Philosophy

Period #1

Problem of Evil

In literature, a destructive force or condition broadly classified as either human (moral evil) or supernatural (metaphysical evil). In the former category lies the bulk of literary interest, focusing on the activities of an individual villain or on an injustice, such as slavery, inaugurated and perpetuated by human agency.

Also included in this category would be psychological evil—the self-destructive, conflicted impulses of a person who is his or her "own worst enemy." Still another subdivision would be the banality of evil, a term coined by the 20th-century philosopher Hannah Arendt to describe those who are unquestioning servants of an ...