The God of Thunderbolts

The One forming light and creating darkness, causing well-being and creating disaster; I am the Lord who does all these things.  Isaiah 45:7  NASB

Creating Disaster – If Isaiah 45:7 just said that God is behind the various calamities in the world, we might—maybe—be able live with this.  Maybe.  At least that’s the way most Christian commentators have tried to skirt the implication that God creates evil.  They offer explanations in an attempt to save the text and detour around the doctrinal/theological quagmire.  Here’s an example:  

If everything God created was good (Genesis 1:31; 1 Timothy 4:4; James 1:17), why does Isaiah 45:7 say God created evil? The Hebrew word translated as “evil” (ra‘) in the King James Version of Isaiah 45:7 has two applications in the Bible. The term can be used in the sense of moral evil, such as wickedness and sin (Matthew 12:35; Judges 3:12; Proverbs 8:13; 3 John 1:11), or it can refer to harmful natural events, calamity, misfortune, adversity, affliction, or disaster. It is in this second sense that Isaiah speaks, and his meaning is reflected in most modern Bible translations of Isaiah 45:7 (emphasis added): “I make success and create disaster” (HCSB); “I make well-being and create calamity” (ESV); “I send good times and bad times” (NLT).

God does not create moral evil. For one thing, moral evil is not a “thing” to be made but a choice or intent contrary to God’s good purposes, His holy character, and His law. Moral evil does not conform to God and His will. God is good (Psalm 34:8), holy (Leviticus 11:44; Isaiah 6:3; 1 Peter 1:16), and loving (1 John 4:8); therefore, His plans and purposes are good, holy, and loving.

As Ruler of the universe, God sometimes creates calamity to accomplish His will. He brought disaster to discipline His people when they turned their backs on Him and refused to repent (Jeremiah 18:17). And He promised to bring calamity to Babylon through Cyrus for the sake of His chosen people—to restore them to their homeland and rebuild their ruined cities (Isaiah 41:8–10; 44:26; 45:4; 2 Chronicles 36:22–23; Ezra 1:3).

As the Sovereign King over all earthly kings, God can make light or darkness and create peace or calamity. He can use Cyrus as His agent of redemption and peace for Israel and as the bringer of calamity upon Babylon. God moved beyond the boundaries of Israel, selecting a world power that did not even recognize His sovereignty to accomplish His greater kingdom purposes. Cyrus would be the Lord’s divine instrument to help spread the good news of God’s “righteousness” and “salvation” (see Isaiah 45:8) to “all the world from east to west” (Isaiah 45:6, NLT). Cyrus would be the channel, but God was the Architect and Inventor of it all.

God’s sovereign rule over all things good and bad—over success and calamity for His people Israel—is cause for hope in the lives of believers today. We can trust and “know that God causes everything to work together for the good of those who love God and are called according to his purpose for them” (Romans 8:28, NLT). God’s purpose is to bring us to spiritual maturity (Romans 8:29; Ephesians 1:4; 5:27; Colossians 1:22; 1 Thessalonians 4:3; Jude 1:24). Our experiences may seem bright or dark, peaceful or disastrous, but God promises to craft them all together, even adversity, affliction, and “evil,” for our ultimate benefit.[1]

Other English Bible versions suggest the same route:

I form light and create darkness, I make weal and create woe; I the Lord do all these things.  NRSVA

I form light and create darkness; I make well-being and create calamity; I am the Lord, who does all these things.  ESV

Is this really an answer or is it just a diversion?  Even if God only causes calamities, doesn’t this still raise the issue about His essential benevolence?  If tens of thousands die in earthquakes and typhoons, isn’t God still responsible?  Or do we just chalk it up to inevitability for the greater good.

Perhaps there’s a better explanation.  Let’s look at the Hebrew text (the crucial word, raʿ, is highlighted):

יוֹצֵ֥ר אוֹר֙ וּבוֹרֵ֣א חֹ֔שֶׁךְ עֹשֶׂ֥ה שָׁל֖וֹם וּב֣וֹרֵא רָ֑ע אֲנִ֥י יְהֹוָ֖ה עֹשֶׂ֥ה כָל־אֵֽלֶּה

Who forms light and creates darkness, Who makes peace and creates evil; I am the Lord, Who makes all these.  Chabad

Chabad does not try to minimize the issue.  Closer to the real meaning of the terms, Chabad recognizes that Isaiah’s statement must be understood within the social/political context of the prophet’s circumstances.  Isaiah is perhaps the most transcendental of the prophets.  He views God from the perspective of absolute sovereignty.  God is in charge, full stop!  What this means is that God’s pronouncements flow from a place human beings cannot access.

“For My thoughts are not your thoughts, nor are your ways My ways,” declares the Lord.   “For as the heavens are higher than the earth, so are My ways higher than your ways
and My thoughts than your thoughts” (Isaiah 5:8-9  NASB).

As such, the transcendental perspective seems utterly incomprehensible and unreconcilable with the human idea of justice and benevolence.  The transcendent God has a completely different view of good and evil.  God reveals that the apprehension  and experience of evil in the world is teleological.  Not understandable.  Using a verb almost exclusively relegated to divine action, God announces that He “creates” good and evil   The root is bārāʾ, here as a participle, that is, a continuing action.  God has not stopped bringing about His purposes and those teleological ends, viewed from the human frame of reference, appear as the continuous generation of both good and evil.

Mccomiskey notes:

The root bārāʾ has the basic meaning “to create.” It differs from yāṣar “to fashion” in that the latter primarily emphasizes the shaping of an object while bārāʾ emphasizes the initiation of the object.^[2]  The word is used in the Qal only of God’s activity and is thus a purely theological term. This distinctive use of the word is especially appropriate to the concept of creation by divine fiat.

The root bārāʾ denotes the concept of “initiating something new”^[3]

The limitation of this word to divine activity indicates that the area of meaning delineated by the root falls outside the sphere of human ability. Since the word never occurs with the object of the material, and since the primary emphasis of the word is on the newness of the created object, the word lends itself well to the concept of creation ex nihilo although that concept is not necessarily inherent within the meaning of the word.^[4]

Does this offer some solace even if it does not resolve the human issue?  I think so.  What it means is that the transcendental view of Isaiah is not intended to be reconciled with the limits of our human horizon.  But that doesn’t mean it is illogical.  We just don’t see the full picture.  Nevertheless (and this is the real point) we can trust that He does.  And that might have to be enough.

Topical Index: evil, create, transcendence, Isaiah 45:7