A Hebrew adjective and noun meaning evil, bad, wicked, harmful, displeasing, injurious, distressing. It covers the full range of badness — moral evil (wickedness), physical evil (disaster, calamity), aesthetic badness (ugly), and relational harm (displeasure). It is the primary Hebrew word for evil in all its forms.
This word stands at the center of Scripture's theology of good and evil. The Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil (tov and ra) introduced the possibility of moral discernment — and moral failure. When God sees the ra (wickedness) of humanity in Genesis 6:5, it grieves Him to His heart. The prophet's startling declaration in Isaiah 45:7 — 'I form light and create darkness, I make peace and create calamity (ra)' — asserts God's sovereignty even over evil outcomes, though not moral evil itself. In Genesis 50:20, Joseph tells his brothers, 'You meant evil against me, but God meant it for good' — the definitive statement that God's sovereignty transforms human evil into redemptive purpose.