The Problem of Evil is a problematic debate amongst skeptics and Christians. This essay will construct my personal views of the inconsistency between the three tenets that intelligent and rational Christians affirm. The focus of this essay is to address the contradiction between the three tenets of the Christian faith and to discuss the consequent remarks in regards to labeling God as all good and all powerful. Based on my personal belief, I find it difficult to accept all three tenets considering that the third tenant challenges the other two tenets of God’s power and love. If God is omnipotent and omnibenevolent, then why does he allow real suffering to exist within the world of humanity? Based on my personal reflection, I believe …show more content…
Therefore we must admit that a good and all loving powerful God would never permit such evil from spreading in the world that we see today.
Although the Bible may explain how evil came into this world, it still doesn’t justify the fact of its pure existence. It doesn’t explain why God didn’t prevent it to appear as well as his soulful purpose for us humans to experience it. An all loving and powerful God wouldn’t allow tsunamis and earthquakes to kill thousands of individuals, nor allow individuals to harm others for any reason whatsoever. I tend to question his power and love for us humans since I hear about so many devastating and gruesome acts that people commit. How can I believe that there is an all-powerful and loving God when I hear about innocent children dying from cancer, or when I know that people suffer every day of their lives so they can remain alive? The answer is I cant’ accept Gods love and power because so many people who believe in the faith of God still suffer countlessly. I remember asking my father if God is the initial factor who allows people to suffer. He referenced two sections in the bible that clearly express God’s allowance of evil coming to existence. In the book of Genesis, chapter 3, the serpent tries to lure Eve to eat the apple when God specifically instructed her to not to do so. During her resistance he says to the serpent “We
John Hick argues in this writing that the all-powerful, all-knowing, and all-good Christian god is compatible with an abundance of suffering. He offers solutions to the problem of suffering which relies heavily upon a tripartite foundation. Hick divides evil into two: Moral Evil = the evil that human being cause - either to themselves or to each other. And Non-Moral Evil = the evil that is not caused by human activity - natural disasters, etc. He tries to explain that a world without pain and suffering, moral traits such as courage, patience and sympathy would not be developed.
In the course of this essay I will argue that evil is not compatible with the existence of god. This means that evil and God cannot coexist because if god were present, the existence of evil would contradict all that god is believed to be. Abrahamic religions insist that God both created the world and that he preserves and maintains it. Christianity claims that God is all knowing and is boundless in his abilities. Religions claim that God is benevolent, and only wants the best for humanity and the universe, as his creations. If all of the above statements be true, then it is hard to understand why god would allow evil to thrive right from the beginning of time.
If there is a God, horrendous things wouldn’t happen. According to Inwagen, there is sufficient reason behind why God allows evil or even created it in the first place. This argument provides an anchor to the argument of God’s existence. God has outweighed reasons to allow evil and has a very real logical motivation why it might be. God being the omnipresent prefect being he is wouldn’t want evil. The key word is ‘want’ in this context, because want is a strong desire for something, doesn’t mean obtaining it or getting it are two very different things.
If god was all good, all powerful and all knowing, he would not allow the existence of evil.
This is a significant problem to the revealed religions because they believe in a wholly good and omnipotent God. Why then, would this God allow evil? In this paper, I will provide, explain, and evaluate St. Augustine of Hippo’s
Furthermore, god is supposedly full of wisdom, his wisdom is infinite, yet the world lacks heavily. One way this can be viewed is with nature, how nature scarcely tends to the need of human and animal happiness. One question that one may ask is can and is god able to prevent evil? Does he have what it takes; maybe god is impotent (lacking power, strength). According
Therefore, we might best respond by saying that God does not Will "bad" things to happen in life. Rather, "bad"
Does the problem of evil pose a challenge for theists and the existence of God? The problem of evil argues that there is so much suffering in the world that an all-good and all powerful God would not allow such suffering to exist. Therefore, a God with those characteristics does not exist. Unless the suffering is necessary for an adequate reason. Some people argue that suffering is necessary for there to be good and for us to able to understand what good is. In this paper, I will argue that suffering does not need to exist in order for good to exist, because the existence of good does not depend on suffering. I will then argue that good and suffering are not logical opposites. Finally, I will conclude that since evil is not justified, then the God that we defined does not exist.
For atheists, apologetics, and non-believers, a big topic of contention is the existence of evil in a world with God. This is known as the problem with evil. How does a God that is all knowing, all powerful, and perfectly good allow such atrocities to occur under his watch? It is this question that so many people have discussed. The argument centers on God being omnipotent, omniscient, and perfectly good (Mackie, 1955 p. 200). Omnipotent is to be all powerful. Omniscient is to be all knowing and to be perfectly good means that God would prevent a morally bad event from ever happening (Swinburne, 1998 p. 13). In the problem of evil, God’s powers are taken at face value, and applied to God’s inaction to evil on earth. People who argue against the topic of evil typically make generalizations on the attributes that God
When asking yourself why God would allow bad things to occur or bad people to do specific things, I see to things happening. One is many lose their faith in God, especially if multiple things happen within in a specific time frame. These people lose their faith in a higher power and hope if they repeatedly asked for help or guidance in prayer to God. Now some people just have times of weakness like this and are able to return to their faith, but
One of the heaviest arguments against God’s existence is the problem of evil. The traditional conception of God is as omnipresent, omniscient and omnibenevolent. If this is true then God either can’t do anything about it, doesn’t know about it or doesn’t care about it. This then implies that God is either not all powerful as he can’t prevent the suffering, not all-knowing as he doesn’t know about the suffering, or not all good if he doesn’t care about the suffering. This challenges the concept of God being the greatest being in the universe. However, there are many different responses to the concept of evil, they may not be all satisfactory but they cast doubt on this argument. One of the responses challenging the problem of evil is that God did not create the evil in the world. A lot of the evil in the world only occurs
William Rowe defines gratuitous evil as an instance of intense suffering which an omnipotent, omniscient being could have prevented without thereby losing some greater good or permitting some evil equally bad or worse.(Rowe 335) In a world with so much evil it raises the questions If God is all powerful, all knowing and all good, how can he allow bad things to happen to good people? Can God even exist in a world with so such gratuitous evil? These are questions that has afflicted humanity for a very long time and has been the question to engross theologians for centuries. The existence of evil has been the most influential and powerful reason to disprove the existence of God. It is believed among many theist that God is the creator and caretaker
Thus, there is reason to believe that an all-powerful, all-knowing, all-good creator does not exist.” However, God gave us the freewill to be good or evil, how could we know good without knowing evil? As for natural evils, such as hurricanes, and other natural disasters, while it is hard to understand why a so called “loving God” could allow these things to happen we have to understand that we wouldn’t need a savior if the world was without
In this paper, I will argue that John Hicks’ theory it was not possible for God to create a world with people but without evil is accurate. I will present Hicks’ argument including the premises and conclusions of the text, a real-world application INVOLVING Hitler, and one objection to Hick’s argument. In John Hick’s argument, he presents what he feels are compelling reasons for our all good, loving God to allow humans that create evil in our world. ADD MORE…..
There are acts of evil in our world constantly. More so than in years past, we hear about school shootings, terrorist attacks, murders, and natural disasters such as earthquakes, tornadoes and hurricanes. Everyday there is a new headline in the news that proves that evil is happening all around us. This news is seen differently from person to person based on their religious beliefs. Those who believe in God think of him as having unconditional and infinite love for us. This being said, it is very difficult for someone with this belief to think that someone so good could let something so evil occur. The problem of evil is important because where there is evil, there is suffering. As humans, we do not like suffering, either physically or emotionally. However, since it does happen so often in our daily lives, we tend to wonder why we suffer in the first place and many times we ask ourselves “where is God through all of this?” Non-Christians and Christians view and respond to this question differently. While some believe that free-will causes suffering, other believe that evil helps us figure out our role in the world and allows us to find peace within ourselves. The Core 9 readings have presented several theodicies explaining what other religions think of suffering and evil. These theodicies help contribute to my understanding and my view of evil and suffering. I have concluded that God does not intend to do evil things to us. But rather the reason for suffering is caused by