[HieroGlyph]

I'll try to be brief. I will be brief because I would need to start quoting various parts of the Silmarillion to explain my meaning above, Boaz.
First we would need to define evil. Then we'd need to know if there was ever any possibility that Eru Himself could ever appear to be evil...
We know (something like) 'Melkor sprang from Eru's thought' as did each and every Valar and Maia, and they were not all the same. Akin to say one coming from the linguistic cortex (of that 'Ultimate' Mind) and another from the visual cortex or auditory part. These are like facets. Like areas of the physical brain. Spacially related. But not solely of that 'part'. They have to be fully functional in themselves. Or the reader loses all comprehension and the 'connexion' we can make with these 'angels' becomes smaller and they become more 'alien'... So I do hold that Melkor did, in a way, have the greatest of minds and all else. He just could not handle it. He saught beyond his means. He was too needy. He needed too much and thus went off track. You have to imagine the time scale involved here too. We're not talking six days. This being Melkor wandered and asked and wondered some more. He couldnt get what he wanted. Knowledge, power, control, answers. He wanted. Thats the beginnings of The Dark Road. To 'think' you have unsatiated needs. To not know your own 'mind' because its too big, too vast, too complex. He started on a dark road and thus spiralled down and down. How else can you explain this creation of Tolkien's? (Short answers above are not adequate, Im sorry to say. Its just not that simple. Melkor came OF Eru's Mind, thus it deserves more thought to 'work'...)