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The conflict between good and evil
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Studies in the Philosophy of Religion
THE PROBLEM OF EVIL
“God is the omnipotent and wholly good creator of all things”
“There is evil in the world”
a) EXPLAIN THESE TWO STATEMENTS AND SHOW WHY THEY ARE SAID TO BE CONTRADICTORY (20)
The problem of evil is usually seen as the problem of how the existence of God can be reconciled with the existence of evil in the world. It’s regarded as a logical problem, because it is based on the apparent contradiction involved in holding onto three incompatible beliefs. This being that God is omnipotent, that God is wholly good and that evil exists in the world. The fact that evil exists in the world constitutes the most common objection to the belief in the existence of the omnipotent (all powerful), omniscient (all knowing) and all loving God of Classical Theism. Classical Theism is the traditional understanding of God as worshipped by Christians, Jews and Muslims. This definition is initially criticised, for being culture-bound, as other religions such as Hinduism and Buddhism don’t believe in one God so can’t be applied to their respective religions. Therefore the problem of evil is only a problem for followers of a theistic religion.
God is described as an infinite, self-existent, incorporeal (without body), eternal, immutable (doesn’t change), impassable (incapable of suffering), simple (one entity), perfect (God is seen as a morally perfect being i.e. wholly good), omniscient (all knowing) and omnipotent (all powerful) being.
Omnipotence means being able to bring about anything which it is logically possible to bring about. However not being able to bring about that which is logically impossible is not a restriction on omnipotence since the logically impossible is not a characterisation of anything. It is a non-thing. Evil is said to come from the free actions of human beings. God can’t do what’s logically impossible and it’s said to be logically impossible for God to create humans who are free but always choose to do what’s right. This therefore takes the responsibility of evil from God.
Omniscience means knowing everything that it is logically possible to know. If God knows everything it is not possible for him to think of something he does not know. This raises the question of whether God knows every little fact; does he know what you’re thinking or what you’re going to do? If so then if he’s omnipotent shouldn...
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...d that finding good consequences in bad things is a horrible idea.
DOES IRENAEUS’ APPROACH SOLVE THE PROBLEM OF EVIL?
There are many instances of good being brought out of evil through a person’s reaction to it, however there are many other cases where the opposite has occurred. Sometimes obstacles result in ones character being strengthened but other times they can be crushing leading to ones character being diminished and left incompetent so unable to grow and develop further. So it would seem any soul making is subject to an individual’s temperament and particular way of dealing with a problem. Therefore this doesn’t remove the contradiction, because there’s evidence of people suffering and not getting better after it. This produces more problems as shows God to be selecting people who he should know would suffer immensely because of this evil. Irenaeus approach takes the blame off God for human suffering. This is what is needed to solve the problem of evil. He places the blame on human free will therefore avoiding questions of God’s nature so in essence removing the contradiction. People accept that suffering is there for a reason and it’s part of God’s plan for soul making.
It is perhaps the most difficult intellectual challenge to a Christian how God and evil can both exist. Many of the greatest minds of the Christian church and intellects such as Augustine and Thomas Aquinas spent their entire lives trying to solve this problem, and were unsuccessful (Erickson, 2009, p.439). However, this dilemma is not only an intellectual challenge, but it is emotional. Man feels it, lives it. Failing to identify the religious form of the problem of evil will appear insensitive; failure to address the theological form will seem intellectually insulting. This conundrum will never be completely met during our earthly life, but there are many biblical and philosophical resources that help mitigate it.
"Did God decide what goodness is? If so, then "good" is more or less the arbitrary decision of a frightening being to which we cannot relate, and that being could just as easily have made murder and stealing the ultimate moral actions without any contradictions. On the other hand, if God did not decide what goodness is, he cannot truly be omnipo...
The problem of evil is a difficult objection to contend with for theists. Indeed, major crises of faith can occur after observing or experiencing the wide variety and depths of suffering in the world. It also stands that these “evils” of suffering call into question the existence of an omnibenevolent and omnipotent God of the Judeo-Christian tradition. The “greater good defense” tries to account for some of the issues presented, but still has flaws of its own.
Throughout the world, most people believe in some type of god or gods, and the majority of them understand God as all-good, all-knowing (omniscient), and all-powerful (omnipotent). However, there is a major objection to the latter belief: the “problem of evil” (P.O.E.) argument. According to this theory, God’s existence is unlikely, if not illogical, because a good, omniscient, and omnipotent being would not allow unnecessary suffering, of which there are enormous amounts.
The problem of evil is a deductive a priori argument who’s goal is to prove the non-existence of God. In addition to Mackie’s three main premises he also introduces some “quasi-logical” rules that give further evidence to his argument. First he presumes that a good thing will eliminate evil to the extent that it can and second, that omnipotence has no limits. From these two “additional premises,” it can be concluded that a completely good and omnipotent being will eliminate all possible evil. After establishing these added premises Mackie continues with his piece to list and negate several theistic responses to the argument.
Shirley Jackson’s short story “ The Possibility of Evil” is about a little old lady named Miss Strangeworth. She thinks she’s in charge of the town and to make sure it’s free from all evil because her grandfather built the first house on Pleasant Street. At first Miss Strangeworth is a nice little old lady, worrying about people and wondering what others are up to. Then in the middle of the story she becomes a little rude to a few of the townspeople. In the end Miss Strangeworth thought she was getting rid of the evil in the town, but in reality she was causing evil in the town by showing her true colors and being extremely mean and cruel to others. Don’t judge a book by it’s cover because people aren’t always what they seem to be.
There is evil. 3. So, God does not exist”. Since there is evil, then that means God does not exist. So there is no loving and powerful God. However, if there is a God then he is not all loving and powerful. Daniel Howard-Snyder states in his article “God, Evil, And Suffering,”: “We would have to say God lacks power and knowledge to such an extent that He can 't prevent evil. And there lies the trouble. For how could God have enough power and knowledge to create and sustain the physical universe if He can 't even prevent evil? How could He be the providential governor of the world if He is unable to do what even we frequently do, namely prevent evil?” (5). This statement argues that God is not all powerful because he is unable to prevent evil in the world. Daniel Howard-Snyder then argues that: “Would a perfectly good being always prevent evil as far as he can? Suppose he had a reason to permit evil, a reason that was compatible with his never doing wrong and his being perfect in love, what I 'll call a justifying reason. For example, suppose that if he prevented evil completely, then we would miss out on a greater good, a good whose goodness was so great that it far surpassed the badness of evil. In that case, he might not prevent evil as far as he can, for he would have a justifying reason to permit it” (5). Even if God had a reason to allow evil, he who is all loving and powerful would want the least amount of people to suffer and feel pain. Since God knows
The article I picked to show the evil in the world today was about a man named Abner Louima. This man was arrested in 1997 and is suing the state of New York for being beaten in a restroom in the station while being questioned. The sole witness Conelle Lugg, 19, he heard loud screaming and banging noises against the wall of the bathroom while he was in his cell, he then saw a police officer push Louima into a cell pants down and blood rushing out of his open wounds. The officer then proceeded to tell Louima to get on his knees. After all this Lugg said, that Louima fell to the floor and screamed in pain and begged to be taken to a hospital.
Since God is perfect, he could not have created evil. Rather, the origins of evil date back to Adam and Eve. Satan, a fallen angel, managed to tempt Eve into eating the forbidden fruit; thus introducing evil into the world. One may wonder why God, whom is omnipotent, decided not to eradicate evil from the world. The answer is straightforward. When God created man, he gave him free will due to his immeasurable love. As a result, the introduction of evil into the world gave man a choice; to follow God and pursue righteousness, or pursue evil and henceforth separate oneself from
For instance, deception only relies on imperfection, while that is not God, which makes God a non-deceiver. The idea of God is something that would not just come naturally. It is not ordinary living and just thinking of God. The idea of God as a whole must be created by God. If humans are finite, and God is infinite, how could one possibly have the thought of such an infinite being?
In order to understand The Problem of Evil, we must first understand the concept of God. The God that this problem addresses is what we call a PKM god. This god is accepted in multiple religions, such as Christianity, Islam, and Judaism. Over half of the world population claims to be followers of any of
God is the source of evil. He created natural evil, and gave humans the ability to do moral evil by giving them a free will. However, had he not given people free will, then their actions would not be good or evil; nor could God reward or punish man for his actions since they had no choice in what to do. Therefore, by giving humans choice and free will, God allowed humanity to decide whether to reward themselves with temporary physical goods, and suffer in the long run from unhappiness, or forsake bodily pleasures for eternal happiness.
One common perception of God is that God is not so much a being, but according to seventeenth century philosopher Benedict Spinoza, that "God is everything, identical to the universe itself." That is to say that God is a part of all humans, all animals, all objects, and all matter in the universe. This particular view is called pantheism, which is literally defined to mean that there is no God, but only the combined forces and laws that are manifested in the existing universe. According to Spinoza, we are each and all an integral part of God, not as individuals or even humanity as a whole but as an integral part of what Spinoza called the "One Substance." He also believed that we are each and all components of some greater being, a being so unimaginably large that we are each nothing more than tiny parcels of matter in that being's blood.
In works based on the Christian religion God is often portrayed as all-knowing and all-powerful. This is how God is portrayed
Even though Adam and Eve did not encounter evil until the fall, they still had the potential for evil intrinsically within themselves. Likewise, although Lucifer was not wholly evil at the time of his formation, his pride and thus capacity to sin was part of his identity. If all of these characters developed the evil within them even though they were made good, one could question whether God is the creator of evil and is thus partly evil himself. Milton himself says that God “created evil, for evil only good / Where all life dies, death lives” (2.623-624). This seems in conflict with the earlier claim that God is omnibenevolent and free of