Gregory of Nyssa on evil

Among the Greek Fathers, Gregory of Nyssa makes the point well: “All wickednessis marked by the absence of good [steresis agathou]. It does not exist in its own right, nor is it observed to have subsistence. . . . Nonbeing has no subsistence; and the Creator of what exists is not the Creator of what has no subsistence. The God, therefore, of what exists is not responsible for evil, since he is not the author ofwhat has no existence” (“Address on Religious Instruction,” 282). Gregory compares evil to blindness, which is a privation of light.—Fleming Rutledge, The Crucifixion, 422–23 n. 78