[Legate of Amon Lanc]

Originally Posted by Tar-Telperien

Actually, "holy" has a bunch of different meanings. Most of them refer to being in the service of God.

Originally Posted by littlemanpoet

'Holy' means 'pure'. Perfect. Flawless. In the beginning even Melkor was holy. Thus, evil, in the Ainulindalë, is equal to 'flawed'.

Really, it is just as Tar-Telperien says: "holy" has a bunch of different meanings. One of them is being in the service of God (in our case, Eru), one is also being "pure". If we reach for the examples to ancient Israel (I think a very good source of examples for this), we can read both the meanings:

Deuteronomy 7:6 For thou art an holy people unto the LORD thy God: the LORD thy God hath chosen thee to be a special people unto himself, above all people that are upon the face of the earth.
and
Leviticus 11:44 For I am the LORD your God: ye shall therefore sanctify yourselves, and ye shall be holy; for I am holy: neither shall ye defile yourselves with any manner of creeping thing that creepeth upon the earth.

(Just for explanation for those who don't know, the Israelites considered many of the insects, lizards&co. - those "creeping things" - being "unclean", thus, unholy in the meaning of unclean: they couldn't eat it. I wonder if they could eat Gollum... okay, jokes aside for now.)
Since, mainly in the Catholic environment (and we know Tolkien being Catholic), the second (elempi's) meaning is used often, I am inclined to believe that Tolkien might have used the word "holy" in this meaning (or both of them), also considering his area of interest being the language, I'd suppose that he was aware of the meanings of this word and he might have used it because he was content with all its meanings and they all conveyed what he had in mind. This is just a hypothesis however, we'll need some proof from his Letters or something like that, touching this subject... if a thing such as this exists? ... But as I said, I find it quite likely that Tolkien considered Valar both "pure" and "serving to Eru" (from which, in the end, Melkor retained neither) and used the word "holy" to express this.

Originally Posted by Lalwendë

If Eru created everything then he also created evil? Did he put it into Melkor? Or is he saying that good/evil was simply not an issue when Eru created his Gods?

I think we are in need to bring in the definition of what "good" is, in the Middle-Earth. (Please consider this when reading my thought above that the "Valar" were "holy" meaning "pure, good".) Here is, I think, a fine explanation of "good": meaning "pure", "unflawed" (the meaning elempi used for "holy"). Good=unflawed. Eru puts his plan before the Valar. They do it, each his own way. Fine. But remember Galadriel's grieving after lost Lórien. Remember the Elves saying that the stars are less bright because the shadow of Melkor is cast over them from afar. This is not "good", this is "flawed". In the beginning, there is Fëanor the Best Craftsman who could create the most beautiful things in the world. In the end, there is Fëanor performing the Kinslaying, betraying his relatives and letting them to go over Helcaraxë. I hope everyone is clear about what "good" in M-E means. And "evil", thus, means straying away from the course of things what it was like in the beginning - flawless. Thus, Eru did not create evil. I hope this is obvious. This is why Eru himself must be good: because "evil" is just a product of other beings than himself. Eru is the creator, so that everything he does is "good". If in the normal course of action Eru put in the plans of Music an idea of destroying mountains or killing people, then destroying mountains and killing people would have been considered "good" in this M-E universe. I hope this is understood. In the beginning, Eru's plan was perfect, good. Some of the Valar (and later Men and Elves and so on) strayed from it - because they were given independant free will, and free will means that you can do whatever you wish - decide whether to move your left hand or move your right hand; as well as whether to move your hand to shake your friend's hand or to break his neck. Simply said: what the creator of the world himself considers ok, is "good" - other is evil. That he allows it, doesn't mean he agrees (as Eru said to Melkor). But he might somehow use even what is done against his will: that well-known Ulmo&frost&hot part. The people of ME clearly might be happy that they have snow and not just simple water, but on the other hand, no one could have died by freezing hadn't there been for Melkor's creation of cold. So, a flaw, even though Eru turned it to a thing Melkor didn't have in mind in the beginning (as he told).

Okay, one final note - I used my own logical aparate as much as I could. But in the end, these are transcendental thoughts we are attempting to make here, we must've been gods to undestand Eru as our equal, because his thinking clearly couldn't be that of human.