WHY IS THERE EVIL?
A Critical Analysis on the Argument from Evil
Aristos Kemiji
Upon philosophically considering the notion of a divine being, the problem of evil and the argument it entails have been traditionally raised by atheists and skeptical thinkers who are critical of conventional theistic doctrines. Epicurus is recognized as the initial philosopher to conceptualize this problem that raises a paradox proposing an omnipotent, omniscient, and wholly good God in conjunction with the existence of evil. This paper will strictly define God as the divine being represented in the scripture of the Judeo-Christian tradition that is stated to have the three properties mentioned above. With this in mind, I have previously considered the reasoning behind the argument from evil in my career as a philosophy major an am inclined to support the notion that the presence of evil in the world and a Judeo-Christian God are incompatible. Thus this paper will critically analyze various philosophical positions, both in defense and against God’s existence, on the problem of evil in order to arrive at a greater comprehensive understanding of the argument regarding these seemingly irreconcilable ideas.
As a point of reference for the rest of this paper, the modern format of the argument from evil is presented below:
Premise 1: God is omnipotent and omniscient.
Premise 2: God is perfectly good.
Premise 3: If God exists, then there would be no evil in the world. Premise 4: There is evil in the world.
∴ God does not exist.
For the sake of properly examining the philosophical positions on this issue, the premises and conclusion of the argument from evil will be taken into account upon clarifying and dissecting scholarly commentaries. Consequently, specific aspects of the argument will be highlighted as philosophers emphasize distinct points in the argument to advance their own assertions on the topic.
Reflecting on the notion of unnecessary evil in the world, Fyodor Dostoevsky provides a critical perspective on divine harmony and the sacrifice it entails in his novel, The Brother Karamazov. While discussing the existence of God with his brother Alyosha, Ivan Karamazov boldly claims that he cannot accept the world as created by this divine entity because the cost of unnecessary suffering does not compensate for the salvation of Judgment Day “in the world’s finale, at the moment of eternal harmony, something so precious will come to pass...to justify all that has happened with men...I won’t accept it”1. Ivan substantiates his refusal to accept this harmony by recognizing the presence of unnecessary suffering as exemplified in children; children are inherently innocent and therefore not guilty of committing any evil yet they are still subject to divine retribution in the same manner as sinners are. Thus Ivan reinforces his point on the exacting expense of eternal harmony by utilizing the example of innocent children: “It’s beyond all comprehension why they should suffer, and why they should pay for the harmony”2. With this in mind, Ivan refuses to accept divine harmony on the basis that it requires the suffering of children who are not responsible for the evils of the world and considers the lack of reparation for children who suffer at the cost of collective harmony “those tears are unatoned for. They must be atoned for, or there can be no harmony”3. Noting this failure to compensate for children’s suffering in the fabrication of divine harmony, Ivan continues to illustrate his refusal by claiming that no human being would consent to forming world peace that required unavenged suffering of a certain group, and eventually Alyosha sides with his brother in his failure to consent to such an exacting harmony.
Taking into account the argument from evil in comparison to this passage of The Brother Karamazov, Dostoevsky clearly supports the truth of Premise 4, which takes the form of unnecessary suffering in Ivan’s argument. For the sake of advancing his claim, Ivan considers the co-existence of God and evil and concludes neither he, nor any other human, would accept the cost of unnecessary evil with respect to achieving divine peace. Thus Ivan successfully refutes the ultimate harmony argument that theists utilize against the argument from evil to suggest that God permits evil for the sake of a greater good; for all intents and purposes the proponents of this defense eliminate Premise 3 from the argument by signifying that God’s existence and evil are compatible. Through highlighting the notion of evil in the form of unnecessary suffering that is not atoned for in this divine harmony, Ivan’s argument in The Brothers Karamazov provides an effective rebuttal against this theistic defense that fails to reconcile the existence of evil and a Judeo-Christian God.
In his fascinating assessment of God’s character through comparison to a morally virtuous human along with well-founded objections to several theistic claims, B.C. Johnson’s essay Why Doesn’t God Intervene to Prevent Evil? provides an insightful perspective on God’s goodness in relation to the problem of evil. In calling for this moral comparison, he begins by considering the claim that given humanity’s inherent free will, there are consequences, synonymous with moral evils, caused by the choices of mankind. With that in mind, Johnson highlights the example of an innocent bystander who witnesses an arsonist create a deadly fire yet does nothing to stop it from spreading; Johnson suggests that this bystander would not be considered morally good because humanity as a whole purports that outside aid to prevent evils is morally good. Following this line of reasoning, since God is omnipotent and perfectly good he would necessarily provide outside aid to stop this evil “If aid ought to have been provided, then God should have provided it”4 yes this is not the case. And while the theist’s usual response to God’s passivity toward human evils entails that divine interference would eliminate necessary moral urgency, Johnson states how this point would consequently label health and safety institutions, whose purposes are to eliminate moral urgency, as morally deplorable; if this were the case God would thereby interact to resolve this depletion of moral urgency. In addition, Johnson recognizes the absurdity of a God who enforces arbitrary moral urgency and would promote evil to uphold this “if there were no such disasters occurring, God would have to see to it that they occur”5, thus he refutes that the maximization of moral urgency is not morally good. Johnson continues by contesting the theistic claim that suffering provides mankind the possibility of forming moral virtues; he substantiates his argument by emphasizing that humanity promotes the diminishing of suffering even at the cost of the progress of virtues, which in effect encapsulates the ultimate harmony argument: “we admit that the development of virtue is no excuse for permitting disasters”6. Another theistic solution purports that evil is a necessary feature of the natural order that serves to establish good as its opposite; Johnson argues against this idea by referencing the notion of unnecessary suffering evident in the death of innocent lives whereby divine intervention should be called upon in regards to these cases of excessive evil. Other theists uphold the tenet that God possesses a higher level of morality that allows for evil and therefore cannot be adequately judged by human moral standards, which Johnson disproves on the basis that this divine morality does not justify its own goodness: “‘higher morality,’ being the opposite of ours cannot offer any grounds for deciding that he is somehow good”7. Thus Johnson states that no one can justifiably believe in the goodness of God and every attempt to remedy the problem of evil by notion God’s goodness can be inversely applied to support the idea of an evil God: “Every excuse we could provide to make the world consistent with a good God can be paralleled to make the world consistent with an evil God”8, leading him to conclude with high probability that God is not perfectly good and so the problem of evils conquers the Judeo-Christian God.
In pointing out the flaws of these theistic argument that attempt to reconcile a perfectly good God with the problem of evil, B.C. Johnson’s essay provides highly probable yet not conclusive reasoning that God does not possess this property. With that in mind, Johnson utilizes the moral comparison of God to a human to reinforce his objections to God’s perfect goodness whereby a human would be morally condemned in situations where the theist justifies God’s absence in the presence of evil. Taking into consideration his refutation of the ultimate harmony argument along with Ivan’s reasoning in Dostoevsky’s The Brothers Karamazov, both these philosophical perspectives efficiently disprove this theist tenet and therefore disqualify the ultimate harmony argument from solving the problem of evil. While he persuasively dispels many of the common theistic claims on the problem of evil, upon further review Johnson’s essay does not present a complete disproval of the free-will defense in which theists apply another premise in the argument from evil to stress the logical impossibility of God enabling organisms with freedom without the ability to commit evil acts. Although Johnson is critical of God’s absence of involvement when free beings commit evil actions, he does not consider the notion that God’s involvement entails a logical contradiction because the consequences of choices, whether they are deemed morally good or evil, are an essential part of exercising free will and divine intervention would therefore eliminate the notion of free will among organisms. Reflecting upon the essay in its entirety, Johnson disproves various theistic claims to reconcile the problem of evil that point to the unlikelihood of God’s goodness, yet he does not successfully refute the free- will defense and fails to provide conclusive reasoning on the incompatibility of a Judeo- Christian God and the existence of evil.
Diverging from the points presented by Dostoevsky and Johnson, John Hick provides a theodicy that attempts to justify the existence of evil with God in a manner where he does not deemphasize the reality of evil but rather defends God in the midst of moral and natural evils. In There is a Reason Why God Allows Evil, Hick dismisses theistic claims that deny the existence of evil as well as those which limit God to a finite entity by referencing the unambiguous presence of evil in Judeo-Christian scripture that also clearly states God’s properties; in addition, he recalls Augustinian propositions to recognize evil as an inherent distortion of good and thus not willed by a perfectly good God. With this in mind, Hick confronts the problem of evil by initially approaching moral evil, which stems from the human capacity to freely choose between right or wrong actions and therefore humanity is morally responsible for the consequences of those actions. And while atheists suggest that God should not allow evil to come about, Hick considers the logical impossibility of God allowing for free will and preventing evil consequences from being realized: “The idea of a person who can be infallibly guaranteed always to act rightly is self-contradictory”9. Hick continues by taking into account suffering caused by non-moral evils as manifested in natural disasters, which atheists reference in order to stress that an omnipotent and perfectly good God has the capacity and is essentially forced to form a world where such suffering could not take place. Hick refutes this in arguing that a manipulation of the natural realm and its lwas would strip the would of basic needs or dangers whereby special providences would illegitimate scientific knowledge of the world because it would be suspect to constant divine intervention: “There could be no sciences, for there would be no enduring world to investigate”10. Furthermore, Hick proposes that a world without non-moral evils would prevent moral progress because there would be no possibility for pain or danger, which are required for our personal moral growth in order to differentiate right from wrong, because in this utopian scenario “such a world... would be very ill adapted for the development of the moral qualities of human personality”11. Thus Hick’s theodicy encompasses a justification for both moral and non-moral evils on the basis of human free will and how the structure of the natural realm is conducive to human moral growth.
In assessing the points established in Hick’s theodicy, he provides well-founded reasoning to add a premise, which sites the logical impossibility of God bestowing free will to humans and guaranteeing that they do not commit evil actions, to the argument from evil that augments the free will defense. In doing so, the argument from evil concedes the compatibility of a Judeo-Christian God and the existence of moral evils as consequences of actions committed by free humans. As this type of evil exists by creation of human free will, Hick argues that the existence of non-moral evils is fundamental to the structure of the natural world and if God were to interfere by distorting the world into a utopian environment, there would be no capacity for knowledge of evil and human moral development. Thus Hick’s theodicy is argumentatively substantial in adding a premise to the argument from evil, supplementing the free will defense that has not been conclusively refuted by atheists.
In conjunction with Hick’s theodicy, Richard Swinburne explores the nuances of the problem of evil and the free will defense in his work The Existence of God where he supports this defense with an argument for the need of knowledge. Similar to the approach Hick applied. Swinburne recognizes the capacity for free creatures to commit evil acts and stats the aforementioned premise of the free will defense: “It would be logically impossible for God to give certain benefits (e.g. of choice of destiny and responsibility) without the inevitability or at any rate enormous probability of various accompanying evils”12. This in effect attributes all moral evils to human beings who choose to cause evil, and so he continues by considering the excessiveness of natural evils, noting that God must have a reason to explain these evils or their existence counts against his. Swinburne admits that the ultimate harmony argument as an atonement of the sins on earth does not provide an effective explanation for the extent of natural evils and so he cites the logical necessity of evil via the argument from the need of knowledge: “if agents are to have the knowledge of how to bring about evil or prevent its occurrence, knowledge which they must have if they are to have a genuine choice between bringing about evil and bringing about good”13. Thus humans utilize inductive inference to consider how a state of affairs will be affected by a moral action that will produce a future state. From this point Swinburne considers how the first sinner would know the consequences to his or her action if there were no prior moral evils he could know of, leading him to the necessitation of natural evils whereby men originally obtained knowledge of evil: “There must be naturally occurring evils (i.e. evils not deliberately caused by men) if men are to know how to cause evils themselves or are to prevent evil occurring”14. Consequently, Swinburne argues that mere knowledge, in the form of inductive inference, allows for man to choose between moral actions of good and evil through an understanding of consequences within the natural world. He also considers the idea of God distributing verbal knowledge of consequences, arguing against it by stating that mankind would conform to God’s will if they possessed divine foreknowledge and therefore would strip humanity of an authentic choice of destiny entail in free will. Ultimately, Swinburne reasons that humanity can only acquire knowledge through inductive inference whilst keeping their free will intact: “If God is to give man knowledge while at the same time allowing him a genuine choice of destiny, it must be normal inductive knowledge”15.
Taking into account the logical approach Swinburne applies to his theodicy, his argument along with Hick’s provide sufficient reasoning to add another premise to the argument from evil that in effect validates the free will defense. This defense in itself provides a legitimate explanation of moral evils that are realized without divine intervention and Swinburne’s argument from the need of knowledge takes into account the compatibility of natural evil and a Judeo-Christian God. Interestingly enough, Swinburne disregards the ultimate harmony argument as explanatorily insufficient and thereby he is in consensus with Dostoevsky and Johnson who also refute this theistic assertion.
In conclusion, while many theistic claims in response to the problem of evil are rationally refutable as evidently mapped out by Dostoevsky and Johnson, the theodicies of Hick and Swinburne point out the addition of a logically true premise to the argument from evil that fundamentally substantiates the free will defense, thereby providing an explanation of moral evils under a Judeo-Christian God. Additionally, Swinburne’s argument from the need of knowledge recognizes excessive suffering as highlighted by Dostoevsky and Johnson and provides sufficient reasoning for the compatibility of natural evils and God. Thus while atheistic claims to the argument from evil provide high probability that God is in all likelihood not perfectly good, the free will defense and the argument from the need of knowledge stand out as successful theodicies that maintain the compatibility of God and the existence of evil; although I initially supported the atheist side prior to this paper, I ultimately concede that these defenses prevent the formation of a logically conclusive consensus between theists and atheists on the problem of evil.
1 Dostoevsky, Fyodor. "The Brothers Karamazov" Philosophy: The Quest for Truth. 8th ed. New York: Oxford University Press, 2013. 117.
2 Dostoevsky, Fyodor. “The Brothers Karamazov” 119.
3 Dostoevsky, Fyodor. “The Brothers Karamazov” 119.
4 Johnson, B.C. “Why Doesn’t God Intervene to Prevent Evil” Philosophy: The Quest for Truth. 8th ed. New York: Oxford University Press, 2013. 122.
5 Johnson, B.C. “Why Doesn’t God Intervene to Prevent Evil” 122.
6 Johnson, B.C. “Why Doesn’t God Intervene to Prevent Evil” 123.
7 Johnson, B.C. “Why Doesn’t God Intervene to Prevent Evil” 123.
8 Johnson, B.C. “Why Doesn’t God Intervene to Prevent Evil” 124.
9 Hick, John. "There is a Reason why God Allows Evil." Philosophy: The Quest for Truth. 8th ed. New York: Oxford University Press, 2013. 127.
10 Hick, John. “There is a Reason why God Allows Evil.” 129.
11 Hick, John. “There is a Reason why God Allows Evil.” 130.
12 Swinburne, Richard. The Existence of God. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1991. 200.
13 Swinburne, Richard. The Existence of God. 202.
14 Swinburne, Richard. The Existence of God. 207.
15 Swinburne, Richard. The Existence of God. 212.
As a point of reference for the rest of this paper, the modern format of the argument from evil is presented below:
Premise 1: God is omnipotent and omniscient.
Premise 2: God is perfectly good.
Premise 3: If God exists, then there would be no evil in the world. Premise 4: There is evil in the world.
∴ God does not exist.
For the sake of properly examining the philosophical positions on this issue, the premises and conclusion of the argument from evil will be taken into account upon clarifying and dissecting scholarly commentaries. Consequently, specific aspects of the argument will be highlighted as philosophers emphasize distinct points in the argument to advance their own assertions on the topic.
Reflecting on the notion of unnecessary evil in the world, Fyodor Dostoevsky provides a critical perspective on divine harmony and the sacrifice it entails in his novel, The Brother Karamazov. While discussing the existence of God with his brother Alyosha, Ivan Karamazov boldly claims that he cannot accept the world as created by this divine entity because the cost of unnecessary suffering does not compensate for the salvation of Judgment Day “in the world’s finale, at the moment of eternal harmony, something so precious will come to pass...to justify all that has happened with men...I won’t accept it”1. Ivan substantiates his refusal to accept this harmony by recognizing the presence of unnecessary suffering as exemplified in children; children are inherently innocent and therefore not guilty of committing any evil yet they are still subject to divine retribution in the same manner as sinners are. Thus Ivan reinforces his point on the exacting expense of eternal harmony by utilizing the example of innocent children: “It’s beyond all comprehension why they should suffer, and why they should pay for the harmony”2. With this in mind, Ivan refuses to accept divine harmony on the basis that it requires the suffering of children who are not responsible for the evils of the world and considers the lack of reparation for children who suffer at the cost of collective harmony “those tears are unatoned for. They must be atoned for, or there can be no harmony”3. Noting this failure to compensate for children’s suffering in the fabrication of divine harmony, Ivan continues to illustrate his refusal by claiming that no human being would consent to forming world peace that required unavenged suffering of a certain group, and eventually Alyosha sides with his brother in his failure to consent to such an exacting harmony.
Taking into account the argument from evil in comparison to this passage of The Brother Karamazov, Dostoevsky clearly supports the truth of Premise 4, which takes the form of unnecessary suffering in Ivan’s argument. For the sake of advancing his claim, Ivan considers the co-existence of God and evil and concludes neither he, nor any other human, would accept the cost of unnecessary evil with respect to achieving divine peace. Thus Ivan successfully refutes the ultimate harmony argument that theists utilize against the argument from evil to suggest that God permits evil for the sake of a greater good; for all intents and purposes the proponents of this defense eliminate Premise 3 from the argument by signifying that God’s existence and evil are compatible. Through highlighting the notion of evil in the form of unnecessary suffering that is not atoned for in this divine harmony, Ivan’s argument in The Brothers Karamazov provides an effective rebuttal against this theistic defense that fails to reconcile the existence of evil and a Judeo-Christian God.
In his fascinating assessment of God’s character through comparison to a morally virtuous human along with well-founded objections to several theistic claims, B.C. Johnson’s essay Why Doesn’t God Intervene to Prevent Evil? provides an insightful perspective on God’s goodness in relation to the problem of evil. In calling for this moral comparison, he begins by considering the claim that given humanity’s inherent free will, there are consequences, synonymous with moral evils, caused by the choices of mankind. With that in mind, Johnson highlights the example of an innocent bystander who witnesses an arsonist create a deadly fire yet does nothing to stop it from spreading; Johnson suggests that this bystander would not be considered morally good because humanity as a whole purports that outside aid to prevent evils is morally good. Following this line of reasoning, since God is omnipotent and perfectly good he would necessarily provide outside aid to stop this evil “If aid ought to have been provided, then God should have provided it”4 yes this is not the case. And while the theist’s usual response to God’s passivity toward human evils entails that divine interference would eliminate necessary moral urgency, Johnson states how this point would consequently label health and safety institutions, whose purposes are to eliminate moral urgency, as morally deplorable; if this were the case God would thereby interact to resolve this depletion of moral urgency. In addition, Johnson recognizes the absurdity of a God who enforces arbitrary moral urgency and would promote evil to uphold this “if there were no such disasters occurring, God would have to see to it that they occur”5, thus he refutes that the maximization of moral urgency is not morally good. Johnson continues by contesting the theistic claim that suffering provides mankind the possibility of forming moral virtues; he substantiates his argument by emphasizing that humanity promotes the diminishing of suffering even at the cost of the progress of virtues, which in effect encapsulates the ultimate harmony argument: “we admit that the development of virtue is no excuse for permitting disasters”6. Another theistic solution purports that evil is a necessary feature of the natural order that serves to establish good as its opposite; Johnson argues against this idea by referencing the notion of unnecessary suffering evident in the death of innocent lives whereby divine intervention should be called upon in regards to these cases of excessive evil. Other theists uphold the tenet that God possesses a higher level of morality that allows for evil and therefore cannot be adequately judged by human moral standards, which Johnson disproves on the basis that this divine morality does not justify its own goodness: “‘higher morality,’ being the opposite of ours cannot offer any grounds for deciding that he is somehow good”7. Thus Johnson states that no one can justifiably believe in the goodness of God and every attempt to remedy the problem of evil by notion God’s goodness can be inversely applied to support the idea of an evil God: “Every excuse we could provide to make the world consistent with a good God can be paralleled to make the world consistent with an evil God”8, leading him to conclude with high probability that God is not perfectly good and so the problem of evils conquers the Judeo-Christian God.
In pointing out the flaws of these theistic argument that attempt to reconcile a perfectly good God with the problem of evil, B.C. Johnson’s essay provides highly probable yet not conclusive reasoning that God does not possess this property. With that in mind, Johnson utilizes the moral comparison of God to a human to reinforce his objections to God’s perfect goodness whereby a human would be morally condemned in situations where the theist justifies God’s absence in the presence of evil. Taking into consideration his refutation of the ultimate harmony argument along with Ivan’s reasoning in Dostoevsky’s The Brothers Karamazov, both these philosophical perspectives efficiently disprove this theist tenet and therefore disqualify the ultimate harmony argument from solving the problem of evil. While he persuasively dispels many of the common theistic claims on the problem of evil, upon further review Johnson’s essay does not present a complete disproval of the free-will defense in which theists apply another premise in the argument from evil to stress the logical impossibility of God enabling organisms with freedom without the ability to commit evil acts. Although Johnson is critical of God’s absence of involvement when free beings commit evil actions, he does not consider the notion that God’s involvement entails a logical contradiction because the consequences of choices, whether they are deemed morally good or evil, are an essential part of exercising free will and divine intervention would therefore eliminate the notion of free will among organisms. Reflecting upon the essay in its entirety, Johnson disproves various theistic claims to reconcile the problem of evil that point to the unlikelihood of God’s goodness, yet he does not successfully refute the free- will defense and fails to provide conclusive reasoning on the incompatibility of a Judeo- Christian God and the existence of evil.
Diverging from the points presented by Dostoevsky and Johnson, John Hick provides a theodicy that attempts to justify the existence of evil with God in a manner where he does not deemphasize the reality of evil but rather defends God in the midst of moral and natural evils. In There is a Reason Why God Allows Evil, Hick dismisses theistic claims that deny the existence of evil as well as those which limit God to a finite entity by referencing the unambiguous presence of evil in Judeo-Christian scripture that also clearly states God’s properties; in addition, he recalls Augustinian propositions to recognize evil as an inherent distortion of good and thus not willed by a perfectly good God. With this in mind, Hick confronts the problem of evil by initially approaching moral evil, which stems from the human capacity to freely choose between right or wrong actions and therefore humanity is morally responsible for the consequences of those actions. And while atheists suggest that God should not allow evil to come about, Hick considers the logical impossibility of God allowing for free will and preventing evil consequences from being realized: “The idea of a person who can be infallibly guaranteed always to act rightly is self-contradictory”9. Hick continues by taking into account suffering caused by non-moral evils as manifested in natural disasters, which atheists reference in order to stress that an omnipotent and perfectly good God has the capacity and is essentially forced to form a world where such suffering could not take place. Hick refutes this in arguing that a manipulation of the natural realm and its lwas would strip the would of basic needs or dangers whereby special providences would illegitimate scientific knowledge of the world because it would be suspect to constant divine intervention: “There could be no sciences, for there would be no enduring world to investigate”10. Furthermore, Hick proposes that a world without non-moral evils would prevent moral progress because there would be no possibility for pain or danger, which are required for our personal moral growth in order to differentiate right from wrong, because in this utopian scenario “such a world... would be very ill adapted for the development of the moral qualities of human personality”11. Thus Hick’s theodicy encompasses a justification for both moral and non-moral evils on the basis of human free will and how the structure of the natural realm is conducive to human moral growth.
In assessing the points established in Hick’s theodicy, he provides well-founded reasoning to add a premise, which sites the logical impossibility of God bestowing free will to humans and guaranteeing that they do not commit evil actions, to the argument from evil that augments the free will defense. In doing so, the argument from evil concedes the compatibility of a Judeo-Christian God and the existence of moral evils as consequences of actions committed by free humans. As this type of evil exists by creation of human free will, Hick argues that the existence of non-moral evils is fundamental to the structure of the natural world and if God were to interfere by distorting the world into a utopian environment, there would be no capacity for knowledge of evil and human moral development. Thus Hick’s theodicy is argumentatively substantial in adding a premise to the argument from evil, supplementing the free will defense that has not been conclusively refuted by atheists.
In conjunction with Hick’s theodicy, Richard Swinburne explores the nuances of the problem of evil and the free will defense in his work The Existence of God where he supports this defense with an argument for the need of knowledge. Similar to the approach Hick applied. Swinburne recognizes the capacity for free creatures to commit evil acts and stats the aforementioned premise of the free will defense: “It would be logically impossible for God to give certain benefits (e.g. of choice of destiny and responsibility) without the inevitability or at any rate enormous probability of various accompanying evils”12. This in effect attributes all moral evils to human beings who choose to cause evil, and so he continues by considering the excessiveness of natural evils, noting that God must have a reason to explain these evils or their existence counts against his. Swinburne admits that the ultimate harmony argument as an atonement of the sins on earth does not provide an effective explanation for the extent of natural evils and so he cites the logical necessity of evil via the argument from the need of knowledge: “if agents are to have the knowledge of how to bring about evil or prevent its occurrence, knowledge which they must have if they are to have a genuine choice between bringing about evil and bringing about good”13. Thus humans utilize inductive inference to consider how a state of affairs will be affected by a moral action that will produce a future state. From this point Swinburne considers how the first sinner would know the consequences to his or her action if there were no prior moral evils he could know of, leading him to the necessitation of natural evils whereby men originally obtained knowledge of evil: “There must be naturally occurring evils (i.e. evils not deliberately caused by men) if men are to know how to cause evils themselves or are to prevent evil occurring”14. Consequently, Swinburne argues that mere knowledge, in the form of inductive inference, allows for man to choose between moral actions of good and evil through an understanding of consequences within the natural world. He also considers the idea of God distributing verbal knowledge of consequences, arguing against it by stating that mankind would conform to God’s will if they possessed divine foreknowledge and therefore would strip humanity of an authentic choice of destiny entail in free will. Ultimately, Swinburne reasons that humanity can only acquire knowledge through inductive inference whilst keeping their free will intact: “If God is to give man knowledge while at the same time allowing him a genuine choice of destiny, it must be normal inductive knowledge”15.
Taking into account the logical approach Swinburne applies to his theodicy, his argument along with Hick’s provide sufficient reasoning to add another premise to the argument from evil that in effect validates the free will defense. This defense in itself provides a legitimate explanation of moral evils that are realized without divine intervention and Swinburne’s argument from the need of knowledge takes into account the compatibility of natural evil and a Judeo-Christian God. Interestingly enough, Swinburne disregards the ultimate harmony argument as explanatorily insufficient and thereby he is in consensus with Dostoevsky and Johnson who also refute this theistic assertion.
In conclusion, while many theistic claims in response to the problem of evil are rationally refutable as evidently mapped out by Dostoevsky and Johnson, the theodicies of Hick and Swinburne point out the addition of a logically true premise to the argument from evil that fundamentally substantiates the free will defense, thereby providing an explanation of moral evils under a Judeo-Christian God. Additionally, Swinburne’s argument from the need of knowledge recognizes excessive suffering as highlighted by Dostoevsky and Johnson and provides sufficient reasoning for the compatibility of natural evils and God. Thus while atheistic claims to the argument from evil provide high probability that God is in all likelihood not perfectly good, the free will defense and the argument from the need of knowledge stand out as successful theodicies that maintain the compatibility of God and the existence of evil; although I initially supported the atheist side prior to this paper, I ultimately concede that these defenses prevent the formation of a logically conclusive consensus between theists and atheists on the problem of evil.
1 Dostoevsky, Fyodor. "The Brothers Karamazov" Philosophy: The Quest for Truth. 8th ed. New York: Oxford University Press, 2013. 117.
2 Dostoevsky, Fyodor. “The Brothers Karamazov” 119.
3 Dostoevsky, Fyodor. “The Brothers Karamazov” 119.
4 Johnson, B.C. “Why Doesn’t God Intervene to Prevent Evil” Philosophy: The Quest for Truth. 8th ed. New York: Oxford University Press, 2013. 122.
5 Johnson, B.C. “Why Doesn’t God Intervene to Prevent Evil” 122.
6 Johnson, B.C. “Why Doesn’t God Intervene to Prevent Evil” 123.
7 Johnson, B.C. “Why Doesn’t God Intervene to Prevent Evil” 123.
8 Johnson, B.C. “Why Doesn’t God Intervene to Prevent Evil” 124.
9 Hick, John. "There is a Reason why God Allows Evil." Philosophy: The Quest for Truth. 8th ed. New York: Oxford University Press, 2013. 127.
10 Hick, John. “There is a Reason why God Allows Evil.” 129.
11 Hick, John. “There is a Reason why God Allows Evil.” 130.
12 Swinburne, Richard. The Existence of God. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1991. 200.
13 Swinburne, Richard. The Existence of God. 202.
14 Swinburne, Richard. The Existence of God. 207.
15 Swinburne, Richard. The Existence of God. 212.