On the Seduction of Evil

It is a strange and fearful thought that in order to build a true relationship, whether with another, with a community, or even with God, one must first make the acquaintance of evil. For what is evil but the most practiced deceiver? It does not stand before us with horns and menace, that would be too easy. No, it arrives clothed in benevolence, in righteousness, in the noble language of prestige and competence. Evil’s art is precisely that it resembles the good so closely that only the eye that has faced it’s own shadow can discern the difference.

Our age has invented convenient pictures of evil, so we might comfort ourselves that we would recognize it when it comes. Yet this very confidence blinds us. We expect a monster, but what appears instead is a benefactor. Evil entices us not by being repulsive, but by being desirable. Only when one has been tempted by it, when one has felt its charm, does one understand that one stands at the edge of the abyss.

Evil is not an event, but a repetition. It lies, not once, but again and again, until the lie becomes its dwelling place. And when the lie is exposed, it denies, so that truth itself becomes uncertain. Thus arises the dizziness of doubt, where one no longer knows whether the ground beneath one’s feet is solid. This is despair; to make the self lose faith in its own capacity for truth.

The deceiver is always at the center of disorder, yet never responsible. Always injured, always misunderstood, always the victim; here is the demonic inversion of truth. It is not the single betrayal, but the system of betrayals; not the single failure, but the refusal to acknowledge failure.

And how shall one guard oneself against such danger? Not by cleverness, for evil outwits cleverness. Not by power, for evil flatters power. No, the task is infinitely harder: to observe in silence, to wait in patience, to see not merely the great performance but the hidden moments between. How do they treat the one of no consequence? How do they endure inconvenience? Do their words cohere with their deeds when the world has turned its eyes away? These are the marks by which spirit is revealed.

But the most decisive mark is this: does the individual take upon himself the guilt of his life, or does he explain it away, placing himself always in the right? Beware the one who cannot confess, who insists endlessly on her innocence, for such a one has locked the door against God. This is despair in its most dreadful form: the self that will not be itself before God, that defends itself against repentance, that makes itself the righteous sufferer. And here lies the demonic; not in open rebellion, but in the self-deception that refuses to be seen.

Therefore, if we would build anything true, relationship, community, faith we must not only perceive evil in the other, but tremble before its possibility in ourselves. For the greatest danger is not simply to be deceived by another, but to join the deception, to live in untruth, and to call it righteousness. Only in standing transparently before God, in fear and trembling, does the self become strong enough to love and to bind itself in truth.