Gregory Bateson’s work also), but typically “evil” is so abstract or ill-defined that it is not even a decent map. Cannot evil can cover a multitude of sins? (Note a double interpretation which furthers the illustration.)
3) Catherine: I would bet the agent who was visiting you was pulling off a psy-ops (psychological operation) and was a specialist. In the type of high-level situation you describe, it is normal to study a person and then attack what looks like their weaknesses: purposes could be to confuse, divert attention, create self-doubt, and/or subtly, or not so subtly, intimidate. Consider yourself honored to get such professional attention. Time prevents me from saying more.
4) It seems to me that the major theme of Western “Civilization” is Power and Conquest. This is the stuff of murder, rape, plunder, torture, genocide–evil for short. This is our own history and in our characters. No one completely escapes their culture. An important step is to acknowledge it. (No easy answers, and answers vary with the person. It doesn’t mean you like it.) This inheritance doesn’t magically go away, although it seems it can lay low for a while. Will Rogers:
“You can’t say that civilization don’t advance…
in every war they kill you in a new way.”
Another example: The Chinese invented gunpowder and cannons, but they used them for fun and ceremonies (I expect). It was the West that turned them into weapons. Many of the native american cultures were exceedingly peaceful by our standards–some still are.
(I think Daniel’s entire post is valuable. The question of evil has been around a long time. Different cultures give surprisingly different answers. Must stop here. I have had personnal experience with point 3 above material.)
I wish there was something firm there, but as you try to grasp it, it evaporates. As far as “evil” goes, I don’t believe the nature of man is evil or fallen generally, although there may be evil men and devil or devils. I believe there is a tendency to simplify things and as a result distort that word of god.
Edward,
And where does the word of God come from? Trust in something that has so many errors and questionable origins contributes to further blindness. Now the parables of Jesus contain many things that can be understood differently by every person. So what is truth?
Daniel said:
“If people believe all is connected yet not fated. That ‘choice’ is the real deal. Then every choice is an opportunity to create good. Every choice is important no matter how small. And hope and energy flow from this.”
Amen to that!
Catherine
I think if you define evil in a specific way you’ll be able to answer your question. It is very abstract to say evil. Ask where laziness, cowardice, greed, etc come from and you can think of specific people and experiences and start answering it. Highly abstract words lead to confusion and lend themselves to long unresolved conflicts too.
I think part of the answer is in global beliefs. If someone thinks for example, that everything is made of matter and energy and behaves according to laws of physics. That even the supposedly chaotic activity at the subatomic level is following laws that we can’t properly observe or understand and thus refute in our typical self-centric fashion (sun around the earth). Then it eventually follows to believe that everything down to the smallest thought or action is destined to happen. That from the moment the universe began or recycled through the Big Bang or however it did, everything was set-up and flowed with complete accuracy from there with no errors like an unimaginably complex clock ticking away. For them choice is an illusion. Life is a meaningless trap. Of course they cannot be responsible either, and an idea like evil becomes meaningless. Things just are.
Another example would be the evolved animal view. If I believe in evolution, and that humans are predators, then I can justify humans preying on each other. I can say, is it wrong when a spider traps and eats a fly? Is it wrong when a mouse eats the spider? A snake eats the mouse? A bird of prey eats the snake? Eyes at the front, likes to hunt. Eyes at the side, likes to hide. People are predators, the best of all on Earth. It is only natural that after dominating our environments we start competing with each other, and yes, preying on each other. It is naturally efficient. It is natural law. To this person, evil might become a largely irrelevant concept evolved to support tribal living and prevent people from destroying their immediate surroundings. Just something to guide us to more successful reproduction and survival within the tribal context in which much of our current DNA was shaped by default. (Evolution is often misunderstood as a system of active design rather than one of passive design or design by default)
I think another part of the answer is also in the formation of and relationships between global beliefs in the first place. I think most people do not carefully reflect and chose their beliefs but instead either take on those given/shown to them by others, or react to an intense experience (early-life ones especially) and form beliefs that explain that experience, or reassure them about it. When people do try to analyze and choose their beliefs they tend to feel very insecure, not knowing where to stand and fearing having no place to stand, no reference point to make the many decisions life forces upon them. So people avoid taking their beliefs apart for study. This gives incentive for the traumatizing of people so that they can be controlled, and is reinforced by telling people they are objects instead of processes so that they’ll stay trapped by failing to address their problems from a process perspective.
Most people’s beliefs are not parts of a sensible/rational whole and their conflicts cause stress, their minds tugging in different directions, decisions made difficult. And most people seek “truths” they find comfort in rather than observing and thinking with an open mind. I think this is reflected in how so many people desire a world in which THEY would thrive. So many want the world to be better for people like THEM, rather than thinking in terms of the diversity of desires, abilities and perspectives of others.
Short answer:
I think evil comes from a lack of belief in one’s ability to make meaningful choices and have real influence. This leads to a lack of hope and responsibility. That person wanders through life doing what is easy, looking for someone or something to hide behind (laziness, cowardice and greed) and constructs beliefs to justify their actions which are conflicting and thereby fatiguing. If only I had enough money, or was better looking, or met the right person, etc. They look outside themselves and get stuck in a state of what the Buddha called samsara which literally translated means “perpetual wandering”. And this in my opinion, leads to addictions. To avoid their suffering they try to distract themselves from themselves. (I don’t know about you, but everyone I know suffers from addictions of some kind) They need to address the unsupportive, draining, conflicting, and destructive beliefs first in my opinion.
If people believe all is connected yet not fated. That ‘choice’ is the real deal. Then every choice is an opportunity to create good. Every choice is important no matter how small. And hope and energy flow from this.
In light of our current situation, evil comes from greed and self-centerness. Greed is a moral vice, a failure of justice involving taking more than one’s due. Steve Forbes in the November 10, 2008, “Forbes” magazine writes: “Greed and recklesness always runs rampant during bubbles, and the mania that engulfed housing and much of the financial sector was no exception.” Greed may not be the only ingredient of evil but is certainly a part of evil. As James Madison wrote in “The Federalist Papers”, “If men were angels, no government would be necessary. If angels were to govern men, neither external nor internal controls on government would be necessary.”
Angela,
I really enjoyed reading your post. A good antidote for all the other stuff I’m reading right now.
Thank you.
Regards,
Evan
It’s a slippery slope, this confrontation with the pit of evil. That’s why the shamans of old kept one foot squarely on the earth when descending into the abyss. The Masters of the Universe are currently (and openly) parading their all-knowing, omnipotent, and Malevolent Plan before us and having a feeding frenzy on the fear and sadness that it evokes in us. But we need to make a vow to ourselves to choose something else entirely, despite what we know.
There is still simple joy and praise to be had for the good medicine in wild roots, green plants and trees. Make compost and feed the precious 6 inch layer of topsoil and take the occasional break from the zapping of life force and creativity that this confrontation with psychopathy demands. Ultimately, the would-be godmen must each die mortal deaths, just like the rest of us. Hopefully, there is such a thing as the afterlife, Libra, Heaven, karma- what have you, to sort things out, but there won’t be alot of difference between the dead bones of the MOTU and our own in the end.
I think that a wonderful screenplay for a movie would be a peasants revolt, where all of these global haters would be rounded up by outraged “salt of the earth” types (aka useless eaters), who feed them a truth serum and make them speak the truth, instead of the manufactured dialectic they spew. Playground bullies cry like babies when attacked, but after years of programming and armouring, only a truth serum could unmask the pathetic, scared black hole of emptiness inside these people. Maybe we should pity those who seek to destroy us?
Man does not rule over evil except when he refuses to do it.
When he has truly done evil, he is its servant.
Hildegard of Bingen
Peaceout, and bless you Catherine,
Angela
From one of the books by Jungian analyst, James Hollis, a relevant quote from Jung.
“The spirit of evil is fear, negation, the adversary who opposes life in its struggle for eternal duration and thwarts every great deed, who infuses into the body the poison of weakness and age through the treacherous bite of the serpent; he is the spirit of regression, who threatens us with bondage to the mother and with dissolution and extinction in the unconscious. For the hero, fear is a challenge and a task, because only boldness can deliver from fear. And if the risk is not taken, the meaning of life is somehow violated, and the whole future is condemned to hopeless staleness, to a drab grey lit only by will-o’-the-wisps.”
Hollis says that evil is what thwarts life, what blocks its purpose and intention. And the source of this evil is inescapable, for fear is ubiquitous. It is the bedrock of our common condition. After all, most of us have been told “the world is big and you are small. now deal with that.” While our vulnerability and our powerlessness may be mediated somewhat by supportive family and tribal mythos, or not, ultimately the world will break through our delusions and remind us of our powerlessness. Fear, then, is the enemy. Whenever fear is not made conscious, chances are very strong that the theology, the psychology, the politics will be fear-driven, fear-based, fear-compensating. From such origins much evil will arise, for as we have seen, even our most reasoned choices may serve something sinister.
To live in a world without imagination, I would die a figurative death. As John Lennon sang, in his popular song, Imagine:
[…]
You may say that I’m a dreamer
But I’m not the only one
I hope someday you’ll join us
And the world will be as one
Imagine no possessions
I wonder if you can
No need for greed or hunger
A brotherhood of man
Imagine all the people
Sharing all the world […]
Satan the devil is foremost source of evil… good will ultimately triumph over evil at the battle of Armageddon in the not too distant future. “And in the days of those kings the God of heaven (Jehovah) will set up a kingdom that will never be brought to ruin. And the kingdom itself will not be passed on to any other people. It will crush and put an end to all these kingdoms, and it itself will stand to times indefinite.” (Daniel 2:44)
Where does evil come from? I think this question can easily be misleading, but I cannot write much at the moment. However, I just wrote the following to a friend dealing in part with Greek Tragedies that I think is relevant at times to this problem: “This interview reminds me of a Greek Tragedy. In a Greek Tragedy, the pain and suffering do not stay simply within a family but spread like a plague to groups, apparently connected only indirectly with the original untoward deed, usually done by a leader belonging to a larger family of high position. The tragedy continues for generations, spreading from person to person, and group to group, like a contagious plague. There seems to be no rhyme or reason for the destruction, except a dark senseless fate that will not be stopped, set into motion by the original untoward deed.
(I believe these tragedies were really lessons warning that an apparently relatively minor transgression, especially when done by a leader, could put into motion events resulting in generations of misery. I don’t this know interpretation for sure, but I am beginning to wish I did.)
In the bible God says “the imagination of mankind is evil”. Evil comes from our imagination. So search to the depths of the bottomless pit of imagination and good will never be found. Only God is good and you can find that in the word of God.