philo - evil and suffering

evil

something inherently wrong, or a malevolent force causing human suffering

NATURAL evil

evil caused by nature e.g. natural disasters

MORAL evil

evil caused by humans, either through comission (action) or omission (choosing not to act)

what did mackie say about evil

‘a wholly good being eliminates evil as far as it can’

LOGICAL poe

How can we reconcile the existence of evil with Omni benevolent, omniscient, and omnipotent?

Argument from evil – coexistence of evil and God is unlikely or impossible.

EPICUREAN PARADOX

God is willing but not able – not omnipotent .

Able but not willing - malevolent

Able and willing – whence cometh evil (from where does evil come)

Neither able nor willing – why call him God?

HUME on poe

18th century

Willing but not able - Impotent

Able but not willing - malevolent

Able and willing – whence then is evil

MACKIE’S inconsistent triad

Attempt to prove God does not exist.

out of omnibenevolence, omnipotence and evil, only two can be true

one factor believes to be true is evil - evident in natural and moral evil

EVIDENTIAL poe

William Rowe 1979

There is so much evil in the world (animal and human suffering) occurring on a daily basis, that an Omnibenevolent and omnipotent God cannot exist

Uses the case of Sue 1986 – on New Year’s Day she was raped and murdered at just five years old by her mother’s boyfriend

AUGUSTNE’S THEODICY

“all evil is sin or the punishment for sin”

Augustine traditionally explained the existence of evil as a punishment as a result of sin

Original sin is passed down through the act of sex and is in everyone as we are all seminally present in the loins of Adam

Humans were given free well because everyone was created perfectly by God – a misuse of this free will meant that humans began to disobey, releasing original sin into the world and creating evil

The crucifixion of Jesus means that humans can reconcile with God

augustine’s theodicy

how is EVIL DEFINED

not a malevolent force but rather the privation of good

augustine’s theodicy STRENGTHS

• use of logic and reason: moral evil is a possibility of free will

• Alvin Plantinga,: back up Augustine’s point of view that freewill is good, he argues that if people did not have free choice to love God i.e. they were made to do so, then they would not truly be free

• By calling evil privation, God is not responsible for creating it

• Gives a concrete explanation for why natural evil happens

• Appeals to those who accept the authority of the Bible because of its reliance on Genesis’s account of creation

• appeals to those who believe in a judgement day where creation is made perfect again and sin is punished

augustine’s theodicy WEAKNESSES

LOGICAL

• Schleiermacher: for evil to exist, it must have either created itself or be somehow from God evil is a real feature of the world so cannot have come from nothing therefore God is not omnibenevolent

• Omniscience means he knew it would happen and didn’t stop it

• For humans to choose to disobey God in the fall, there must have been some knowledge of evil already. This must have come from God.

augustine’s theodicy WEAKNESSES

SCIENTIFIC

• Depends on a literal transaction of Genesis 3 – hick: it is fatally lacking in plausibility

• Rests on ancient Judaeo-Christian theology

• Evolutionary theory suggests that the universe has been constantly developing from earliest stages, rather than that the world was made perfect then damaged by humans

• Biologically, it was impossible for every human to be similarly present in Adam, derailing original sin argument

augustine’s theodicy WEAKNESSES

MORAL

• Predestination – can he be benevolent if God has favourites?

• Why would God create people just to spend an eternity in hell?

• Heavy criticism of Augustine and Calvin’s predestination being compatible with free will

• Augustine argues he exists, this would imply that evil and punishment are part of the structure of the universe

• Omniscience: God created the world knowing that the fall would happen so he says he is ultimately responsible for evil. If a manufacturer knowingly created a faulty product, would we hold them responsible?

• If evil is really apparent then why is it used as a punishment?

FREE WILL DEFENSE

it is better for god to have created a world where everyone is a free moral agent than a world containing only automata (self operating machines), or beings without consciousness

argues that god has given up control over human actions in order to bring about the greater good

TF humans develop qualities that are valuable in themselves - we develop compassion, courage, patience, and generousity by experiencing pain and seeing those around us experiencing pan

free will defense DOWNSIDES

pain is a stimulus for development

the possibility of developing pos. qualities is matched with that of neg. qualities

e.g. pleasure in inflicting pain. jealousy, greed

MORAL EVIL IS THE PRICE OF FREE WILL

parable of KING AND MAIDEN

king who loved maiden - strength to crush all opponents yet was melted by love for maiden

wanted a lover, an equal, not someone who was forced into loving him

renounced throne in order to prove love and to win hers

king = god

maiden = humanity

represents god becoming jesus to give people a genuine choice to follow him or not

PROBLEM - god renounces throne which does not corellate w/ christian narrative

MACKIE’S free will defense

god has no control over actions as everyone is a free moral agent so develop qualities ourselves,, releasing evil into world

FIRST ORDER good/ evil - action as a result o free will

SECOND ORDER good/ evil = quality developed as result

• these orders show evil exists

THIRD ORDER good = freedom causing evil to enter world

and cycle repeats

fwd - STRENGTHS AND WEAKNESSES

STRENGTHS:

• logical explanation by removing blame of existence of evil from god and placing it onto mankind

• explains how god can remain omniscient, omnipotent and omnibenevolent whilst evil exists

• encourages development of human character which is morally desirable - wants humans to learn from their mistakes in limited earthly lives to be better people

• swinburne - god does not stop suffering because he values human freedom

WEAKNESSES:

• peter vardy - doesnt give adequate explanation for natural evil, many examples of natural evil do not have greater good behind them

• floods and diseases appear to have no human cause

• rowe’s evidential poe is not solved by FWD: why does there have to be so much evil?? why do people suffer so badly cos of gods plan???

• mackie argues that as god is omnipotent he could have he could have created humans with the emotional intelligence to always choose the good action to stop human suffering ‘there cannot be a logical impossibility in his freely choosing the good on every occasion’ - the fact He doesnt do this implies his non-existence

• determinists argue that freedom is an illusion so FWD is built on incorrect principle - no choice is truly free bc all choices come from a prior cause, like a chain reaction - the cause is believed to be god, who allowed evil into the world

vale of soul making

SOUL DECIDING

humans have the choice to turn back to god through the salvation of jesus (augustine)

vale of soul making

SOUL MAKING

humans are equipped to make their own decisions to develop into perfection to make their souls better, to be more like god

vale of soul making

IRANEUS

• born w/ free will and are always developing to perfection

• through encountering evil, this allows humanity to develop

• god is omnibenevolent - it is all loving to allow evil so justified

• interprets genesis - adam had form but not content of god as was immature and needed to develop through facing evil

• ‘create mankind in our image’

vale of soul making

HICK’S ADAPTATION of iraneus

• human goodness more valuable when humans choose freely to be good

• world is ‘vale of soul making’ as humans develop souls and become better over time

• god left humanity to complete process of creation themselves - unfinished

• part of god’s plan

• created in image with potential to be in likeness of god in future

what is epistemic distance?

god keeps world at a distance so as not to directly reveal self to humanity

gives free choice to believe in him and therefore room for moral development

is world was a paradise, every action would result in happiness and there would be no chance of ever causing harm and evil would be indistinguishable from good

this means there would be no opportunity to develop into god’s likeness

moral evil as described by hick

w/o evil, everyone would follow god’s laws as there would be no difficulty in doing so, and therefore qualities such as love and courage would be impossible, resulting in no oportunity to develop into god’s likeness w/o essential qualities to do so

natural evil as described by hick

god’s purpose would not be possible in a world free from suffering and evil so the world must contain natural laws which lead to some suffering produced. showing that some natural evil is essential

vale of soul making

IRANEUS AND HICK CONCLUDE

all people will eventually go to heaven

• eventually evil and suffering will be overcome and humans will develop into a perfect likeness of god and have eternal life in heaven

vale of soul making

STRENGTHS AND WEAKNESSES

STRENGTHS:

• emphasis on human development falls in line with the theory of evolution

• supported by Christian tradition by relying on iranaeus

• Russian league accounts for all types of evil whilst holding the three O’s of the classically theistic characters of God

• epistemic distance explains why God does not interfere in humans suffering

WEAKNESSES:

• evidential problem remains: does that really need to be so much evil?

• does not explain why suffering appears to be distributed so inconsistently – e.g. developed world versus developing world

• The suffering of some seems to benefit the development of others: does God have favourites? This is counted by Hicks view of freewill and God not getting involved.

• is it fair that everyone eventually goes to heaven?

• DZ Phillips, it would never be justifiable to hurt someone in order to help

• Mary Midgley: by suggesting that God is ultimately responsible for allowing evil then it does not highlight sufficiently our responsibility for moral evil

• Christians are concerned that he takes away from the idea of Jesus as saviour. Instead, he becomes a teacher of how to live morally

• contradicts both Bible and Quran so is not compatible with classic theism

what is a theodicy

it upholds the classically the idea of God, and if it doesn’t, it’s just an argument or line of inquiry

it must explain how God can have his three central characteristics

process theodicy

GRIFFIN AND WHITEHEAD

• The world was not created ex nihilo, it already existed and God used his power to change it

• God is therefore not omnipotent God in the universe are both eternal, God is the soul of the universe but he does not have the power to bring the universe into being

• God is not transcendent so he cannot intervene in the world to eliminate evil. Instead he develops the universe overtime by persuading it through the power he has and this accounts for evolution.

• humanity has free will and the natural environment has the potential to go wrong – God takes responsibility for starting the process that includes human suffering

how do griffin and whitehead solve the inconsistent triad?

they agree that God is not omnipotent but is still omnibenevolent and this can agree with Mackie‘s inconsistent triad

process theodicy

moral evil

God’s creation was imperfect – it didn’t come from nothing, it developed humans from matter that already existed.

therefore, humans cannot be perfect, they make mistakes and God does not have total power over them to make them more moral

To prevent evil, humans should choose to follow God because he’s all loving and all good and he knows what is best for us even if he can’t control everything

however, humans often choose to do wrong

process theodicy

natural evil

natural evil exist because the world wasn’t made perfectly unlike in the Augustinian theodicy

The world is made of imperfect substance and therefore has the potential to go wrong, causing natural disasters

God does not have the power to intervene and stop natural evil

whitehead and TEMPORAL PROCESSES

God can change over time because he is affected by temporal processes

This goes against the classical the belief that God is eternal, and changing and unaffected by the world (transcendent)

God has the power to influence humanity only, he cannot control peoples behaviour or the worlds events

Instead, God offer as possibilities for how humans can behave, and tries to persuade them to do good

God has a will in everything, but not everything that occurs it’s God’s will

process thought

connection between god and universe

God is viewed as the soul of the universe

God is being that is connected to the universe, and both depend on each other for existence

process thought and DEATH

at death, all souls go and live in God’s soul, allowing them to live for as long as the universe exists

God is not eternal or unchanging, but he is loving and good, and wants the best for humans

process thought

gods involvement with the world

• God is intimately involved in the world, not at an epistemic distance

• He suffers when moral evil stopped him from being able to help humanity to be better

• whitehead - god is the “ Fellow sufferer who understands”

• griffin - God has suffered more than anyone else because he has experienced all the moral and natural evil that humankind has ever committed and witnessed

S/W of process theodicy

STRENGTHS:

• realistic about gods abilities

• Supported by quantum mechanics – reality is a chaotic process of flux and change

• Hebrew account of Genesis talks about creation from chaotic materials

• Creation = ‘putting chaos into order’ in Babylonian mythology

• Pantheism – God suffers to show those who suffer know God understands

• Concurrent with evolution

WEAKNESSES

• Lack of omnipotence makes him unworthy of worship

• Evidential problem of evil – to what extent will God still be judged to be in the right?

• Why not cease efforts if God saw the complexity of evolution was bringing about greater levels of evil?

• Element of risk in God’s creation – why take it?

• No guarantee of ever overcoming evil – no incentive to fight against evil

• No eschatology– No doctrine of what will happen at the end of time

• Not at theodicy, doesn’t uphold three characteristics