GEN192 “Behold it was very good” [this verse]. Rav Nahman bar Shmuel said in the name of Rav Shmuel bar Nahman, “It says, ‘good’ – this is the yetser tov, but it also says ‘very [good]’ – this is the yetser ha’ra.’  Is then the yetser ha-ra’ ‘very [good]’? [Yes, for] were it not for the yetser ha-ra’, a man would not build a house, marry a woman, have children, and engage in business as it says …  Bereshit Rabba 9:7 [note the tradition is from his father and that he bears his grandfather’s name].  COMMENT: This midrash on Genesis 1:31 proposes an answer to two questions: What is the “it” in the verse; that is, what is the antecedent to the implied pronoun? And, what is the meaning of “very”; that is, what kind of goodness would be “very” good? The answer given here is that the yetser ha-ra’, which in rabbinic psychology is the source of sinfulness, contains a germ of goodness in it, for it is the sexual and ego drives that move humanity to achieve.  The inclination to do evil, then, is part of the goodness of creation. (There is an alternate midrash that suggest that death is the kind of goodness that is “very” good and, hence, included in creation in Genesis 1:31).  BANAL 191