I've never figured out how cast metals, or little bits of paper could be the root of evil. Typically, without an outside agency to act upon them money does very little of it's own accord.

Of course, this is also one of the biggeast misquotes in the world. It's actually the love of money is the root of all evil. Whilst this is still not entirely true, it is at least more of a truism than money being the root of all evil. The desire to own, the perceived power having money gives, and the status that power gives call to some basic part of our psyche that will bring out the worst in us.

Or course, concepts such as money require quite a sophisticated soceity structure, as well as the ability to do the mathematics to deal with it. It takes a developed soceity to get beyond one/two/lots. But then, it takes a developed society to really allow evil to exist - anything else would be as instinctive as the lion or the crocodile. So maybe money is a symtpom of evil, or another sign that evil can exist in a society...