evil and suffering “the rock of atheism” Flashcards
moral evil
- hurtful and harmful acts that humans as moral agents carry out or to human inaction when someone is in need
-the problem becomes acute when truly horrendous acts of evil are commited e.g holocaust - raised questions of why God permitted such evils to be carried out
natural evil
- evil as a result of things beyond human control
-examples: natural disasters, disease - many christians find natural evil hard to accept particularly on large scale.
- The Old Testament gives numerous examples of God using the forces of nature to wreak havoc on people:
-noahs ark
-plagues in eygpt
-drowning or many israelites pursuing egyptians in exodus
“they sank like lead in the mighty waters” Exodus
The logical problem of evil
-Greek philosopher Epicurus
inconsistent triad :
-is God willing but unable to prevent evil then God is important
-is God able but not willing to prevent evil then God is malevolent
-is God both able and willing to prevent evil then how come there is evil
-to deny two traditional beliefs about God is not acceptable to most Christians: God= impotent- not worthy of worship; God= not loving- contradict the teaching of Jesus and destroy the basis of Christian belief
The evidential problem of evil
-argument based on evidence from the world around us
-the sheer quality and quantity of both natural and moral evil are overwhelming, some state that evil is too high a price to pay for the joys of heaven
- the pointlessness of so much evil that serves us no useful purposes:
-e.g Rowes (unnamed scholar) example of the fawn
suffering a slow and agonising death in a forest fire
- calls into question Gods omniscience
- an omniscient God must have know the terrible suffering that would be caused by both the laws of nature and humans
Responses to the problem of evil and suffering intro
-Since ancient times, religious believers have tried to reconcile belief in God with the existence of evil. -These attempts are known as theodicies and the following are those set for study: the Free Will Defence, John Hick’s soul-making theodicy and Process Theology.
The free will defence- John Mackie
-The free world defence needs to show that :
1.humans cannot have free well without the existence of moral evil
2. having free well is worth the cost in terms of suffering
-Mackie= atheist, he made the free will defence to simply rip it to shreds
-Mackie said we have first order goods: a good at the basic level of human experience e.g happiness or pleasure ; eating
-And second order goods: more valuable and significant than first order goods e.g we can respond to suffering with kindness, love etc
-first order evils: misery or pain such as breaking leg
second order evils: responding to suffering with cruelty, spite etc
-third order good: free will giving us choice between two things. Pain and suffering are needed to help us deveip capacity for sympathy etc
-downside: many choose opposite
-fourth order good: God gives us free will
Mackies rejection of the Free Will defence
-Logically, it is possible for someone to freely choose good at every point of choice.
-Therefore, God could have made people so they have true free choice yet always choose good.
He didn’t do so, so he
• lacks power, or
• lacks love, or
• does not exist.
Platinga’s defence of The Free Will Defence
-The logical problem of moral evil
Plantinga’s three possible worlds give three options:
• The world as it is, with ‘morally significant free will’ and no causal determination from God, which means there is evil and suffering;logically possible.
• The world without ‘morally significant free will’ but with God’s causal determination to make people choose good, so no evil; also logically possible but would make human robots
• Both ‘morally significant free will’ and God’s causal determination to make people choose good, so no evil; logically impossible. Genuine free will ≠casual determinism (fate). Mackies argument therefore fails
Natural evil
• This is tied up with punishment for the Fall.
• It is logically possible that God created or allowed natural evil because of human sin in Eden.
Strengths and Weaknesses of the FWD
STRENGTHS:
- The free well defence addresses the issue of natural evil as nature has to be free to follow its laws of operation and the evils that result from this enable the development of second order goods
-A world with genuine free will has much more value than one without it where humans are in effect robots
WEAKNESSES
This all hinges on whether or not Libertarianism ( humans can be held morally responsible for their actions)
provides the raid interpretation of human experience. It can neither be proved or disproved.
-not all agree with this even if God’s omniscient meant he was transcendent ,the sheer amount of evil and pointlessness isnt justifiable
John Hicks soul making the theodicy
-christian
-humans are high point of evolution:
-ultimate Telos is personal relationship with God
- Keats said the world is a “vale of soul making”
-instead of augustines soul deciding world where humans choice of good or evil condemns them, Hicks world is spiritual growth that will enable humans to become children of God
-Hick believed in Imago Dei and that our full potential is fufilled in afterlife
- God has to keep a epistemic distance from us ( humans cannot know that there is a God due to world operations)
-freedom to choose faith or not, means it is true faith not forced
-sin is inevitable; God permits this out of respect for human freedom, but only he can put things right
-Hick was a universalist; rejects ideas of hell and eternal punishment as its contradicting Gods nature
Objections made to Hicks theodicy
- The theodicy does not address the issue of animal suffering, since animals cannot develop spiritually
2.the concept of epistemic distance does not resolve the problem of purposeless evil
3.the theodicy does not justify the very worst of evils
Hicks response to objections
- pain is needed to warn animals of danger
unlike humans, they do not fear future harm or death
animals have to exist to stop us realising our ‘special’ nature and they have to suffer to an extent that is beyond our understanding - this has to remain a mystery as otherwise the epistemic distance would be lost and we would know that God existed so therefore not freely choose a relationship with him
- if the worst evils are removed then the next worst ones would become the worst
the more evils are removed the less free and responsible humans are
strengths and weaknesses of Hicks theodicy
STRENGTHS
- epistemic distance can justify any form of evil
-suffering develops character
-includes evolution in argument
WEAKNESSES
- admits there is no good explanation for animal suffering
-what seperates humans from animals
-doesnt match with some christian beliefs
Griffens process theodicy
-primarily from whitehead who said “ God is “the fellow sufferer who understands”
-rejects creation ex nihilo, says christians reading bible wrong
-he believes the universe was pre existant and eternal ; God is inextricably bound with it
-he created order out of chaos
-God is also suffering but he cannot control evil, he still loves us
Augustines theodicy ( religious response to the problem of evil)
- some deny existence of evil:
- augustine said evil is the “ privation ( lack of) good = darkness absence of light
- evil and suffering does not disprove the existence of an all loving God because evil did not come from God human decisions who abuse their free will
- shown in genesis, shown in Adam and eve ( original sin)
