The Problem of Evil, Final

So I didn't really post many of my thoughts as I went, because it's time consuming. But here is the anti-climactic paper. It's so short I really can't get much into it, especially since in this context I have to talk about Descartes and his "solution" even though he is really addressing a pretty limited and narrow scope, as it pertained to his Meditation. Anyways... here it is:



"God either wishes to take away evils, and is unable; or he is able and unwilling; or he is neither willing nor able, or he is both willing and able. If he is willing and is unable, he is feeble, which is not in accordance with the character of God; if he is able and unwilling, he is envious, which is equally at variance with God; if he is neither willing nor able he is both envious and feeble, and therefore not God; if he is both willing and able, which alone is suitable to God, from what source then are evils? or why does he not remove them?”1

Neither a new problem before the 1st Century, nor a forgotten one in the 21st, the problem of evil seems to be almost obviously understood. As Epicurus asked, how can evil and God be reconciled? That is, if we suppose there is a God who is all-knowing, all-powerful, and all-loving, how can we account for the presence of evil in the world? What we typically mean by the problem of evil is that we see evil both moral and natural all around, and so to suppose that a wholly good and powerful God exists is to present a logical contradiction. If God can rid the world of evil (is omnipotent), and if God desires to get rid of evil (is omnibenevolent), how can it be that evil exists, other than to conclude that God does not?

Descartes understood the problem when it arose in his Fourth Meditation. As he sought to find that which was clear and distinct, he had to account for error. In other words, if some things were clearly not clear, it must be because he is finite and limited. But, since he had a clear and distinct idea of God, he found it necessary to explain how his imperfections could come from a perfect Being. Establishing that error was a defect, a privation, it could not be blamed on God. And God, of course, cannot deceive or cause us to err if he is God at all.2

Descartes saw that God is necessarily perfect, infinite and complete, and that he himself is not. If the opposite of God is nothingness, then he finds himself caught somewhere in between this nothingness and the totality of God, and is therefore sufficiently convinced that error is due to the finite nature of his knowledge and will. And, moreover, that he wills further than he understands, which is the ultimate cause of his own error. Because he wills what he does not understand, he loses sight of what is clear and distinct, abandoning that which God has given him the ability to know and therefore deceives himself and falls into sin.3

For Descartes, there is now a clear and distinct idea of why it is that he commits errors. God is not to blame, and it is not merely that he chooses to do wrong. It is the case that his intellect and will, and the freedom in which they operate, are not sufficiently in sync.4 But it is not clear how this explains the assumed contradiction between God’s goodness and evil in the world. Even if Descartes can explain his finite intellect and will, he has not properly answered for God’s allowing evil to persist in any other form.

But given that perhaps Descartes never set out to solve such a problem in the context of his Meditations, which were purely to find out what he could know “indubitably”. We can carry on this discussion in the way it has traditionally been framed: that if God were God, he would end the evil and suffering in the world because He would desire to and be able to. To properly understand this argument, a proper form may be illuminating. That is, (1) There is a God who is all-powerful and all-loving, and (2) Evil exists. This is a problem initially of logic, although it has never been shown how this provides an actual, explicit logical contradiction.5 Typically there are at least 2 hidden assumptions within this argument. First, that if God is all-powerful, He can prevent evil and second, that if God is all-good, He would prevent it. These assumptions hold that God could create beings who always freely choose what is good, and that God could end all natural evil.

But, this argument, on these assumptions, is purely speculative, and if it is even possible that humans have free will, our first and second assumptions are not necessarily true. Again, that both an all-good and all-powerful God exist and that evil exists is no contradiction. So the most basic of claims to the contrary is defeated. The problem in sum may not be, but holding this set of assertions is.

J.L. Mackie brings about a second problem, however, which is the question of egregious, gratuitous evil, and especially nature evil that does not hinge on human free will.6 That is, that there is an inconsistency between the God of love and the vastness of evil. But again, there are hidden assumptions here to reckon with.

First, we assume that there is more evil than there ought to be in the world. That is, we assume God could have still allowed some evil (especially of the moral sort) but less natural evil. But it is possible that God could not have created a world with less evil and kept the same amount of good. It is possible that God has allowed the current amount of evil because it brings about the most possible good for humankind. It is further possible that with the total eradication of evil there would not be good at all, which would be contrary to the attributes the theistic God is generally thought to have.

Truly, the assumption in terms of how we view the quantity of evil really betrays the position that we believe we have any ground to stand on in judging God’s moral decisions. It is completely possible that if God has sufficient moral reasons for allowing any evil (e.g., hardship causes us to grow and mature), then God could have morally sufficient reasons to allow all evil. To argue to the contrary is pure speculation.

Furthermore, as finite, limited beings, we are not capable of establishing where God is justified and where he is not. We must admit that there are a vast amount of evils or difficulties or sufferings in which we cannot immediately see a reason, but which later may make sense or be capable of being explained in a larger, historical or even personal context. The God who is all-powerful is also outside of space and time and transcends the limitations which are often to blame for our anger or misunderstanding of evil. It is simply unreasonable to assume that if God had morally sufficient reasons for allowing some evil that we would know what those reasons are.

This all amounts, of course, not to an actual theodicy. In this context, what is primary is to establish a defense. That is to say, to show that the problem of evil is not the problem it seems to be, one must only show that it is not logically impossible or incompatible for God and evil to exist. To establish a theodicy, or reason for why, exactly, God allows evil, is perhaps important, but is a separate endeavor from our present one of a defense of the theistic God in terms of the evil present in the world.

So what Descartes saw as his finite ability to know as far as he wills, and the separation between himself and God can be helpful in this regard. We ought not throw up our hands in despair, nor do we let God off the hook because He is God and we just cannot know. We ought not appeal to mystery or ignorance, but we make careful our assumptions and think clearly about our response to problems. Taken in isolation, the problem of evil is problematic, but in sum it approaches nothing near a contradiction or crushing blow.

Citations

1. Epicurus (341-270 B.C.), quoted by Lactantuis (A.D. 260-340) in William Dyrness' Christian Apologetics in a World Community (Inter-Varsity Press, 1983), p. 153.

2. Rene Descartes Discourse on Method and Meditations on First Philosophy, "Meditation Four" (Hackett Publishing Company, 1993), pp. 82-83.

3. Ibid, p. 85.

4. Ibid, p. 86-87.

5. See various speeches and writings of Dr. William Lane Craig and J.L. Mackie's The Miracle of Theism (Clarendon Press, Oxford, 1982) pp. 154-155.