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The ability to recognize parallelisms can often clear up apparent difficulties in understanding a text. It can also greatly enrich our depth perception of various passages. In the King James Version of the Bible there is a passage that has caused many to stumble. Isaiah 45:6-7 says:

I am the LORD, and there is none else. I form the light, and create darkness: I make peace, and create evil: I the LORD do all these things.

I have been asked about this verse many times. Doesn't it clearly teach that God creates evil? Doesn't this make God the author of sin? The resolution of this problematic passage is simple if we recognize the obvious presence of an antithetic parallelism in it. In the first part light is set in contrast with darkness. In the second part peace is set in contrast with evil. What is the opposite of peace? The kind of "evil" is that evil which is contrasted not with goodness but with "peace." The New American Standard Bible, a recent translation reads, "Causing well-being and creating calamity." That is a more accurate rendition of this thought expressed by antithetic parallelism. The point of the passage is that ultimately God brings the blessing of well-being and peace to a godly people but visits them with calamity when he acts in judgment. That is a long way from a notion of being the creator of evil originally.