Problem of evil
The problem of evil is the philosophical question of how to reconcile the existence of evil and suffering with an omnipotent, omnibenevolent, and omniscient God. The best known presentation of the problem is attributed to the Greek philosopher Epicurus. It was popularized by David Hume.
The problem of evil is generally formulated in two forms: the logical problem of evil and the evidential problem of evil. The logical form of the argument tries to show a logical impossibility in the coexistence of a god and evil, while the evidential form tries to show that given the evil in the world, it is improbable that there is an omnipotent, omniscient, and a wholly good god.
Quotes
[edit]- Is God willing to prevent evil, but not able?
Then He is not omnipotent.
Is He able, but not willing?
Then He is malevolent.
Is He both able and willing?
Then whence cometh evil?
Is He neither able nor willing?
Then why call Him God?- The Epicurean paradox, traditionally attributed to Epicurus
- Intelligence...has quietly stripped from our moral valuations that half-supernatural, half-aesthetic halo which is but the shrunken religious involucrum wherein they came into the world. The "problem of evil" has already become the problem not of its its toleration by God, but of its diminution by Man.
- Vernon Lee, Proteus, or the Future of Intelligence, (1925). Quoted in Brian Stableford, "Haunted by the Pagan Past: Vernon Lee", in Jaunting on the Scoriac Tempests and Other Essays on Fantastic Literature, Wildside Press, 2009.
- Matter, being fecund in all attributes, is able also to engender evil. I put aside, therefore, O Asclepios and Ammon, the question asked by many: "Could not God hinder evil in the nature of things?" There is absolutely nothing to say to them; but for you I will pursue the discourse begun, and I will give the explanation. They affirm that God ought to have preserved the world from evil; now, evil is in the world as an integral part of it. The sovereign God indeed provided against it inasmuch as was reasonable and possible, when He bestowed upon humanity sentiment, knowledge, and intelligence. By these faculties solely, which place us above other animals, we may escape the snares of evil and vice.
- Hermes Trismegistus: A Treatise on Initiations; or, Asclepios, part VII. In the Hermetica, as translated by Anna Kingsford. Books on Demand (2018). ISBN 3-7481-2937-8.
- Some would ask, how could a perfect God create a universe filled with so much that is evil. They have missed a greater conundrum: why would a perfect God create a universe at all?
- Sister Miriam Godwinson, Sid Meier's Alpha Centauri
- The so-called “problem of evil” would presumably be the strongest (and maybe the only) evidence against theism. It does indeed have some strength; it makes sense to think that the probability of theism, given the existence of all the suffering and evil our world contains, is fairly low. But of course there are also arguments for theism. Indeed, there are at least a couple of dozen good theistic arguments. So the atheist would have to try to synthesize and balance the probabilities. This isn’t at all easy to do, but it’s pretty obvious that the result wouldn’t anywhere nearly support straight-out atheism as opposed to agnosticism.
- [[[Alvin Plantinga]], as quoted in Gary Gatting, [https://christianleaders.org/mod/page/view.php?id=34750 Reading: An Interview With Alvin Plantinga
], February 9, 2014.
