Evil in light of a perfect benevolent God

[Alan McDougall]

By Charles Hodge

How can the existence of evil, physical and moral, be reconciled with the benevolence and holiness of a God infinite in his wisdom and power? This is the question which has exercised the reason and tried the faith of men in all ages of the world. Such is the distance between God and man, such the feebleness of our powers, and such the limited range of our vision, it might seem reasonable to leave this question to be answered by God himself. If a child cannot rationally sit in judgment on the conduct of his parents, nor a peasant comprehend the affairs of an empire, we certainly are not competent to call God to account, or to ask of Him the reason of his ways.

We might rest satisfied with the assurance that the Judge of all the earth must do right. These considerations, however, have not availed to prevent speculation on this subject. The existence of evil is constantly brought forward by skeptics as an argument against religion; and it is constantly in the minds of believers as a difficulty and a doubt.

 

[cosmictraveler]

Evil is brought up because we were taught about it in religious teachings and other mythological ways through the centuries by our ancestors. Today we can see that there are good and bad in people and evil does not posess anyone except those who are religious and want us to be brainwashed into thinking along those evil ways instead of saying what a bad person that was or what bad things they dis we are told how evil that person was. Words are just that, words and those who use them to gain a foothold into everyones mind to use it to control what they think subtly.

 

[birch]

Evil is brought up because we were taught about it in religious teachings and other mythological ways through the centuries by our ancestors. Today we can see that there are good and bad in people and evil does not posess anyone except those who are religious and want us to be brainwashed into thinking along those evil ways instead of saying what a bad person that was or what bad things they dis we are told how evil that person was. Words are just that, words and those who use them to gain a foothold into everyones mind to use it to control what they think subtly.

i disagree. evil is symbolized by the devil in religion and people are usually not called evil if they are part of the religion. a bad person that is religious is just considered a good person that makes mistakes. that's why it attracts people with the idea that one can think of themselves great even if they are not because they use forgiveness. i think religion primarily attracts two types; the very gullible and the very corrupt. i think it mostly attracts those who don't want to take responsibility for their actions but that someone will save them, the devil can be blamed or they can just ask forgiveness. they will say atonement etc but all the above seems really the real reason why they are attracted to it.

 

[Yazata]

How can the existence of evil, physical and moral, be reconciled with the benevolence and holiness of a God infinite in his wisdom and power?

There are lots of theological theories intended to somehow make evil consistent with god's goodness.

Some people have argued that evil, misfortune and unwarranted suffering are tests of mankind's faith. (There are hints of that in the OT.) Others (like Leibniz I believe) have argued that this is the best of all possible worlds and that a proper mix of good and evil is necessay so that desirable virtues like courage can flourish. Still others (like the ancient Persians) have embraced a dualistic scheme where an all-good god is locked in heavenly combat with an all-bad god. (The Christians' devil is an echo of that.) And yet others have attributed evil to mankind's own doing (like the story of the "fall") or to the ontological circumstances of spirit's incarnation in the corrupting world of matter.

Such is the distance between God and man, such the feebleness of our powers, and such the limited range of our vision, it might seem reasonable to leave this question to be answered by God himself. If a child cannot rationally sit in judgment on the conduct of his parents, nor a peasant comprehend the affairs of an empire, we certainly are not competent to call God to account, or to ask of Him the reason of his ways.

If we push that line of argument a little harder, we seem to arrive at agnosticism. If god is supposed to be so transcendent that our human concepts of 'good' and 'evil' simply don't apply, then we can question whether any human concept applies.

There have been very devout Christians (and Muslim Sufis and Hindu Vedantists aand Chinese Taoists) who have made very similar agnostic arguments for entirely religous (as opposed to skeptical) reasons, namely the felt need to emphasize divine transcendence.