IS EVIL IN THE WORLD COMPATIBLE WITH THE NOTION OF GOD

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EVIL IN THE CREATION OF A GOOD GOD: A PHILOSOPHICAL DISCOURSEBy

JIMOH, Anselm KoleINTRODUCTION

This paper discusses the problem of evil from the dual perspective of historical considerations by various thinkers and the question of compatibility, namely, whether the notion of evil as we conceive it is agreeable to the notion of God as we conceive Him. My position is that we need to revisit our definition of evil to exclude physical disaster and consider a more holistic conception of events in the world as parts of a whole rather than isolated, singular and unrelated happenings. I also strongly uphold that the treat of the question of evil so far remains unsatisfactory.

The problem of evil, which has for long been a puzzle to the human mind is: if God exists and he is infinitely good and powerful, and if this world was actually created by him, it is impossible to understand why there could be so much evil in it. The fact of evil is for many the most positive objection to belief in God. It thus, poses a challenge to theism. This challenge is traditionally presented as a dilemma:

If God is perfectly loving, he must wish to abolish evil; and if he is all-powerful, he must be able to abolish evil. But evil exists; therefore God cannot be both omnipotent and perfectly loving.

The agnostics, for instance, are greatly appalled by the extent of human suffering, which for them makes the idea of a God who is a loving creator incomprehensible, in fact, irrational and implausible. According to J.L.Mackie, the problem of evil is a problem only for someone who believes that there is a God who is both omnipotent and wholly good it is a logical problem, the problem of clarifying and reconciling a number of beliefs: it is not a scientific problem that might be solved by further observations, or a practical problem that might be solved by a decision or an action.

The problem of evil can and has been stated in various ways. For instance, it is stated as the problem of whether Gods existence is compatible with the existence of evil? In a more direct way it is formulated thus; is it possible that a world containing evil could have been created by an omnipotent, omniscient and omni-benevolent God? Against the suggestion of compatibility in the first formulation, the atheist argues that the existence of evil in the world entails the non-existence of God. In his opinion, if God exists, if God is omniscient, omnipotent and benevolent, then evil will not exist. This is because, he, that is, God, would have prevented it. Thus, for the atheist, the existence of God with all his attributes will necessarily imply the non-existence of evil. The reverse being the case, God cannot be said to exist. On the contrary, the theist has consistently denied this claim with the argument that it does not follow necessarily that a perfectly good being, who foresees evil and is able to prevent it, will prevent it.

The aim of this paper is to revisit the aged problem of evil from the perspective of its compatibility with the notion of a good God. To achieve this, I intend to make a historical survey of the various explanations that have been given to the problem of evil. There after, I shall critically discuss the problem of evil in relation to Gods omnipotence, omniscient, benevolence and human freewill. My method shall be expository, analytic and critical.

A HISTORICAL SURVEY OF THE PROBLEM OF EVIL

There are some who seek a solution to the problem of evil by denying the reality of evil. In this way, they attempt to explain it away as needing no solution. The argument is that, there is no problem, so, no solution required. Prominent among those who fall under this group are the theists who opine that evil is a privation that ought to have been. According to McCloskey, this amounts to an attempt to sidestep the problem simply by changing the name of that which has to be explained. There are others who think the problem is merely a logical or ontological one. Their argument is that, it arises from concepts, which connotatively cannot go together. Others still, while admitting the reality of the problem of evil, attempt to put it aside by declaring it a great mystery, which poor humans cannot hope to comprehend. Others adopt a rationalist approach and propose rationalist arguments to show that evil, properly understood is compatible with and even the consequence of Gods goodness. The question is; how can this be so?

Various philosophical schools and philosophers at various times and ages have attempted to explain and clarify the problem of evil. These explanations are often from the inclination of such philosophical schools and individual philosophers. Some of these views include the following:

PLATO: Platos philosophy holds that the world is an imperfect reflection of the perfect world of forms. In his Timeaus, he speaks of God as a demiurge - a deity, creating the world using the world of forms as a prototype. In his view, the demiurge used defective materials, which could be properly brought under control in the process of creating, but he made the best out of the defective materials. Thus, he argued that evil in the world is a result of the defective materials used by the demiurge in creation. The materials were not created by the demiurge; so, evil cannot be attributed to God or the demiurge.

STOICISM: This teaches that while God is the soul of the universe, the latter is the body of God. By implication then, the universe and God are one. According to the Stoics, the laws of nature, which come from the Logos, govern the universe the logos is used as a co-referential to God. The universe is a harmonized system where everything is important, nothing is useless and nothing happens by chance. Whatever happens has been so planned from eternity and has a function to play within the system. The universe, for them, is made of opposites, for instance, light and darkness, male and female, good and evil, etc. therefore, you cannot understand one without the other. These opposites are complementary and are harmonized to bring about completeness in the system. Since these opposites are complementary, it therefore means that what is called evil is complementary to good. So we cannot talk of evil in terms of something destructive or bad. The latter can only be the case when we do not understand the role of particular events that are tagged evil, within the whole system.

For the Stoics then, there is no such thing as evil. The universe is recycling, what is seen as useless in one area is useful in another, what decays in one area, contributes to growth in another. We call certain things evil because we do not understand how they contribute towards the order and harmony of the universal system, we do not understand how they fit into the eternal plan of God.

PLOTINUS: He argues that what is called evil is the absence of light, a lack of good, lack of being. For him, whatever is being is good. This view stems from his metaphysics, which begins with the One. This one is absolute transcendence. It is the source of light, goodness and being. All beings derive their being from the one. Plotinus argued that only the one existed originally. From the one emanated the nous. (This means the mind or spirit, it emanated directly from the one) The nous is a reflection of the one, a perfect image of the one. From the nous the world soul emanated. The world soul is the universal soul; it has two aspects, namely; the inner soul and the outer soul. Both correspond respectively to the higher soul and the lower soul. From the lower soul emanated the material universe. The light that comes from the one does not reach this aspect of the world soul. The material universe is matter and it is at the lowest level of emanation, therefore, it lacks being and light. According to Plotinus, it is this very lack of being that is referred to as evil, for evil is the lack of being.

ST. AUGUSTINE AND ST. THOMAS AQUINAS: Augustine accepted the solution to the problem of evil put forward by Plotinus. He argued that one could say without fear of contradiction that God created all things but did not create evil. His argument is that whatever is being is good; a lack of this being is what is called evil. Arguing further, Augustine contends that things may be bad in their relations to one another, for instance, a snakes relation to man. The snake in itself is not bad neither is man in himself bad, but in their relation, i.e. a snake biting a man, we can talk of bad or evil. So for him, everything is good ontologically. Following from this argument, Augustine opines that nothing is totally bad, since that would imply a total lack of being in which case it ceases to exist. Only being can exist, evil on its own cannot exist. At this point, Augustine made a distinction between natural and moral evil, which Thomas Aquinas carried over in his argument.

Thomas Aquinas maintained with Augustine that evil is a lack of being and that there is natural evil and moral evil. Natural evil is part of the very nature of being, for example, a carnivorous animal like the lion, will naturally have to feed on other animals to survive. On the other hand, moral evil results from the human persons misuse of free will.

Thomas Aquinas argues that no one can desire evil for its sake since the human will is oriented towards good and it seeks good always, just as the intellect seeks knowledge. However, when evil is done, the human person who does it must have seen something good in the act. Here Aquinas introduces the notion of ethical determinism. Ethical determinism simply means that when presented with the good, the will has no option but to choose good against evil since good imposes itself on the will as truth on the intellect.

SPINOZA: In his monistic and functionalistic worldview, reformulated the view of the Stoics on the problem of evil. According to him, there exists only one substance in reality, which is God or nature. God has infinite attributes but we know only two of these. They are; (i) spirit and (ii) matter. In line with this, nature has two dimensions, namely, (i) natura naturans naturing nature and (ii) natura naturanta natured nature. According to Spinoza, everything that happens in nature is a modificatiocation of Gods self-expression; this includes human actions. By implication therefore, whatever happens, it is God acting. Here Spinoza argues against human freedom as an idea that arises out of ignorance or inadequate knowledge. Nothing happens without a cause and God is the ultimate cause of everything. If everything comes from God, then nothing is evil. The universe is a system that works in harmony. God knows how a particular action contributes to the universe. For lack of holistic view of the universe on our part, we tend to isolate particular events from the whole system, and we call it evil because we cannot see how it contributes to the universe. If we see things in relation to its totality, the idea of evil would disappear, as it is a result of our ignorance. Evil for Spinoza is man made, as it does not really exist for God has no idea of evil.

LEIBNIZ: He started his discussion of the problem of evil by making a tripartite distinction of evil, namely, (i) metaphysical evil, (ii) natural evil and (iii) moral evil. Metaphysical evil arises from human finitude or imperfection. Evil, in other words, is imperfection in creatures. The question is then asked, if God is perfect, why did he not create perfect beings to avoid the problem of evil? According to Leibniz, for God to create perfect beings would mean for him to create other Gods since perfection belongs to God alone and this is impossible. The other alternative would be not to create at all, since by their very nature, creatures are imperfect. Leibniz concludes that it is better for creatures to exist as imperfect beings rather than not to exist at all. God works according to the principle of perfection, which consists in doing the best of alternatives. Leibnizs notion of natural and moral evil akin to the Augustinian and Aquinian notions of natural and moral evil.

TEILHARD DE CHARDIN: According to Teilhard de Chardin, evil is part of the very structure of the system rather than being an accident in the world. Evil for him is an essential disorder, which is inevitable in the evolutionary system. According to him, the world is an evolutionary one and it is gradually developing and evolving. In its process of evolution, the world is gradually overcoming evil to attain perfection. He conceives the world as still being under creation through the process of evolution. So, the question of evil in the world is not a problem to him. He argues that the world has gone through certain stages and is still going through some stages. The world for him has gone through the stage of geosphere, which was the period of innate matter. This was the stage prior to the coming of life into the world. It has also, from the stage of geosphere, gone through the stage of the biosphere. This was the stage when life sprang up from the world. From this stage the world has gone through the stage of the nousphere, which is the stage of intelligence of mind. At this stage, the world came to the human level that is the sphere of the spirit or soul. Teilhard de Chardin argues that at the stage of the nousphere, the world was at a divergent phase. It was the phase in which the human intelligence was spreading. Now, the world is at a convergent phase and human intelligence is coming together again. His argument is that the history of the world is heading towards a goal, namely; the omega point. At this point, it will enter into a new sphere, this is, the theosphere. At this theosphere stage, all evil would be overcome and man will attain perfect happiness and the process of evolution would stop. For Teilhard de Chardin, its those who have a static conception of the world that have problem with evil in the world. This is because they see the world as a perfect creation, which has reached its completion. This is not so, the world is evolving towards the omega point, which is the point of perfection. Any perfection attained now means the overcome of some evil. He contends that at the theosphere, the omega point, anyone that sees evil can then question it.

ALFRED WHITEHEAD: Evil is understood here within the context of his metaphysics, which is metaphysics of organism. The world according to him is a dynamic one and it is in a process of dynamic creativity. Whitehead uses organism to replace substance as you have it in traditional metaphysics. According to him, the world is an on-going process of dynamic actualisation. The world is full of actual entities, which are continually being actualised. It is a dynamic process of change, perishing and transformation of beings. He argues for a universal recycling in nature, which concerns both inanimate inorganic matter and the human person. God, for him, is part of this process. The difference between God and the actual entities of the world is that, while the latter is caused and is causing others, the former is not caused.

Every actual entity has both physical and mental dimensions. That is to say, entities in the world are bi-polar; they have mental pole and physical pole. God too is bi-polar. He has both primordial nature and consequent nature. In his primordial nature, God is infinite potentialities and he contains eternal objects. His infinite potentialities are actualised in his consequent nature and the process of the actualising of the eternal objects determines his consequent nature. According to Whitehead, all events in the world take place in Gods consequent nature. His primordial nature is free, eternal but potentials in need of actualisation, while his consequent nature is determined, fixed, and incomplete but continually being actualised. Nothing is lost in the world, as everything is preserved integrated and put to use in Gods consequent nature.

Within the context of this background, Alfred Whitehead argues that there is nothing that is evil since what we call evil is overcome in the consequent nature of God through which he maintains contact with the world and has a reciprocal relationship with it. So, God suffers along with his creature i.e. man, in his consequent nature. God for him is a great companion in suffering, a fellow sufferer who understands. He experiences the sufferings, pains, sorrows and joys of his creatures and overcomes them in his consequent nature. What we call evil, for Whitehead, is the process of actualisation of the potentialities of the primordial nature of God.

THE COMPATIBILITY QUESTION: IS EVIL COMPATIBILE WITH THE NOTION OF A GOOD GOD?The problem of evil and the existence of God in its simplest form is this:

God is omnipotent; God is wholly good; and yet evil exists. There seems to be some contradiction between these three propositions, so that if any two of them were true the third would be false. But at the same time all three are essential parts of most theological positions: the theologian, it seems, at once must adhere and cannot consistently adhere to all three.

The contradiction that Mackie tries to point out here is not obvious, thus, we may require additional premises or as he puts it, quasi-logical rules that connect the three principal terms, i.e. good, evil, and omnipotent. The additional premises would be that good is opposed to evil. This implies that evil is always eliminated by good as far as the latter can, and the second premise would be that there is no limit to what an omnipotent thing can do. With these two premises, it follows that a good omnipotent thing would completely eliminate evil. So, the proposition that a good omnipotent thing exists, and evil exists, is incompatible.

To state the problem fully as it has been done above, it becomes clear that the problem can be solved within the context that the problem will not arise if at least, one of the propositions that constitute it is given up. That is to say; if you are prepared to say that God is not wholly good, or not quite omnipotent, or that evil does not exist, or that good is not opposed to the kind of evil that exists, or that there are limits to what an omnipotent thing can do, then the problem of evil will not arise for you.

Following from this, there are quite a number of adequate solutions to the problem of evil and thinkers of different ages and times have almost adopted some of these. For instance, while some (a few) are prepared to deny Gods omnipotence, a larger percentage are ready to keep the term, but in a restricted sense that point to a number of things an omnipotent being cannot do. Others have argued that evil is an illusion based on their opinion that the material world is itself an illusion and what is called evil belongs to the material world. Another opinion that falls within what I have referred to as adequate solution is the view that evil is the absence or privation of good, that evil in the positive sense, that is, evil opposed to good, does not exist. Whether these opinions are true or not is a different question on its own, but suffice to note that they come in as adequate, or you may say, convenient solutions to the problem of evil, at least, in the sense that, acceptance of any of them eliminates the problem. Of course, some other problems may arise from their acceptance but that is not of immediate interest to this paper.

Besides the above-proposed solutions, other solutions have been put forward, but as Mackie says, though it is not always easy to notice where the fallacy lies, other so-called solutions, which purport to eliminate the contradiction without abandoning any of its constituent propositions, must be fallacious. Such solutions would explicitly maintain all the constituent propositions, but would implicitly reject at least one of them in the course of the argument that would explain away the problem of evil. Let us examine some of such fallacious solutions.

It is sometimes argued for instance, that good cannot exist without evil or that evil is a necessary counterpart to good. The argument here implies that if there is to be good, there must, as a matter of necessity be some evil and if there is no evil, there cannot be good either. A version of this argument states that pleasure is possible only in contrast with pain. There is an obvious problem here, namely, why should there be evil or pain at all? After all, God is omnipotent. He could have created good that requires no evil to authenticate it. So we find a solution that first, limits God. That is, God cannot create good without creating evil at the same time meaning that God is not omnipotent or that there are limits to what the omnipotent can do. This solution also suggests that evil is compatible with good. If good and evil are counterparts, then a good thing will not seek to eliminate evil as far as it can. Yet this is what we observe around us.

As a corollary to this argument, it is suggested that evil is necessary for good not as a counterpart, but as a means to an end. This obviously implies a severe restriction of Gods power. If God has to make evil as a means to good, it then means that God is subject to some causal laws. Now, this view that God is limited by causal laws conflicts with the view that causal laws are creations of God.

Another solution that has been put forward within the group of fallacious solutions that I am now considering is the argument that the universe is better with some evil in it than it could be if there were no evil. The suggestion of this solution makes it look like a variant of the previous solution. That the evil in the universe contributes to the goodness of a whole in which the evil is found. The aesthetic analogy that contrasts heighten beauty may be used to support a development of this solution. For instance, that there may be some discords in a musical work which somehow add to its beauty as a whole. Another support that this solution could enjoy is in connection with the notion of progress. That a static organisation of the universe, which will be the case in an eternal unchallenged supremacy of good, would not be the best compared to a progressive movement in which evil is gradually overcome by good. Even with these two supporting analogies, the fact that this solution begins with the assumption that the evil that gives rise to the problem of evil is primarily what is referred to as physical evil i.e. pain, renders it defective. It is argued (at least against David Hume, who in his treatment of evil stressed pain and disease) that pain and disease make sympathy, benevolence, heroism and the gradual, but successful struggle of doctors and reformers to overcome these evils possible. The antitheodicists, against this, hold that all we need to perform such good acts is to believe that the evils that are said to prompt them are there, not necessarily that they actually exist. But this is tantamount to prescribing or advocating a deceptive world and as such, it stands untenable. This kind of argument if valid simply shows that some evil may enrich the universe; it tells us nothing about how much evil will enrich this particular universe and how much will be too much.

Yet another solution in this category is the argument that evil is a result of human freewill. This is about the most important solution that has been proffered to the problem of evil. It ascribes evil to the independent actions of human beings rather than to God. It argues that human beings have been endowed with freedom of will and evil is a consequence of human actions. For this solution to stand scrutiny, it must first be assumed that it was more important to be free and sometimes err than there should be an innocent automaton that acts rightly and in determined way. In this case, freedom is being treated as a superlative good and evil as a necessary result of this good.

While this paper does not permit an exhaustive discussion of the question of freedom, the question would however be asked; if God has made man such that in his free choices, he sometimes prefer what is good and sometimes what is evil, why could he not have made man such that he would always freely choose the good? Richard Swinburne in his discussion of the problem of evil treats this question quite explicitly.

According to him, the antitheodicists would argue that a creator who is able to create creatures that will not be evil ought to have done so. (P1). By implication, this means that God ought not to have created human beings capable of doing evil. Against the antitheodicists, the theodicists, in their appeal to freewill, argue that it is illogical for an agent to make another agent who necessarily will freely do only good actions. The argument is that God cannot create a free agent i.e. an agent who has the power to make choices between alternative actions and God makes the agent always choose to do good actions. How the agent exercises the power to make choices, God cannot have control over as long as the agent remains free. It is not morally bad that God creates free creatures, even with the possibility of their doing evil. As a matter of fact, a logically necessary consequence of free agents is that they exercise their freedom, either to choose to do good or evil. This leads to the realisation of the essence of their freedom. The existence of free agents is good and the price is worth paying according to Richard Swinburne, even if such agents sometimes do evil. This argument renders the moral principle (P1) of the antitheodicists, implausible.

The antitheodicists can put forward another principle (P2) that a God who can do so, ought not to have created humanly free agents, whose evil actions would not result to passive evil i.e. humanly free agents whose evil actions could not affect others. By passive evil, it is meant, such evils that result from the evil action of the human being. To have such a case would be to have a situation in which we have freedom but lack responsibility. Thus, the theodicists claim that it would not be wrong for God to create interdependent humanly free agents. That means we would have a society in which the agents are responsible for one anothers well-being. This creates a situation in which human beings can make or mar one another. The antitheodicists quite agree with a world of interdependence. But is it not possible that this interdependence is only beneficial (positive)? This would mean an opportunity to withhold benefits rather than cause pain. To accept this latter claim of the antitheodicist would be to accept a society where any strong responsibility for one another is lacking. For if I can only choose to help someone or not, then I have no full responsibility towards the person. It is like having the ability to decide to give you sweet or not and not capable of deciding to break your leg or not.

The antitheodicists have yet another room for a third principle (P3). That a creator able to do so, ought to ensure that any creature, he creates does not cause as much passive evil as in our world. The implication of this principle is the assumption that freedom and responsibility have gone too far in our world and have caused too much physical and mental hurt. This principle also raised the important question highlighted above, about what amount of evil should there be in the world? The theodicists, of course, would be quick to say that the fact of death shows there is a limit to the amount of pain a person can suffer.

Evil has also been argued to be Gods punishment for sin. This argument is usually advanced to explain natural disasters. It is a view that is prevalent in the Old Testament of the Scripture and which the book of Job confronts. It is however questionable how God selects those who die in an earthquake or are afflicted in an epidemic. Victims never seem to fit into a particular profile for which they may have been selected for punishment. If that were the case, then Gods criteria for selecting humans to be punished require some serious explanations. Furthermore, for physical evils that are simultaneous with birth, what offence could the child have committed that he is born deformed and for a parents sin to be visited upon his child is injustice or at best, evil of another kind.

From the foregoing discussion, it has become clearer that there seem not to be an easy proof of incompatibility between the existence of evil and that of God. It is obvious that the God of the theodicists is one who thinks the higher goods to be worthwhile such that he is prepared to allow humankind endure evil. A good creator would no doubt put a limit to the amount of evil in the world and perhaps, put an end to the struggle with it after some years.

CONCLUSION

Besides the solutions this paper has considered in discussing the problem of evil, a number of other attempted solutions exist, but it is a considered opinion that none will stand up to criticism. The existing concept of God is put into serious question by the problem of evil. What a discerning philosopher cannot afford to overlook however is that if the problems arise from our conception of two attributes of God i.e. omnipotence and wholly good, in confrontation with the experience of evil, then those two concepts should be closely examined. Here, mention should be made that the problem of religious language, arising from the application of human terms to religious concepts or the realm of the divine opens a window for further exploration into the problem of evil. The question is, is the concept omnipotence applied and understood correctly? God, as a first principle is eternal and so is his actions, that is to say, God and his actions are not subject to time. Can omnipotence be meaningfully applied to him within this context?

I am of the opinion that there cannot be a satisfactory solution in terms of explanation, to the problem of evil without doing away with at least one of these propositions; God is omnipotent, God is wholly good and evil exists as suggested by J.L.Mackie. I believe and hold strongly to the argument that God being infinite in knowledge knows and is aware of all the possible worlds there can be. Being also infinitely perfect, God chose to create the world as it is now, knowing that it is the best amongst all conceivable alternatives. Evil, as opposed to that which we call good in the world is not a direct creation of God since God is goodness and in goodness there is no evil. (Given our understanding of evil as completely opposed to good, such that good tries to eliminate evil as much as it can possibly eliminate evil.). The presence of evil in the world is a result of the misuse of free will by humans. Free will in itself is not evil but its use can bring about effects that are morally evil. Here I share the Augustinian view that God created everything good in themselves, things are good they are only bad in their relations to one another. For instance, the snake as a snake is good in itself as the man as a man is good in himself, but in their relations to each other in which the snake bites the man, we talk of evil.

Concerning physical evil, that is what we call natural evil, is part of the plan of the world as created by an infinite and all knowing God. We call it evil because in our finite and limited nature we lack the knowledge of its ultimate purpose and thus fail to see that it is actually not evil but good in disguise. Here I propose that the definition of evil be revisited to coin a new meaning of evil that leaves out such natural occurrences that are referred to as evil within the present understanding of the term. Such definition would then confine the meaning of evil to moral evil in which case the term would be restricted to describing the relations of humans to one another within the context of their freedom to make choices and decisions that are helpful and beneficial or harmful and destructive to their fellow humans.

I do not subscribe to the opinion that God should have created a perfect world. Neither do I agree that he should have created a world that is in any way logically impossible. I therefore, rest my case with the submission that the many attempts to explain the problem of evil are unsatisfactory.

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--------------- Philosophers and Religious Truth. London: SMC Press Ltd.1964. J. O. Omoregbe, A Philosophical Look At Religion: Philosophy of Religion, (Lagos: Joja Educational Research and Publishers Ltd., 1993) p. 134

J. H. Hick, Philosophy of Religion 2nd Ed., (New Jersey: Prentice-Hall Inc., 1973) p. 36

J. L. Mackie, The Miracle of Theism: Arguments for and Against the Existence of God, (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1970) p. 7

J. O. Omoregbe, Op. Cit., p. 136

Cf. ibid. p. 139

Teilhard de Chardin, The Phenomenon of Man, (London: Fountana Books, 1965) p. 313

J. L. Mackie, Op. Cit., p. 8

Ibid.

Ibid., p. 10

H. J. McCloskey, God and Evil, (The Hague: Martinus Nijhoff, 1974) p. 33

Cf. R. Swinburne, The Problem of Evil in S. M. Cahn & D. Shatz (ed.) Contemporary Philosophy of Religion, (New York: Oxford University Press, 1982) pp. 3 -19

Ibid., p. 6

Ibid., p. 9