Problem of Evil [2]: The Justice Defense

[Neithan]

I am a real believer that a theodicy according to natural law as I sketched in your original topic is sufficient to respond to the problem.

Understood; it does look like a comprehensive “greater good” theodicy based on goodness=being. To move things along I’ll try combining the next two defenses in this essay in a topic (I’ll wait a couple of days), since it does add a different angle, then summarize all of his takes on the greater good defenses last.

Not moral evil but all the evils that befall us through the course of our lives that make us ask “why?”

It’s true. And even if we can intellectually structure a theodicy from being, that doesn’t fully account for the phenomenological (subjective) experience of suffering. Pope St. John Paul II explored that area but always emphasized that we shouldn’t detach phenomenology from (objective) being; they are both needed to account for human existence. There’s a good essay on that here: Library : Was John Paul II a Thomist or a Phenomenologist? | Catholic Culture

 

[Magnanimity]

It’s true. And even if we can intellectually structure a theodicy from being, that doesn’t fully account for the phenomenological (subjective) experience of suffering. Pope St. John Paul II explored that area but always emphasized that we shouldn’t detach phenomenology from (objective) being

I’m interested! I’ve never heard a good response to Mohanty, but I’m open to the possibility.

 

[Neithan]

I’m not sure exactly how Mohanty formulated it; but it doesn’t seem like he did anything new if he’s appealing to existential experience of suffering. Certainly the justice defence would be inadequate (in my opinion, and yours); but it doesn’t exhaust the options. Consider Nietzsche and the response by Josef Pieper. Here’s an interesting paper on that: The Phenomenological Problem of Evil: Nietzsche’s Axiom and Pieper’s Solution

 

[Magnanimity]

I’m not sure exactly how Mohanty formulated it; but it doesn’t seem like he did anything new if he’s appealing to existential experience of suffering. Certainly the justice defence would be inadequate

Mohanty rejected any law-like statement by the theist that could satisfactorily answer the questioner of extreme suffering when she asks “why me?” I don’t think he believed he was being original or unique, but the problem persists nonetheless.

Why indeed does 40 y.o. Paul acquire a cancer that will kill him in less than a year? If any of us are “Paul’s” we would find ourselves asking the same question. And what does the theist have to offer that might possibly be considered satisfactory?

I don’t say that such an answer is impossible. (There’s plenty I don’t know.) I’m just saying that I’ve yet to hear a good answer.

 

[Neithan]

Mohanty rejected any law-like statement by the theist that could satisfactorily answer the questioner of extreme suffering when she asks “why me?”

Right, it’s a subjective question and requires a subjective answer. You might be interested in Eleanore Stump’s Wandering in Darkness which develops JP2’s phenomenological theodicy of redemptive suffering.

 

[Magnanimity]

You might be interested in Eleanore Stump’s Wandering in Darkness which develops JP2’s phenomenological theodicy of redemptive suffering.

Thanks for that! I’m a big fan of both Stump and JP2. I’ll check it out.

 

[Vico]

… Do we suffer because we deserve it? Is our suffering a just punishment? …

Sometimes just, sometimes not. Sometimes it is not directly due to sin. Suffering can be vicariously offered for others.

John 9

9 And Jesus passing by, saw a man, who was blind from his birth:
2 And his disciples asked him: Rabbi, who hath sinned, this man, or his parents, that he should be born blind?
3 Jesus answered: Neither hath this man sinned, nor his parents; but that the works of God should be made manifest in him.

 

[Neithan]

I confess I, um, haven’t read it yet… It’s been on my list. I was waiting for an audiobook.

 

[Magnanimity]

Ha! It’s cool. We’re all just stumbling about, trying to make the best of all this,
you know? As long as we remain of “good will,” it’ll be fine. Heck, it may even be fine even if we don’t! I tend to agree with Aquinas that there is absolutely nothing outside of the providence, governance and care of God.
Good for you for trying to honestly square with these thorny questions!

 

[Neithan]

Over the years I’ve found there’s nothing better for my faith than atheism, lol. It really sharpens and clarifies it. [That’s a facetious overstatement, but I do really value atheist critiques if they’re not complete nonsense or malicious.]

So I checked the index for Stump’s book, she might be developing her own version of it because she’s a Thomist and I didn’t see JP2 there. But see Salvifici Doloris for some official teaching from the chair.

 

[Magnanimity]

Over the years I’ve found there’s nothing better for my faith than atheism, lol. It really sharpens and clarifies it. [That’s a facetious overstatement, but I do really value atheist critiques if they’re not complete nonsense or malicious.]

I do agree. There is truly nothing to fear. I can listen to and read Harris and Oppy all day long. But Dawkins is harder. He’s such a blowhard. So, I’m with you, but it depends on the atheist. Many of them are arguing against a deistic god, which is totally legit. But they too often think they’re arguing against theism. What a mess it all is!!

 

[Latin]

GOD CREATED THE DRAMAS OF EVIL AND SIN FOR THE BENEFIT OF THE HUMAN RACE

Catholic Encyclopedia : Evil
“But we cannot say without denying the Divine omnipotence, that another equally perfect universe could not be created in which evil would have no place.”
.
CCC 310 But why did God not create a world so perfect that no evil could exist in it?
With infinite wisdom and goodness God freely willed to create a world in a state of journeying towards its ultimate perfection, 314 through the dramas of evil and sin. – God created the dramas of evil and sin.

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THE REASON GOD CREATED THE DRAMAS OF EVIL AND SIN.

Life without suffering would produce spoiled brats, not joyful saints.

Our struggle and tribulation while journeying towards our ultimate perfection through the dramas of evil and sin is the cost which in-prints the virtue/ nobility into our souls – the cost of our road to nobility and perfection.

In this world man has to learn by experience and contrast, and to develop by the overcoming of obstacles (Lactantius, “De ira Dei” xiii, xv. Augustine “De ordine,” I, vii, n. 18 in “P.L.”

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CATHOLIC ENCYCLOPEDIA: Free Will explains;

“God is the author of all causes and effects, but is not the author of sin, because an action ceases to be sin if God wills it to happen. Still God is the cause of sin.
God’s omnipotent providence exercises a complete and perfect control over all events that happen, or will happen, in the universe.”

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CATHOLIC ENCYCLOPEDIA Divine Providence explains;

“His wisdom He so orders all events within the universe that the end for which it was created may be realized.

He directs all, even evil and sin itself, to the final end for which the universe was created.

All events preordained by God in accordance with His all-embracing purpose.

Evil, therefore, ministers to God’s design” (St. Gregory the Great, op. cit, VI, “P.L.”

God is the sole ruler of the world. His will governs all things.

http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/12510a.htm
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CCC 2022; The divine initiative (supernatural intervention of God in the faculties of the soul) in the work of grace precedes, prepares, and elicits the free response of man.
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AS WE SEE ABOVE

In His training program God designed every obstacles down to its minutest details, and He also designed His aids for us down to its minutest details, the way He aides us that we will able to overcome every our obstacles.
At the end of our training program on this earth, we will be joyful saints in heaven.
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CCC 324 Faith gives us the certainty that God would not permit an evil if he did not cause a good to come from that very evil, by ways that we shall fully know only in eternal life.
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CCC 301 God does not abandon his creatures to themselves.
He not only gives them being and existence, but also, and at every moment, upholds and sustains them in being, utter dependence enables them to act and brings them to their final end.
Recognizing this with respect to the Creator is a source of wisdom and freedom, of joy and confidence.
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God bless

 

[o_mlly]

Overall I gather that you’re arguing the Justice Defense fails because it is out of context i.e. it considers only facts about the present state.

But is it true that no one is innocent? Aren’t babies and very young children, and any person without the reasoning ability to discern morals innocent?

Born in Original Sin, the babes are subject to the effects of the sin of Adam, i.e., the loss of God’s friendship; the loss of sanctifying grace, but not Divine Providence. Absent the ability to reason and freely will, no one is culpable for their sin as all sin requires knowledge and consent. But they still commit sin in the sense of objectively evil acts. I’ve never met a selfless baby.

The Old Testament Book of Job provides some light on the mystery of sin and grace.

Then Job answered the LORD and said:
"I know that You can do all things,
And that no purpose of Yours can be hindered.
I have dealt with great things that I do not understand;
Things too wonderful for me, which I cannot know.
I had heard of You by word of mouth,
But now my eye has seen You.
Therefore I disown what I have said,
And repent in dust and ashes” (Job 42:1-6).

In these beautiful verses, Job sublates his prior astonished indignation at an unjust God and confesses his enlightened surrender to an unfathomable God. In a free act, albeit conditioned by intense physical pain and suffering resulting in mental anguish, Job converts his attitude from being God’s victim to beneficiary. I think Job’s desolation, his deep, soul- wrenching suffering, sprang from the culturally prevalent but erroneous premise that one’s suffering verified one’s alienation from God. As I read the text, I imagine Job’s eyes opening wide and the wrinkle of a smile softening his taut, pained face as the reality behind his suffering finally comes to him.

After the theophany, Job is filled with God’s grace and the desolation that surged from Job’s false perception of God’s disaffection departs. Job now sees himself suffering with God; his prior view imagined his suffering as coming from God. Job’s new attitude allows grace to accompany suffering; his former attitude made suffering and grace mutually exclusive. Job’s renewed affection with God stunningly reverses Job’s disposition toward his suffering from the evidence of his alienation to the instrument of his atonement, “at-one-ment” with God.

In my interpretation, Job comes to see suffering as God’s instrument of intimacy; not of punishment. His prior experience of God expressed in verse five, “I had heard of You by word of mouth,” is indirect and wanting. In the time of his material prosperity, Job “heard” about God and responded liturgically using the proven formulas of his cult to maintain God’s goodwill. In a simplistic quid pro quo relationship, Job gives to God what is His—sacrifice—and, in return, God gives to Job—prosperity.

(Continued)

 

[o_mlly]

But God so loves Job that He wishes to reveal Himself in a deeper, profounder way. To achieve this intimacy, God must first penetrate Job and strip away all his distractions, thereby capturing his complete attention. The bounty of the land impedes Job; prosperity and prolificacy inflict on Job a spiritual myopia, so God gracefully removes these obstacles to intimacy. What Job first misinterprets as deprivation, he construes after the theophany as blessing, because intimacy with God requires detachment and an opening of oneself. Now a truly disinterested Job testifies of experiencing the intimacy of directly relating to God and he confesses so in verse five, “But now my eye has seen You.”

 

[Magnanimity]

With infinite wisdom and goodness God freely willed to create a world in a state of journeying towards its ultimate perfection, 314 through the dramas of evil and sin. – God created the dramas of evil and sin.

Hi @Latin, thanks for chiming in. I think that CCC 314 puts it a little more subtley than you have here. The claim there is that God is guiding his creation to its definitive sabbath rest even through the dramas of evil and sin. So, the end-goal is said to be a great good toward which it is all heading. The CCC text doesn’t so matter of factly say “God created the dramas of evil and sin,” does it? Of course, in an ultimate sense, if God freely creates this present world, then the responsibility for its current state would seem to rest with Him, especially with respect to “natural evil.”

What I was trying to get at above is that the to-bring-about-a-greater-good answer to evil and suffering doesn’t provide a lot of solace to the person who asks “why me?” when a tremendous natural evil has befallen her. And it certainly doesn’t answer her “why me?” existential question.

 

[o_mlly]

if God freely creates this present world, then the responsibility for its current state would seem to rest with Him, especially with respect to “natural evil.”

Are Mr. and Mrs. Dahmer responsible for Jeffrey’s evil acts?

What I was trying to get at above is that the to-bring-about-a-greater-good answer to evil and suffering doesn’t provide a lot of solace to the person who asks “why me?”

Perhaps the better question is, “Why not me?” After all, to suffer is the human condition.

 

[Magnanimity]

Are Mr. and Mrs. Dahmer responsible for Jeffrey’s evil acts?

Dahmer would be an example of “moral evil,” wouldn’t he? I’m specifically addressing “natural evil” in this thread. However, since human lives are rather entangled/intertwined one with the other, you do raise an interesting question…

Perhaps the better question is, “Why not me?” After all, to suffer is the human condition.

Yes, but as you might note from my replies above, I have acknowledged the pervasiveness of suffering for humanity. That really isn’t the issue. The problem arises when we experience (unlike our peers) some fantastic suffering which causes the “why me?” question to arise within us. Small sufferings normally do not cause this question because they are in keeping with our fellow man. The Boxing Day tsunami, being diagnosed with terminal cancer at age 40, your child dying young, these are outside of the normal range of human suffering and are therefore extreme examples of natural evil. All of us who experience them ask the “why me?” question. My contention is that the theist (of which I am one!) has no great answer, no answer at all really, as far as I can tell.

 

[o_mlly]

Small sufferings normally do not cause this question because they are in keeping with our fellow man. The Boxing Day tsunami, being diagnosed with terminal cancer at age 40, your child dying young, these are outside of the normal range of human suffering and are therefore extreme examples of natural evil. All of us who experience them ask the “why me?” question. My contention is that the theist (of which I am one!) has no great answer, no answer at all really, as far as I can tell.

Praise God that mankind has with His grace reduced the number of great sufferings through advances in weather forecasting and medical science. This reduction is a recent phenomena in human history. And only a myopic view of history could judge sufferings such as premature death as now great and not normal because only in the last 50 to 100 years the frequency has decreased.

From the perspective of all human history, the normal range of human suffering includes these great sufferings as far more commonplace. So, given the long view, I think the better question is still, “Why not me?”

 

[o_mlly]

Dahmer would be an example of “moral evil,” wouldn’t he? I’m specifically addressing “natural evil” in this thread.

We don’t know how to categorize Dahmer’s evil acts. If his horrific acts were done with full knowledge and freely willed then the evil would be moral . If he was psychologically impaired, e.g., brain disorder, then the evil would be physical. Let’s hope the latter.

 

[Wesrock]

My contention is that the theist (of which I am one!) has no great answer, no answer at all really, as far as I can tell.

At most general answers about why such things may happen disproportionately, and answers as to how there is no contradiction to God’s perfect goodness, but why this individual rather than that one specifically? Perhaps not.