Evil & Suffering: AQA RS Philosophy Review

Vocabulary-style flashcards covering AQA A* grade notes on Philosophy (AO1 and AO2) regarding the Problem of Evil, theodicies, and contemporary responses.

Natural evil

Suffering caused by the natural world, such as earthquakes, floods, and diseases, which God is believed to have designed or could have intervened to prevent.

Moral evil

Suffering caused by human actions, such as war and genocide, resulting from human choice rather than natural processes.

David Hume

A philosopher who highlighted how nature's structure generates suffering through physical fragility, scarcity, and pain as a survival mechanism.

William Rowe

A philosopher who used the example of a fawn dying in a forest fire to illustrate the evidential problem of gratuitous, purposeless evil.

Gregory S. Paul

An author who argues that suffering is embedded in life’s structure, citing historical child mortality from disease and malnutrition as natural evil.

Logical problem of evil

A deductive, a priori argument claiming that the existence of evil is logically inconsistent with the God of classical theism as defined by Epicurus and Mackie.

Inconsistent triad

A modern form of the logical problem of evil involving three mutually exclusive concepts: God's omnipotence ($P1$), God's omnibenevolence ($P2$), and the existence of evil ($C1$).

Evidential problem of evil

An inductive, a posteriori argument based on the experience of suffering, claiming evil makes belief in God unjustified rather than logically impossible.

Gratuitous evil

Suffering that appears to have no purpose or benefit, which Rowe argues makes the existence of God unlikely ($P1$, $P2$, $P3$, $C1$).

Soul-making theodicy

A defense of God developed by Irenaeus and John Hick, claiming evil is necessary for humans to develop from God's image into his likeness through moral growth.

Epistemic distance

John Hick's concept that God’s existence must remain religiously ambiguous to allow humans to make genuine moral choices without the pressure of divine presence.

Eschatological justification

The idea that all suffering will ultimately be redeemed in a final state of moral perfection, potentially through post-mortem development.

D. Z. Phillips

A philosopher who criticized soul-making theodicy, arguing that justifying events like the Holocaust for the sake of character growth is morally unacceptable.

Ivan Karamazov

A character from Dostoyevsky who rejects a world built on the suffering of innocents, arguing that such a system is immoral regardless of the potential for salvation.

Free Will Defence

Alvin Plantinga’s response to the logical problem of evil, arguing that God cannot remove evil without destroying the moral significance of human free will.

Libertarian free will

The view that freedom requires the ability to have done otherwise, making it logically impossible for God to force free creatures to choose only good.

Compatibilism

The view used by J.L. Mackie to argue that God could have created free creatures who always choose good because their actions are determined by their character.

Leibniz’s theodicy

The claim that we live in the 'best of all possible worlds' where evil is an integrated, optimal part of a globally perfect system.

Process theodicy

A worldview by Whitehead and Griffin that denies traditional omnipotence, viewing God's power as persuasive rather than coercive.

Creatio ex nihilo

The traditional belief in creation out of nothing, which Griffin contests in favor of God ordering pre-existing chaotic matter.

Panentheism

The belief that the universe exists within God, implying that God is personally affected by and suffers alongside his creation.

Jürgen Moltmann

A theologian who argued that God suffers with humanity, famously stating God was present 'on the gallows' at Auschwitz.

Persuasive power

The form of strength in process theology modeled by Jesus, Gandhi, and M.L. King, where love transforms the world without using coercive force.