The problem of evil, if one believes in the great and powerful God, is something that most will think about at some point in their life. It’s one of the greatest objections to the existence of God. It’s basically the problem of figuring out to what extent does the existence of evil count against the existence of God or if it even does at all. First and foremost, we can most likely come to an agreement that when thinking of the sufferings and evil in the world we think of either inhumane acts or natural disaster, both of which we’d assume God could prevent being that he’s the creator of everything. With that being said, most will agree that there are two types of the problem of evil, the emotional and intellectual. A lot of people will experience …show more content…
Then there is the intellectual problem of evil, which is considering that God and evil coexist. There are two versions of this problem which are the logical problem and the probabilistic problem. There is also another typeThere are many popular arguments worth considering against and for both the emotional and intellectual problem of evil. Like mentioned before, there are two versions of the intellectual problem of evil. First lets explore the logical version. This is that it is logically impossible for evil and God to both exist. This can be compared to an irresistible force and an immovable object both existing. So since we all can clearly see and agree that evil definitely does exist, God must not. Although Nt Wright, a British New Testament scholar and many others, suggests we …show more content…
He says if free will does exist then the above claims can not be true. Which destroys that whole argument. God created the circumstance in which a person is able to make a free choice--he can not determine the choice they will choose. God doesn’t create evil but it can’t be avoided without giving us free will. This supports the all knowing, all powerful, and all good God. This only solves the inhumane acts though. The evil committed on purpose by human beings. It doesn’t solve the natural evil which is the things we can not be blamed for, such as the plates below the surface moving. Therefore, the problem of evil still goes
The beauty of the problem of evil is its simplicity. David Hume displays the problem well by questioning the existence of God and evil. For, if both God and evil exist, God must either be “willing to prevent evil, but not able” or “able, but not willing”. Hume shows that there seems to be a problem with God and evil coexisting. For, with an all good entity
Out of all the different choices human’s have to make not all of them are made using freewill, for example someone’s choice may me chosen by something or someone else and thus any evil that is caused from that choice was not chosen via freewill. If evil is created this way then it is not supporting the existence of god. There are many examples of this like how suffering (evil) may be created from a natural disaster, which was not an option someone had chosen via freewill, this creates a problem for the free will defence. Not all evil is due to choices human’s have made. In response to this problem for the free will defence, if god was all good, powerful and knowing then he would have been able to prevent and stop natural disasters as the evil they create is not due to freewill. However, this is evidently not true as natural disasters have
Evil can be categorized into two forms, moral evil and natural evil. Moral evil is brought about by bad choices that stem from our free will. Natural evil is bad things that happen to people, whether they deserve them or not. The problem with evil is,
In a world of chaos, he who lives, lives by his own laws and values. Who is to say that the death of millions is any worse or better, for that matter, than injuring a cockroach. And in the case of an existing power in the form of God, who is presumed to be all which is good, presiding and ruling an organized universe, why then does evil exist? The prosaic response of “without evil, there is no good” no longer holds any validity in this argument as the admitted goal of good is to reach an existence without evil. So even if a God does exist, I think it is fair, at this point, to say that he is the embodiment of both good and evil. And if humoring those who would answer the previous question with the response that there can be no good
From this, some possible solutions arise. Simply, if stating that one of the premises is not true, then the problem of evil does not exist. Maybe one does not believe that God’s power is limited or perhaps are prepared to say that evil does not exist and is merely an illusion. It is hard to truly prove that these solutions are true, but they are solutions nonetheless. Along with these adequate solutions, are some solutions that Mackie describes as “fallacious”. The most noted one very well could be the Free Will Defense.
The logical problem of evil basically states that there is an inconsistency with the existence of God and the existence of evil. In other words, saying that God is all good, omnipotent and omniscient, meaning that he knows everything and has absolute power, it doesn’t not make sense to conceive that he would let evil exist in the world. It explains that evil is bad and a good God want to get rid of it and he would know exactly how to do that. So if evil still exist then God must not exist according to the logical concept. At first look, this argument makes complete sense and seems unbreakable, however there were some evident holes in the argument. The part that this argument did not take into account is that God may have not caused evil to exist or maybe he has but for a special purpose.
Following this line of thought, the next logical step for our human minds to pursue would seem to be that in order for God to experience Himself as the all-consuming good, there had to be something called the all-consuming evil. This is a flawed argument for there is only one deity we recognize as God. God is all there was, all there is, and all there ever will be. The existence of evil cannot be used as a pathetic excuse for God to be able to justify His existence.
When we are discussing the problem of evil, we are specifically discussing a God that is omniscient, omnipotent, and perfectly good. A God that is perfectly good would not allow suffering to exist, and any minute amount of suffering that exists disproves God’s existence. Unless, the suffering is justified with an adequate reason. However, even then there seems to be large amounts of evil in the world that seems unnecessary for any good reason. By evil and suffering I mean death, pain, and disease. I will be using these terms interchangeably. In the problem of evil, many arguments are placed in order to find a justification for the evil that exists. However,
As long as evil and suffering exists in this world, God cannot exist. More importantly, it does not only contradict with the idea of God being “all-good”, but also him being “all-knowing” and “all-powerful” as well. Because, if God only desires good, how evil was formed unless God was evil in someway. If not, then if God has all knowledge, he should know evil exists. Even more, if God is “all-power”, he should be able to the evil and suffering in the that he created. So, the existence of evil contradicts
On this very debatable topic the common question that is commonly asked is “How can the two objective claims (1. Evil exists. / 2. God exists.) Both are true in the same universe?” First I’d like to talk to you about a philosopher by the name of Augustine who was born in 354 AD. Augustine offers two solutions to this intriguing question. The two solutions are that there is an all-powerful God and there is such thing as “free will”. Free will is simply just the willingness to make a decision by yourself without help or influence from anyone but your self-using your own logic or self-conscious. Augustine believes that God is all knowing and all powerful and that evil still exists only because
In a world of chaos, he who lives, lives by his own laws and values. Who is to say that the death of millions is any worse or better, for that matter, than injuring a cockroach. And in the case of an existing power in the form of God, who is presumed to be all which is good, presiding and ruling an organized universe, why then does evil exist? The prosaic response of "without evil, there is no good" no longer holds any validity in this argument as the admitted goal of good is to reach an existence without evil. So even if a God does exist, I think it is fair, at this point, to say that he is the embodiment of both good and evil. And if humoring those who would answer the previous question with the response that there can be no good
Important point: Evil does not mean God does NOT exist, but only implies that God’s probably has a lesser chance of existing.
How we view the presence of God and evil depends on why we believe the world was created. If man is a fully created creature then the world was created for him to live in, a comfortable, pleasant place. Our world is obviously filled with suffering, danger, hardship of all kinds, so an all-powerful God could not have created it. To Christians the world is not a paradise where one can experience the maximum of pleasure and a minimum of pain. The world is a place of “soul making” or person making. As we try and understand the challenges of our lives, and our environment we may become “Children Of God”.
The problem of evil is as ancient as humanity itself. Since the dawn of man, thinkers, philosophers, religionists and practically every human being who have suffered at the hands of evil have pondered this enigma, either as a logical-intellectual-philosophical or emotional-religious-existential problem. The preponderance of evil as a reality in human existence, and
Theist: If God made everything in the world perfect and there is no evil, how can we