Problem of evil and suffering

Question 1

Natural Evil

Answer 1

Any suffering brought about as a consequence of events outside the control of freewill agents e.g. earthquakes, droughts
* difficult for theists as an omnipotent and omnibenevolent God should have surely created a perfect world in which none of these happens
* Problematically, God uses natural evil in the Old Testament to achieve his purposes e.g. flooding the world, sending plagues on the Egyptians

Question 2

Moral Evil

Answer 2

Any suffering brought about through the actions of a freewill agent e.g. murder, violence
* This is potentially less troubling to theists: in the light of humans having freewill moral evil is easier to blame on people rather than God
* However, one can still ask why God would allow humans to cause suffering

Question 3

Logical problem of evil- Epicurus

Answer 3

• The dilemma for theists is expressed in the Epicurean Paradox
• Either God wants to abolish evil and cannot (he is impotent), or he can but does not want to (he is wicked). If God can abolish evil, and God really wants to do it, why is there evil in the world?

Question 4

Logical Problem of evil- JL Mackie

Answer 4

• formulated the logical problem of evil into the Inconsistent Triad
• God is omnipotent, God is omnibenevolent, evil exists
• Mackie argues that it is inconsistent for these statements to exist simultaneously, as an omnipotent God would have the power to remove evil. A benevolent God would want to remove evil due to his loving kindness towards his creation. It would be nonsensical to deny the existence of evil. Thus it is illogical for all three to coexist

Question 5

Trying to resolve the inconsistent triad

Answer 5

• An alternative to this problem is to try to resolve the inconsistent triad by removing one of the three points:
  1. God is not omnipotent- God loves creation but is unable to prevent evil and suffering. This is the stance of process theology, which argues that God is confined to limitations within the universe. God is the ‘fellow sufferer who understands’
  2. God is not benevolent- God has the power to remove evil but does not want to. However, this God would be seen as malicious- far removed from what theists believe
  3. Evil does not exist- There is no contradiction is God’s attributes, the problem is our interpretation of experience, which may be very different from God’s perspective (analogy of a parent disciplining a child for its own good). This view is held by idealists- evil is merely a privation of good

Question 6

The evidential problem of evil- William Rowe

Answer 6

• There exist instances of suffering which an omnipotent, omniscient being could have prevented without thereby losing some greater good or permitting some evil equally bad or worse
• An omniscient, wholly good being would prevent the occurrence of any intense suffering it could, unless it could not do so without thereby losing some greater good or permitting some evil equally bad or worse
• Therefore, one must conclude there does not exist an omnipotent, omniscient, wholly good being
• Examples of the overwhelming quantity and intensity of evil and suffering- The Brothers Karamazov, atrocities done to innocent children
• Example of the pointlessness of evil and suffering- story of the fawn

Question 7

Link between suffering and evil

Answer 7

• suffering is caused by evil- whether natural or moral
• A typical response from the Church has been that all suffering will be recompensed in heaven. However, this arguably entails universal salvation and would have to include animals that have suffered over billions of years of evolution
• Others point to the inadequacy of this approach as it seems to be saying the suffering in this life does not matter e.g. children being burned at Auschwitz
• It implies that God remains uninvolved and unconcerned, in the knowledge that all will be well in the future

Question 8

Freewill defence- Augustine

Answer 8

• Evil doesn’t come from God- God’s creation was faultless and perfect
• Evil came about through the misuse of freewill, therefore, God is not responsible for evil (a privation of good) and justified in allowing it to stay
• While his theodicy argued that suffering is our own fault and a deserved punishment for sin, most modern versions of the freewill defence insist that freedom is given by God for the greater good- allowing humans to develop valuable qualities and that these cannot be given ready made but require suffering to develop e.g. empathy
• The defence rests on the arguments that free will necessarily leads to moral evil and having freewill is worth the price of suffering
• this is known as a soul deciding theodicy- the fate of the soul is decided as to whether God’s grace and forgiveness is sought by accepting Christ’s death or not

Question 9

Freewill defence- Alvin Plantinga

Answer 9

• attacks Mackie’s inconsistent triad and attempts to show that God’s existence is not a logical impossibility in the face of the existence of evil
• When we talk about God’s omnipotence we do not mean that he can do absolutely anything e.g. create a square circle (these are logically absurd). God’s omnipotence means that God is able to do things that are logically possible for him to do. Thus, God could not create a world with morally free creatures who will always choose to do good
• A world containing creatures who are significantly free is more valuable than a world containing no free creatures at all
• Moral good is only possible if there is also moral evil. Moral evil is not an argument against God’s goodness or omnipotence, as God could only prevent the occurrence of moral evil by removing the possibility of moral good

Question 10

Freewill defence- Richard Swinburne

Answer 10

• In response to the Holocaust, he argues that the less God allows humans to bring about large scale horrors, the less responsibility and freedom he gives them. In such a system, God would be like an overprotective parent who would not let his child out of his sight for a moment. So to intervene, to prevemt large scale horrors would compromise true freedom
• Death- despite the suffering it causes, death is essential to the freewill theodicy because life is very definitely limited. Only with a limited lifespan can we have genuine responsibility for our actions. We know we can bring about genuine good and genuine evil by our actions, enhance or erode the finite lives of others