In the absence of

“Badness cannot succeed even in being bad in the same way in which goodness is good. Goodness is, so to speak, itself: badness is only spoiled goodness.”

-C.S. Lewis; Mere Christianity

I read this quote today and it got me thinking. This is basically the same concept that I use to describe light and darkness. Darkness cannot be dark in the same way as light. Light is as itself; light. Darkness however, is merely the absence of light.

Good and bad; light and dark. Two sets of forces with something in common. Badness and darkness are both contingent upon their opposing force.

To illustrate this concept, imagine that you are in a bright room. Perhaps a greenhouse on a sunny day. It is so bright everywhere you look. Now, try and make a spot of darkness in that room. Just an open small spot of darkness. You cant do it. You cant put a spot of darkness into a bright room.
Now, imagine that the sun has gone down; the light has bee removed from the bright room and you are in the dark. Now, try and make a spot of brightness in the room. In your hands you hold a candle and a match. You light the candle with the match and you now have a small spot of brightness.
Look around you now. Think about how dark it was before you lit the candle and how you just couldn’t see anything. Then think about what a difference that one little spot of brightness has made in the room. It doesn’t just illuminate the tiny diameter of the flame; but shines its little light widely across the room.

Even if you took that candle and put it under a basket it doesn’t not add darkness; it merely restricts the light to the area inside the basket. The only way to make it dark again it to blow out the candle and remove the light. You cannot add to the darkness; you can only remove the light.

“You are the light of the world. A city set on a hill cannot be hidden;
Nor does anyone light a lamp and put it under a basket, but on the lamp stand, and it gives light to all who are in the house.
Let your light shine before men in such a way that they may see your good works, and glorify your Father in heaven.”

-Matthew 5:14-16 NASB1995

Darkness isn’t so much the opposite of light, so much as it is the absence of light. I think the same is true of badness. Badness doesn’t necessarily mean the opposite of goodness; the absence of goodness brings badness in itself. This is well said in the words of Edmond Burke, “The only thing necessary for the triumph of evil is for good men to do nothing.”

“The only thing necessary for the triumph of evil is for good men to do nothing.”

-Edmond Burke

The darker the night, the brighter the light of a single candle.

Darkness is the absence of light and badness is the absence of goodness.
For what else would be ‘spoiled goodness’ but the removal of the goodness in any situation?

Another thought for consideration: If darkness is the absence of light and badness the absence of goodness, how could darkness or bad come to existence without first the existence of goodness and light? Could you really label the absence of something without that something existing in the first place?

“The Light shines in the darkness, and the darkness has not overcome it.”

-John 1:5 ESV