Bad men need nothing more to compass their ends, than that good men should look on and do nothing. – John Stuart Mill (often mis-attributed to Burke).
There is something instinctively seductive about looking on – and doing nothing. Indeed, the media have adjudged this kind of behavior to be “Journalism,” as if it were somehow noble to observe an atrocity, and then in response to it, do nothing more than stand back and take pictures. As we know from countless smartphone videos, today, looking on and doing nothing is the rule, not the exception. Of course, this should be considered absolutely unacceptable in polite society: nobody should stand by and “witness” rape or murder. Daniel Penny agrees.
Jordan Peterson nailed it when he pointed out that, while people read history and imagine themselves as the heroes, when a crisis actually arises, the vast majority of people are actually the villains. Peterson reports that during Covid, 30% of Canadians informed on the people around them. “Witnessing,” indeed. Covid Karens felt that there must be something inherently noble in watching and reporting on others. There is not.
John Stuart Mill and Jordan Peterson are right. But they were not the first to notice it. There is a would-be homograph (words that are spelled the same but have different meanings) in the Torah that makes this very connection!
The word for “evil” in the Torah is Rah/Ra-ah (masculine and feminine forms). It is first offered when the Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil is introduced. Evil is thus the opposite of good. This seems simple enough.
And we know the Torah meaning of “good.” Goodness in the Torah is about creativity and productivity. Hence G-d judged steps within creation to be “good.” And G-d decided that “it is not good for man to be alone” – in order to create and productively grow (biologically as well as in every other way), men need women.
So if evil/Ra is the opposite of “good,” is it possible that in the Torah, “evil” is not merely a value judgement, but also is the opposite of goodness? The opposite of activity and creativity? In other words, does the Torah tell us that “evil” is really inaction and passivity?
Does the text really support this kind of understanding?
With bells on. Because the word for evil, Ra/Ra-ah, are the very same letters as the word for “seeing” or “watching!” Evil IS looking on and doing nothing – on this, John Stuart Mill and the Torah agree.
The Torah uses this word, Ra-ah, quite a lot, because it is the same word for shepherd. Shepherding, while not evil in itself, certainly does involve an awful lot of merely “watching.” This is how David had so much mental time on his hands during which to compose Psalms!
We need more heroes, more Daniel Pennys, people who are brave enough to act even when all others just stand and watch. Actually trying to save people is so much better than self-righteously intoning, “someone should do something!”
Because the difference between watching and acting, in result, is quite similar to the difference between watching pornography and investing in a marriage. They might share the same physiological outcome, but our interpersonal actions are meant to be constructive and good, while watching porn is evil, if for no other reason than it is about passively watching, and not productively engaging. Inaction is wasted opportunity.
The human desire and instinct for indolence, for inaction, is described in the text:
First, we are told (Gen. 6) that powerful men, left to their own devices, pursue unproductive lives, taking what they want (especially women), and never giving in return. G-d first makes our lifespan shorter, hoping that mortality will spur us to want to achieve more. But it is not enough, so the Torah tells us:
G-d saw how great was human wickedness (Ra) on earth—how every thought that emerged from man’s heart was nothing but evil (Ra) all the time.
If there is no reason to choose otherwise, men choose indolence, superficial relationships, and porn. Man’s desires are “Evil from youth” (Gen 8:21). We are not inherently active – we instinctively choose to look on and do nothing. That is how man’s default state is evil, as per the verse above. Our default is inaction, especially once we have met our material needs (see the vast swaths of young people today).
Which perhaps explains why Joseph, who is explicitly called a “youth’’ while still living at home, brings evil reports about his brothers back to his father. The word for “reports” (deebah) is already pejorative (it is only found in the text elsewhere to describe the corrosive reports of the spies), so the word Ra-ah in this context tells us that Joseph reported what he saw. In other words, he acted with the noblest self-righteousness of a journalist. And it was, in a nutshell, Ra – it was evil. Joseph’s tale-bearing was the equivalent of a Covid Karen, snitching on her neighbors.
Thus passivity, watching without acting, is itself the opposite of creativity – evil is the opposite of good. There is an opportunity cost, a wasted chance, that comes from not acting. If we are not building life, then we are taking it away. Hence the use of the word Ra-ah to describe the wild animal whom Jacob feels must have killed his beloved son. Joseph, the son who passively ratted out his brothers, is turn described as having been a passive victim, ripped apart by some predator (the word Ra is thus used in both examples, middah kneged middah, “measure for measure”). Evil and laziness leads to victimization: young people who blame everyone else for their own failings and limitations.
And what is described as the most evil thing of all in the Torah? It is not murder – it is adultery. An older and much wiser Joseph declines to sleep with Potiphar’s wife, saying, “How can I do this great evil?” If investing in creativity and relationships is “good”, then the greatest evil of all is undermining and destroying the relationships, the marriages, of others. If pornography is evil because it is lazy and self-destructive, then adultery is the greatest evil because it is exporting this selfishness and victimhood to others, threatening to tear society apart, one marriage at a time.
P.S. The above interpretation suggests there might be a radically different understanding of the Garden of Eden. Adam and Eve were entirely passive in the Garden. But when they left, they started to create. The awareness of knowledge of Good and Evil, eating the fruit, triggered a movement in their personal lives from passivity to action, from evil toward good!
P.P.S. There is a principle that there are “seventy faces” to the Torah, that there are layers of meaning that can each contain an aspect of truth without contradiction. So the above should not be taken to suggest that there is only one way to understand Ra-ah (or any other) word. Nevertheless, the context of the word and how it is used and found elsewhere can help shine a light on what the Torah is trying to communicate to us, just below the surface-level meaning.