Here the problem is not about what it is because it suffices to say that it exists and that it clearly predates human existence. It also does not matter if it is moral evil or natural evil.
Nature of natural evil
Moral evil results from a perpetrator, or one who acts intentionally and in so doing has flouted some duty or engaged in some vice. Natural evil has only victims, and is generally taken to be the result of natural processes. The "evil" thus identified is evil only from the perspective of those affected and who perceive it as an affliction. Examples include cancer, birth defects, tornadoes, earthquakes, tsunamis, hurricanes,
acts of God, and other phenomena which inflict suffering with apparently no accompanying mitigating good. Such phenomena inflict "evil" on victims with no perpetrator to blame.
In the
Bible, God is portrayed as both the ultimate creator and perpetrator, since the “sun, moon and stars, celestial activity, clouds, dew, frost, hail, lightning, rain, snow, thunder, and wind are all subject to God's command.”
[4] Examples of natural evils ascribed to God follow:
- Earthquake: By the Lord “the earth will be shaken” (Isaiah 13:13).
- Drought and Famine: God will shut off rains, so neither land nor trees yield produce (Leviticus 26:19-20).
- Forest fires: God says, “Say to the southern forest, 'I will kindle a fire in you, and it shall devour every green tree in you and every dry tree'” (Ezekiel
- Floods: God brought “a flood of waters on the earth” (Genesis 6:17).
- Thunder, hail, lightning: God “sent thunder and hail, and fire came down” (Exodus 9:2
