David Hume Anti Theodicy

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Anti theodicy is the argument that it is wrong to seek theodicies, that is, it is wrong to seek answers to the problem of evil. Anti theodicy is prompted by the religious effects of theodicizing. Theodicizing has been accused of risking our faith in God by questioning Him, wasting time, reducing divine mystery in case we succeed in understanding the problem of evil, and increasing self-satisfaction when we realize that there are reasons behind the evil and we stop fighting against it. It says we should not try to seek the hidden ways of God but rather try to find the path that we shall walk on when evil attacks. What anti theodicies fail …show more content…

Hume tried to solve this problem by claiming that God had no morals. He backed his claim without trying to deny the existence of God, since he needed the concept of God’s existence to account for divine providence. He understands the problem of evil as a challenge to belief in the nature of God. He believed that the problem of evil drove people towards superstition, violent passions like love, hatred and humility and fanaticism. Hume believed that what was important in terms of religion for the support of a good common life was a general manifestation of divine care. First of, he asserted that the existence of evil can be used to prove that some of the arguments for the existence of God cannot be relied on. Secondly, there exist judgements about the goodness and badness of actions, about what a person can do and cannot do, of whether a particular action violates a person’s rights. As far as the punishment for the evil and reward for the bad are concerned, Hume declares that the arguments on the existence of evil alongside God are based on the supposition that God has qualities beyond what he has shown in the entire universe. It is better for us to believe and know that whatever the Divine being has done is actually the best rather than us wanting what seems best for

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