Abstract

The problem of evil is a metaphysical problem bound up with the conditions of human existence. The radical evil of fascism and communism, according to Józef Tischner, opens up the possibility that we live in the time of a modern Manichaeism, understood as having two faces: nihilism and pessimism. The possibility of thinking of such a modem form of Manichaeism necessarily calls for a new inquiry into the question of evil. For Tischner, evil, like good, is not an object, but something in which man participates, and for this reason it cannot be objectified and defined. One can only ask how it appears.