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The existence of evil in the world blights the lives of all human beings. Humans
face many evils during their lives. There are moral evils, such as pride, lying,
stealing, cheating, cursing, adultery, malicious talk, etc. There are physical
evils too, such as poverty, illness, pains, tornados, earthquakes, famines,
floods, and death. In addition, the existence of evil is an acute intellectual
problem for Christians who claim that God is the Creator who is all-loving and
all-powerful. The resolutions to the intellectual problems of evil
have varied widely. It is helpful to have an outline of the various solutions that
have been proffered to explain evil’s
existence
1. Evil is just a fact of the universe.
This is generally the response of atheism to the problem of evil. Atheists
squarely face evil and see it for all its tragedy and find its existence
repulsive. They believe that reality is limited to the physical universe and that
evil is just a fact of our earthly existence. For atheism, evil’s existence is
incompatible with the Christian view of deity. It is entirely the
responsibility of human beings to alleviate as much evil as
possible. There is no deity to save humans from suffering and the evils of
this life.
2. Evil is a manifestation of the struggle between two or more deities.
Manichæns believed there were two Principles in eternal conflict.1 The King of Light
battles with the King of Darkness, and this conflict explains the presence
of evil. Polytheism believes there are a
multitude of gods who don't act in concert, so there is disharmony or evil in the universe. By
contrast, peaceful harmony would be expected, if one God were all-powerful and
all-good and who is the creator and sole ruler of the universe.
For a polytheists, the existence of evil argues against monotheism.
3. Evil shows that God is not all-powerful.
Since the universe is finite, it is possible that a finite God created this universe.
A finite God may desire to eliminate
evil, but he is not capable of controlling everything in the universe. Hence, evil exists in spite
of his wishes. God is not able to eliminate evil, simply because he is not all-powerful
(omnipotent).
4. Evil shows that God is not all-good.
In stead being limited in divine power, God is finite with respect to his goodness.
God is omnipotent but not omnibenevolent. Since God is not all loving, God allows the existence of evil
because he has no desire to extinguish it. Since he is all-powerful, he could
prevent all evil. But evil exists, because God is not all-good.
5. Evil is a mystery.
The presence of evil in the world cannot be understood by finite human
reasoning. Its existence is a divine mystery, and human reason should not attempt
to fathom its divine obscurity. God commands us to believe and not to probe what is unintelligible to the human mind.
6. Evil is necessary for our testing.
Life has to be filled with trials and temptations, because our future reward
depends upon our perseverance in trials and overcoming the temptations to do evil.
Evil is an unfortunate necessity to provide for humanity’s trials
and temptations.
7. Evil is necessary to make us enjoy heaven more.
Suffering life’s evils will make heaven seem all the more glorious.
The blessed would not appreciate the felicity of glory unless they had suffered
from life’s trials and
temptations. Evil serves a vital purpose for humanity to make the
beatific vision more glorious. The purpose of evil is centered in the good
it does for the blessed.
8. Evil is necessary to glorify and magnify God.
Evil is a necessary element in creation to provide a backdrop to glorify and
magnify God. Because, if there were no evil, then God’s mercy, grace, justice,
forbearance, and compassion would never be known. Hence, it was necessary for God
cause evil to provide the greatest and fullest display of His
attributes.
In stead of evil serving a purpose for the blessed, evil is in
the service of God to manifest his glory, majesty, and divine sovereignty. This view is
discussed further here. Click
9. Evil is an illusion.
Evil is not a reality in the universe. It is an illusion, and humanity blindly
accepts its existence due to their ignorance of the good nature of all things. The Christian
Science religion hold this view. In addition, pantheism believes that everything
flows out of god (ex deo) and is a manifestation of god. Since all is god, evil
is impossible. Due to ignorance, humans subjectively feel there is evil in the
universe. Through the teachings of pantheism, a person can overcome the
illusion of evil’s existence.
10. Evil is necessary to attain the best possible world.
God always does the best possible, simply because he is God. Hence, this
world is the best possible world that God could create. In some way, evil was
necessary to achieve this best of all possible worlds. Just as a painter needs to
use some black coloring to add clarity and depth to his painting, so God had to
use some evil to create the best world. Up close a black stroke might look
dark and foreboding, but it adds to the over-all beauty of the painting from the
perspective of the painter. Likewise, if a person’s stands right next to a snare
drummer, the person may get a headache. Yet, if the person were to listen to the
musical score from where the audience listens, it would be enjoyable and inspiring
music. This view is defended in G.W. Leibniz’s book, Theodicy: Essays on the
Goodness of God and the Freedom of Man and the Origin of Evil.2
11. Evil is caused by choices of free-willed of creatures.
This view holds that God is not the efficient cause of evil. Rather, God’s
role is limited to permitting the possibility of evil without causing it. Evil
exists through the free choice of rational creatures, such as humans and angels.
Saint Augustine developed this viewpoint in his book, De libero arbitrio
voluntatis (On the Free Choice of the Will).3 He felt that this view was
compatible with Christian theism in that it maintained the infinite goodness
as well as the infinite power of God. He taught that God created human beings with rational minds that
could make rational choices. It was good that God created humans with rational
thought, because they could then love and intelligently serve God. However, it
entailed the possibility of evil, but the evil would be the responsibility of
human beings because they were the ones who choose to do evil. For example, parents allow their teenagers to go
skiing on the slopes of mountains, so they can enjoy the excitement of skiing,
the beauty of the snow, and the splendor of the mountains. Yet, skiing allows the
possibility of broken bones. It is not the purpose of the parents to have one of
their teenager’s break a bone. The teenager is responsible to ski carefully so
as to avoid injury. So, God created humans with the wonder of rational thought and
choice, so that they could freely fellowship, commune, worship and love
their Creator. Yet,
this entailed the possibility that humans would sin and bring evil into God’s
good creation.
Conclusion
No doubt, there are other attempts to offer a solution to the problem of evil in the world. Those
mentioned above give a sense of the wide variety of answers as a
rationale for the
existence of evil in the world.
Last edited 06-04-2001
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