(Rom. vii. 22-23), For I delight in the law of God after the inward man ; but I see a different law in my members, warring against the law of my mind, and bringing me into captivity under the law of sin which is in my members, had been felt by many long before his day. The origin of the existence of the “law of sin in the members,” which asserted itself in spite of the ardent desire of men to be free from its power, was the great problem which had to be solved. The result was the theory, based upon the observed facts of experience, that within man, as part of his created being, there were two tendencies: the tendency towards good, Yetser ha-tob
(οι νο), and the tendency towards evil, Yetser hara‘ πα aan) But whence originated these two tendencies? If they both formed part of man’s nature from the beginning, it followed that their creation was due to God; there was, of course, no difficulty about ascribing the creation of the good tendency to Him, but that He should have created anything evil was obviously a difficulty. The varying thoughts and speculations on the subject will perhaps best be seen by giving a few illustrations as examples. In Sir. xv. 14, 15, we have these interesting words, according to the Greek Version: ‘‘He made man from the beginning, and left him in the power of his will” (ἐν χειρὶ διαβουλίου αὐτοῦ) ; “if thou willest, thou wilt observe the commandments, and to exhibit faithfulness is a matter of thy good pleasure” (καὶ πίστιν ποιῆσαι εὐδοκίας) ; the significance of these words is only realised when they are read in the Hebrew, viz., ‘God [this is the reading of the Syriac and Latin as well] created man from the beginning; and He delivered him into the hand of him who
took him for a prey (DM); and He gave him over into the power
of his will (7¥°)”; here it is clear that the second clause is an explanatory gloss (it is wanting in the Greek), the object being to indicate that to be in the power of the Yetser (which is here clearly used in reference to the evil tendency) is equivalent to being in the power of Satan. This is important as showing that the evil tendency is not ascribed to divine creation, but that over against the good which God created in man there is an opposition of evil which is due to the activity of Satan. This thought of opposing tendencies is apparent elsewhere in the same book, ¢.g., xxxiii. 15: ‘Good is set against evil, and life against death; so is the godly against the sinner. So look upon all the works of the Most High ; there are two and two, one against another” (the Hebrew of these verses is not extant); here the writer comes perilously near ascribing the creation of evil to God; but in another passage the question is left