Problem of evil

[SeekingCatholic]

Yes, but at the expense of freewill.

No, not at the expense of freewill. Free will only demands the potential for moral evil to exist, not its actuality.

Being all powerful, does not mean that God can do irrational and meaningless things. Therefore, God being love, has given us the freewill to conduct ourselves and our destiny as we so please.

This is not the bone of contention. The claim is that, God being love, He would also see to it that what “we would please” in every case would be to choose Him. IOW, we would freely choose Him because we would want to, and we would want to because He made us want to. If you deny that is exactly what happens in the case of the elect, then you deny traditional Catholic theology on grace.

Could God create a world in which all beings with free will chose Him? That is the crux of the matter.

First we have to know what the greater good is by nature, in order to claim that it is not necessary. Since we do not know; it simply a matter of faith. One must believe, if one so chooses, that God has good reasons for allowing evil.

No, we know of all categories of possible goods we can enumerate. If we can demonstrate that either a) the realization of a possible good is not necessitated by moral evil; or b) if it is, the good is not outweighed by the evil, for all possible goods, then the moral evil is gratuitous.

If the greater good, that which is the end goal of reality, is greater then the finite suffering that we will experience in this life, then God is justified in allowing evil; since God is the greater good, and so unification with such a being ought to be desired by man.

Off topic. We are talking about moral, not physical evil, so I will ignore the rest of this paragraph. I’ve agreed that a morally sufficient reason exists for the allowance of physical evil. The question is whether a morally sufficient reason exists for the allowance of moral evil. I firmly hold that it does not.

The logical problem of evil has been solved only by positing libertarian free will - which is a rejection of classical theism.

If there is no God, then there is no difference between one act or the other. There is no good or evil. First we must accept that there is a God, and then we can ponder as to why he allows evil.

I’ve seen this dodge before, which doesn’t do much to raise my confidence in the critical thinking abilities of the apologists who make it. Perhaps in an atheist framework there is no absolute good or evil. But the atheist is using his own concept of good or evil, but the theist’s own conception, and in the theist framework there certainly is good and evil, which means the problem of evil is a real problem.

 

[MindOverMatter]

No, not at the expense of freewill. Free will only demands the potential for moral evil to exist, not its actuality.

Yes I understand that. But it was you who said that God can remove all moral evil. But doing so would be to rob man of his freewill. I fail to understand why you have not grasped that simple fact.

This is not the bone of contention. The claim is that, God being love, He would also see to it that what “we would please” in every case would be to choose Him. IOW, we would freely choose Him because we would want to, and we would want to because He made us want to.

We also have the capacity of self. Selfisness is a perversion of ones ability to look after ones well being. We all desire good. But we also place are self interests above Gods, and therefore deceive our selves. This causes a disharmony between us and God

If you deny that is exactly what happens in the case of the elect, then you deny traditional Catholic theology on grace.

I fail to see why? The elect are simply those who have freely chosen God and God has given them the grace that they freely asked for; and God has foreseen this. God wills that all men are saved, but he also wills that those who do not wish it, are removed from Gods nature. And if it is the belief of classical Catholic theology, that God puts men in hell against their will, then i freely call my self a liberal on the factor.

Could God create a world in which all beings with free will chose Him? That is the crux of the matter.

The nature of love forbids it. For if all men ought to have a chance to find heaven, Love cannot be prejudiced against the existence of those who freely choose otherwise. In other words it would be to rob Men and Women of the dignity of freewill. Justice would also be robed, for it is the nature of God to judge the free actions of man. In other words, such a universe would contradict the nature of God. You have to prove that it would be better that Man should not exist simply because God has foreknowledge of his or her demise. But we must also remember, that all the creatures that exist, exist because it was Gods will for them to exist, God knows that they will go to hell, only because he created them. If God did not create them, then how would he know them if they do not exist? How can God, while maintaining freewill, separate the sheep from non-existent goats?

God would need more then foreknowledge in order to create a world in which all creatures freely chooses God. He would have to be an irrational being that could do the irrationally impossible.

No, we know of all categories of possible goods we can enumerate.

What is good? It seems evident to me, that what is good for one person is not good for another. So no, we do not know. For one, we would not disagree on what is good and what is evil if we knew the perfect good, and none of us know perfection. We know by “faith” the way to perfection, because of divine revelation. For example, a man may be called selfish if he tries to rebuke the behavior of somebody on the subjective point of view of taste; and this is because one is concerned only with ones own well being and depriving another in order to actualize that reality. But if one sees that the man is corrupting his soul and therefore depriving himself of eternal Joy, then a rebuke is now instead a “selfless act”; and a brave act considering that one could come to fatal harm if the man is violent. This is the nature of self sacrifice. What is truly good depends on the true nature of our reality.

To be Continued…

 

[MindOverMatter]

Off topic. We are talking about moral, not physical evil

Those who have read the post will see that it is on topic.

I firmly hold that it does not.

You have given me no reason to agree with you.

The logical problem of evil has been solved only by positing libertarian free will - which is a rejection of classical theism.

The problem of evil is solved if God exists. For God is eternal joy and love, and eternal love is worth your existence, and your suffering. If you were good, you would not deny anybodies existence or the capacity to freely choose just becuase they have to suffer in order to obtain perfection. If suffering is necessary, then there is no problem; and if you think that there is, then I don’t see how you can prove it with out having the infinite knowledge of God. Your arrogant assumption that you can know, simply reveals your unwillingness to contemplate that human beings are ignorant.

Perhaps in an atheist framework there is no absolute good or evil.

No perhaps. There is no evil full stop.

But the atheist is using his own concept of good or evil, but the theist’s own conception, and in the theist framework there certainly is good and evil, which means the problem of evil is a real problem.

Fine; but if the atheist takes God in to account, they have to take into account the existence of freewill and their capacity to sense evil; to know that their is such a thing as right and wrong.

Problem of evil is a real problem.

No it is not. it is more a matter of desire. If evil is real, then good is real, and my inability to understand why God allows evil, can either be seen as a disproof or a matter of ignorance. It would take a humble person to see the latter. But one is not working on blind faith. There are clues that support the latter; such as freewill. Given that God is Love; I see no contradiction to the potential evil that could exist, and the existence of God. If one is truly good, then one would not deny the existence of their enemies, since one would wish only for their salvation. Even if somebody beats you rapes you and mocks you, a good person would not desire that such a person ought not to exist, for a saint would see the value of such a person and would love their enemies. This is the nature of love. Jesus loved his enemies. It is only those who are blind to Gods will, and the true nature of love, that do not see this. Jesus Christ obviously thought that mans chances of being united with the Father was infinitely more important then the suffering that he would have to go through in this life.

 

[SeekingCatholic]

Yes I understand that. But it was you who said that God can remove all moral evil. But doing so would be to rob man of his freewill. I fail to understand why you have not grasped that simple fact.

You evidently don’t understand, for you contradict yourself. You agree that free will only logically demands the potential, not actuality, of evil. Thus logically God can remove all actual moral evil, not all potential moral evil, without robbing man of free will. But then you contradictorily claim just the opposite.

We also have the capacity of self. Selfisness is a perversion of ones ability to look after ones well being. We all desire good. But we also place are self interests above Gods, and therefore deceive our selves. This causes a disharmony between us and God

Do you deny that God has the power to cause us to desire Him over self? And do you deny that if we do desire Him over self, it is only because He has caused us to do so? If you do deny this, you place yourself far outside the bounds of Catholic orthodoxy. If you don’t deny this, then the problem of evil still stands.

I fail to see why? The elect are simply those who have freely chosen God and God has given them the grace that they freely asked for; and God has foreseen this.

But why did they ask for the grace and not others? If the answer is that they did not desire it, why not? Could not God have instilled in them the desire for it? In traditional (Thomistic/Augustinian) theology God chose the elect first, although this position isn’t demanded by the Church.

God wills that all men are saved, but he also wills that those who do not wish it, are removed from Gods nature. And if it is the belief of classical Catholic theology, that God puts men in hell against their will, then i freely call my self a liberal on the factor.

Well it is the traditional belief God puts men in hell against their will; they’d much prefer annihilation. So I guess you are a liberal. Welcome to the club. Now to the primary point: if God wills that all men are saved, how is it that all men are not saved? If the answer is that they do not wish it, how does this come to pass if God could make them wish it? If He could do this, but refrains, that He does not really “will” that all men are saved, but this is only a mere sterile “wish” that all men are saved despite His unwillingness to do what is necessary to bring it about.

The nature of love forbids it.

Rather, the nature of love demands it.

For if all men ought to have a chance to find heaven, Love cannot be prejudiced against the existence of those who freely choose otherwise.

Yes it should be, if it had the capacity to make them freely choose otherwise then they did.

In other words, such a universe would contradict the nature of God.

God has the capacity to give efficacious grace, whether intrinsically or extrinsically efficacious. Do you deny this? Again if you do you are far outside Catholic orthodoxy. If you admit this, then your point is disproven. He could give everyone efficacious grace.

You have to prove that it would be better that Man should not exist simply because God has foreknowledge of his or her demise.

Not too difficult. Something about it being better for Judas that he was never born.

But we must also remember, that all the creatures that exist, exist because it was Gods will for them to exist, God knows that they will go to hell, only because he created them. If God did not create them, then how would he know them if they do not exist?

It’s something called “middle knowledge”.

How can God, while maintaining freewill, separate the sheep from non-existent goats?

There aren’t any goats. So what? What logically demands that there be any?

God would need more then foreknowledge in order to create a world in which all creatures freely chooses God. He would have to be an irrational being that could do the irrationally impossible.

God has infallible, omniscient foreknowledge, remember. Based on this, why is it logically impossible for him to create a world in which all creatures freely choose Him?

What is good? It seems evident to me, that what is good for one person is not good for another. So no, we do not know. For one, we would not disagree on what is good and what is evil if we knew the perfect good, and none of us know perfection. We know by “faith” the way to perfection, because of divine revelation.

Nonsense. I’m applying the Christian concept of what good is. Either you admit the Christian concept of good could be mistaken, or this line of argument is a dead end.

 

[SeekingCatholic]

Those who have read the post will see that it is on topic.

I rather doubt it. A morally sufficient justification for physical evil does nothing whatsoever regarding the problem of moral evil.

You have given me no reason to agree with you.

I did so up-thread. The Cliffs’ notes version is like this:

A persons sins, and possibly incurs eternal damnation. Is the evil gratuitous, meaning it is not logically necessary to bring about a greater good? The categories of “good” can be restricted since moral/spiritual evil is the worst evil in Christian theology. Specifically, it can be restricted to:

1. The person himself. While his sin could conceivably lead to his greater spiritual good for the learning of humility, it is not logically necessary. God could bring about this good in another way. His damnation: no benefit at all.
2. Others. Again his sin could provide the occasion for the practice of virtue by others, but it is not logically necessary. His damnation: some benefit to the souls in heaven (an increase in accidental glory) BUT the good does not outweigh the evil. They only gain an accidental increase in glory whereas he is deprived of all his essential glory and must suffer eternal punishment besides.
3. God Himself. The sin and damnation need not be here separated. It does indeed, provide God with the opportunity to “show His justice” - for which the sin and damnation are logically necessary (it’s not however logically necessary for God to show His mercy). Again the good does not outweigh the evil. God only gains an accidental increase in glory, AND the accidental increase in glory He gains is LESS then would have been the case had He not permitted the evil, and brought the soul to salvation.

The problem of evil is solved if God exists.

A rather obvious case of question-begging.

If suffering is necessary, then there is no problem; and if you think that there is, then I don’t see how you can prove it with out having the infinite knowledge of God. Your arrogant assumption that you can know, simply reveals your unwillingness to contemplate that human beings are ignorant.

Again we are talking about the problem of moral evil, not physical evil.

Fine; but if the atheist takes God in to account, they have to take into account the existence of freewill and their capacity to sense evil; to know that their is such a thing as right and wrong.

The atheist just says these are the result of evolutionary processes.

Given that God is Love; I see no contradiction to the potential evil that could exist, and the existence of God.

Nor do I. It’s the actual evil that’s the problem.

 

[Nickkname]

I do not believe in the Judeo-Christian God precisely because of this objection.

How do people on this forum address this issue?

Evil comes from good
Good cannot come from evil
Good must come from a greater good
The greatest good is God
God is the source of all good

So the fact that evil exists shows that God exists.

By the way, it’s improper to call God the Judeo-Christian God. He is not the God of two religons. He is the God of all things. He is the only God. And who God is in his essense is unfathomable.

 

[SeekingCatholic]

Evil comes from good
Good cannot come from evil
Good must come from a greater good
The greatest good is God
God is the source of all good

So the fact that evil exists shows that God exists.

This also shows that evil comes from God. I think you will need to brush up your logic a little.

 

[Nickkname]

This also shows that evil comes from God. I think you will need to brush up your logic a little.

No, it dosen’t. Evil is the abscence of good. Hence, God could not be the source of evil. He is the source of all good.

 

[SeekingCatholic]

No, it dosen’t. Evil is the abscence of good. Hence, God could not be the source of evil. He is the source of all good.

Yeah, and if evil comes from good He is therefore also the source of evil.

 

[JLongoria]

I don’t see how. This distinction is a philosophical one.

Theology is the study of God, in its purest form. Leaving ourselves to purely philosophical devices leads us to a false God. Aristotle, in all his thought, could not begin to speculate the real nature of God. It is easy to devise of a God that does not present some difficulty in understanding, yet this God would not be the Christian God.

Aristotle could not have reasoned that Christ’s sacrifice would be necessary to reconcile us to God. Since you’re so big on “the Scholastics”, you should also realize that St. Aquinas reasons that our intellect cannot know of God without divine revelation.

This is why for him, natural law is the moral law that we can come to on our own (murder, abortion, contraception, homosexuality, etc. are all things that we can realize by ourselves); it is the basest form of participating in God’s eternal laws. The divine laws, however, are laws that we could not reach on our own; they absolutely require divine revelation; the most of important for us is that Christ, and by extension His Church, is the only way to salvation.

Think about it. Does has a soul in heaven have absolutely no perfection at all? The fact that a rational entity has an intellect and will; these are perfections.

The soul in heaven is only perfect because it has been made perfect. That is why there is the doctrine of infused justification; we are not declared righteous, we are made righteous by Christ’s blood.

Our intellect and will are not perfections. So long as we act while not placing God as the ultimate end, our will and intellect are not perfect. We must struggle to conform our will to that of the Lord’s (for some, this is obviously more difficult than others).

It also might be worthy to note that at times, our intellect and will may be infallible. But they are never in the state of continual perfection, something that we can only ascribe to God.

Yes, but the Church has certainly not taught that man’s nature was always fallen and imperfect in the sense of “defective”.

… Due to original sin only, and not due to any intrinsic defect at the time of creation.

Oh, I completely agree. Yet this asks another question then: the nature of our initial existence is now called in to question. Did we initially partake directly in God’s existence? Seems like that might very well be the case, and if that is the case, then our initial state of being creature may have been direction participation in the Body of Christ.

Either way, the entire argument has now become a veritable quagmire, haha.

 

[MindOverMatter]

1. The person himself. While his sin could conceivably lead to his greater spiritual good for the learning of humility, it is not logically necessary. God could bring about this good in another way. His damnation: no benefit at all.

This is an [edited] baseless claim.

First of all, if a person has no choice, then you are justified in saying that God should have given him a choice. Which he did.
If you remove freewill, you remove freedom.

And as for the claim that God could have done it another way; i would really like to know where you got the neccesary background information from, which would allow you to justly assume such a thing. You are encoraging people to doubt Gods intentions by introducing to us a temptation which would have us think that the classical God of Christianity is playing spitefull games that he doesn’t have to play. Which would be fine, if you had any evidence!

So if there is any question begging at all in this debate, then it is certainly comming from your direction.

Nor do I. It’s the actual evil that’s the problem.

As far as your claim, that the Catholic Church teaches infallibly on the idea that God has forced a select few human beings to go to heaven, you are going to have to provide some evidence of its infallibility and your interpretation of it. The nature of love, cannot force anyone to choose God. God can only “influence”, and can only help those that he knows will freely choose him. The key to understanding is to understand the nature of love and its relationship with human freewill.

Your rejection and arguments in this particular area is unclear and strange, to say the least. It seems that you are rejecting freewill. Which is no surprise.

Now as far as God permitting moral evils is concerned, let me ask you some questions and give you some answers.

1. Do you agree that there is the potential for human beings to sin?
2. If so, do you also agree that human beings are sinners?
3. If you do; then wouldn’t you also agree that there are many people who commit sin on a daily basis, and that there has been some who have done great evils or have made choices which have lead to greater evils, which have later been repented at some point in there lives?
4. Would you also agree that some people have been inspired to salvation because of the moral evil that is aloud to exist in the world? I for one might have never come to know God if it was not for my experiences; though they didn’t determine my will, they certainly inspired my faith. However, my suffering was a merciful act, since before-hand, i freely chose to live in sin and only chose God because i had nobody else to turn to when my sinful life had gotten the better of me. My choosing God, was in fact a selfish act, inspired by my “suffering”. I was not forced into believing, but there were influences, which arrived through “suffering”, caused by “moral evils”, that God allowed to occur, simply because he knew that it was either for my benefit or somebody else’s. However, there is no temporal guarantee that I will freely choose to stay in Gods will. The mere fact that God has knowledge of my eternal residence in heaven, and that he helped me in some way to get there, doesn’t mean i did not freely choose God, or that God does not call upon all people.
5. If you agree with the above case, then don’t you think that it would be a bit irresponsible up-rooting evil when it is so intimately intertwined in human affairs? Remember the parable of Jesus? God said to his workers that they should not remove the seed of Darnell, in case it ruins all of creation. Unless you’re willing to call God a liar, then I think that you will be humble enough to accept that God happens to have knowledge and wisdom, which you don’t have.

If you agree with my argument, then wouldn’t you also agree that those who have caused small or great evil, whether directly or indirectly, and repented, ought to be entitled to the same salvation as we are all entitled? Remember that none of us are entitled to anything since none of us are good in the first place. God has freely given us salvation.

If everything I am saying is correct, then it would seem that there will be “unavoidable moral evils” in the world, despite you protests to the contrary. I certainly don’t see any possibility for anyone to go to heaven with out suffering. The idea that God can create people who will “freely choose” to do no moral evil, assumes that such people exist. If they do, they would be very few in existence; since I find that perfect people are hard to come by. I think God would rather create a world in which moral evil exists, and in which a lot more then one or two people are “freely saved”; given that my life has value, just as much as somebody born perfect. In which case, the real problem is in your understanding; which you conveniently over-looked as a “huge possibility”.

Which ever the case maybe, this is my last post on the matter.

 

[AndyF]

brycelaliberte:

I have a problem with this also.

Assume I create an aware sensual cyborg with an embedded component I can activate at will to bring on him excruciating and permanent pain.

I switch him on and tell him, “You have the choice to love me and to hate me. BTW: Your choosing to exit this scene and return to being an object is hating me. If you choose to stay then there is the possibility that you may fail, and that would be by your own fault which I can never be faulted for, and which will bring on a permanent and aware existence of suffering in you. I am good because I give you that choice and I would never interfere with your choice”

The entity firmly caught in a predicament, now I can go on listing things I can never be accountable for and that would always bring on approval by the aware units I create. I can be a good creator or I can be an ogre and it would make no difference to the results, as my will will always be done and they will always agree to bend to my will. Every one of these cyborgs will vy for my approval, even to the point to deny sound reasoning between them. They will go on and pretend that they find everything positive about me through their own reasoned discovery. Anything to avoid the second, “choice” they may find themselves in and ensure self preservation.

Now we know some things to be true. We know it is coercion not allowing for an outlet in a predicament when we can make it so.

co·erce

verb (used with object), -erced, -erc·ing.

1.to compel by force, intimidation, or authority, esp. without regard for individual desire or volition: They coerced him into signing the document.
2.to bring about through the use of force or other forms of compulsion; exact: to coerce obedience.
3.to dominate or control, esp. by exploiting fear, anxiety, etc.:

In this case the aware entity may find it risky and that is from his perspective. Remember, free choice respects the chooser and recognizes his point of view, the bases of free choice. Since his thought processes equated to risky, then he should not be coerced to choose not to exist.

I made it a rule that it is evil to do so. The problem exists with me not willing to allow for creatures unwilling to remain, and that is a thorn. I could simply realize that the cyborgs that chose to serve me actually chose to do so, and that would give me immense satisfaction and real respect from them all.

I thing aware beings have a right to choose to exist. I think the testing should start and hell should be applicable only AFTER this first choice, and yes, an omni-God can return someone to non-existence.

AndyF

 

[SeekingCatholic]

This is an [edited] baseless claim.

It’s simple logic. [edited]

And as for the claim that God could have done it another way; i would really like to know where you got the neccesary background information from, which would allow you to justly assume such a thing.

 

[MindOverMatter]

you make no logical connection to unavoidable moral evils anyway.

You make no logical conection that moral evil is avoidable. You merely make the asssertion that God could do things another way and that i am setting up strawmen. I see no evidence of this. And since you don’t know the full picture behind Gods intentions, merely asserting that there may have been another way around it doesn’t actually prove that there was another way round it. .

I apoligise for any insulting language.

 

[Archus]

People seem to be reading too much into this. The whole point of truth is that it is simple, and undisputed. As soon as we get a really long post with long paragraphs, using all sorts of multi-syllable definitions, then they are losing the ball.

This may be a long post, but a lot about a little.

God above all things, is Truth, Love, and Reason. He is everything that is good. He loves us, because He is love itself, and did you know, that we are the only beings created for our own sake?

He gave the angels and us free will. This means we have a responsibility to choose. We have that power, along with the angels.

Free will means that we are able to choose for ourselves what path we take, and it is free because we have the choice to abuse that freedom. Abuse as in going against what is good.

Now, given that God is good, and therefore His Will is good, evil is what is contrary to God.

We started out, like the angels, in God, being good. Turning away from Him is what created evil. It is what gave us Original Sin, it is what brought the devil into fruition.

Free will comes into the problem of evil, because of its very nature. We can choose not to live a life of love, but to choose death, if we wanted.

The thing to remember here is that God loves us, and so it isn’t that He cannot interfere with our choices, it is that He doesn’t want to, because that would negate our free will. He wants us to come to Him willingly, which is why He gave us free will in the first place.

So the evil in this world is a consequence of our own choice.

God loves us, that will never change. It is in the nature of choice that evil is born, because of the possibility that we turn away from love.

So we have an absolute good, and an absolute evil. God, is good. The choice to go against God, whether we are tempted by the devil, or of our own volition, is what is evil.

What is morality? It is the principle concerning the distinction between good and evil. Christian morality, is to do with going with or against God. A common output of this is conscience.

I don’t understand how suffering can be evil. It is sad, and people shouldn’t have to suffer, but suffering in itself is not evil. The person who made them suffer may have done something evil, but still, suffering, is not evil.

The problem of evil, therefore, is where evil is applied. The greatest trick the devil ever pulled was to make people believe he didn’t exist. If we start labelling things as evil, we are doomed when we start. This is because we associate a potentially good act as something that is contrary to God, and we do not blame it on ourselves or the devil, but on God. Because God and evil are the exact opposite to one another, as soon as we associate something as evil, we lose the goodness in the act, and we lose our faith and so we lose God.

We must therefore be prudent in our actions, and cautious. God loves us, and because there is suffering, does not mean He made us to suffer, nor does it lead to the conclusion that He created the suffering in the first place. We have free will. As man, we finished creation. We have an important role to play in the world, so we have great power. This means we have a great responsibility, for we have free will.

Sorry, but I did not think this out thoroughly. If the last paragraphs seem weak, then that is because I am following a train of thought. I felt as though I needed to get my point down, and to bring us toward simplicity and the facts.

 

[MindOverMatter]

It’s simple logic. [edited]
It isn’t necessary for God to actually allow someone to fall into sin to impart this knowledge.

Loving God with all your heart is the path to heaven, not just knowledge. You have to freely engage with God in order to have a relationship. You have to freely choose to be in a relationship. Such a relationship might be only possible in a world of suffering. And as long as that is a possibility, I need not assume any other.

He could enlighten the person’s mind in a number of different ways; visions, temptations, etc.

God does use visions and allows temptations so far as he sees it necessary to the greater good of humanity. Such things however, do not guarantee that man will follow God with all their heart. Seeing that men and women have followed God in the past, is not proof that God created them good; they were sinners before they followed God, and therefore had caused moral evil and are imperfect, and in need of salvation. If God had not given his influence at all, then all would have gone to hell. Man cannot be good at all with out God. You are correct that God influences good will, since all good is rooted in God; but he does not influence events to the extent that you cannot freely choose whether you want to have a relationship with God or not. God has obviously infused a sense of good into nature, but not to the extent that it interferes with our freedom. Everything is delicately balanced in order to achieve a certain goal. The nature of Love is as such that we must have the freedom to reject God, otherwise we are not really making a free choice, but are only making it because God is puppeteering events, rather then giving a balanced influence. It seems evident to me that I have freewill and can shun temptation or partake of it, regardless of any influence to the contrary. If there are such things as people who have chosen God after a time of doing evil, then such people ought to exist in Gods eyes, despite the suffering they caused.

It isn’t logically necessary for God to have to permit sin in order to enlighten people with the necessary knowledge for humility. That was shown above…

You have shown nothing here but another assertion. Knowledge can influence; but knowledge of something does not guarantee salvation. Knowing that I ought to be humble, does not guarantee that I will freely choose to be humble. I have to will it. Virtue, which is the greater good, might not be achievable unless one achieves it from a state of ignorance and imperfection; or a better term would be a “state of neutrality”. True virtues, in respect of Gods creation, might best be learned through experience, and practice, as well as reading it out of a book. The side effect of coarse is that ignorance and neutrality can potentially lead to sin. However, the greater-good is worth having. Bare in Mind that God is good by Gods very nature of being. We, as the creation, have to choose good, since we are not good and can only be partakers of good in God, and you can only choose good if you are choosing from a neutral state.

You could say that God might be able to give us all knowledge. But at what expense? We do not know that we would be better off or “good” as a result of obtaining it.

Nowhere did I claim that God “forced” anyone. Straw man…

If not, then I am sorry. If I am right, well…lets just say I will leave that to your conscience.

No, I’m not rejecting free will either. Another straw man…

Then what is it that you are rejecting? If Not all, nearly every created man that has ever chosen God has been a sinner, has done wrong in the eyes of God. There are those that came to God, freely chose God and have sinned in there lives despite Gods grace.

It’s possible, but again the moral evil is not logically necessary for a person to be inspired to salvation…

You have given know satisfactory explanation of why not. Where is your evidence? Did God tell you?

If God is running the show, He could have seen to it that the weeds never got planted or that they got uprooted while leaving the wheat in place…

According to what? Whom? God cannot force people to do good. He can only influence. Such influence will not guarantee that all humans will desire Gods will. Force and influence are two different words.

Well no, I wouldn’t agree, and neither would you, since your statement is contradictory - you say first that those who have caused evil should be “entitled” to salvation and next that no one is entitled to anything.

I used the wrong word maybe. What I mean to say is, we are not entitled to Gods mercy at least not by any power or nature of our own making, but by the will of God. We are all entitled to salvation according to Gods will, but not according to our own merit; we have all fallen short. God, through Jesus Christ, has given us salvation, but we can freely choose to reject it. What I meant by entitlement, was that God has given us all an opportunity to repent.

But it isn’t correct, and you make no logical connection to unavoidable moral evils anyway.
But God has, in fact, created rational beings who freely chose to do no moral evil, according to Catholic theology. Therefore they exist.

Where are they and who are they? Please don’t leave us with the temptations of your assertions when you could offer us so much more. I need evidence.

There are those who freely choose to master there will through the will of God; but they have done moral evils in there lives and most probably continue to do so. Even if there are one or two or even a hundred who have not sinned all there lives (I am not aware of any), it is because they have freely chosen not to; not because God has worked some favor that he hasn’t given to others. If God does some favor, then it is for the greater good of humanity. If suffering exists, it could possibly be the case that an even greater good can be achieved through the permittance of potential suffering and moral evils. People’s inability to understand what that is, is not a disproof of classical- freewill-Theism in my eyes. I certainly don’t believe in predestination as interpreted by some to mean that God has chosen a few people to serve him, while the rest are predestined to burn. Something might be predestined by Gods foresight, but not necessarily by the direct removal of somebody’s freewill. If you have not chosen God, but only think you have, because God has willed you to choose him while giving you a false knowledge that you have freely chosen him and love him, then this is not freewill. If God knows that you will choose him, but your choice occurs in events which have moral evils involved, then God has good reason to actualize those events, since he knows that you will choose him. We develop a relationship with God through Gods grace, which is open to everyone who freely chooses to partake of it.

 

[mlchance]

I do not believe in the Judeo-Christian God precisely because of this objection.

How do people on this forum address this issue?

Here’s my thousand words:

(Please Note: This uploaded content is no longer available.)

– Mark L. Chance.

 

[onetimeposter]

I consider poverty to be an evil because it has the potential to cause immense suffering… I do not see how is that caused by “free will.”

That’s a very easy answer…

man does not fairly share the worlds resources, they freely choose to live the way they do and therefor, many people live in extreme poverty, because of the choices that people make.

 

[onetimeposter]

A better question…

God knows all, see’s all and lives outside of time.

Therefor God can see ahead of time, every decision that we will ever make and because of that, God knows if the choices we make will send us to heaven or hell.

If God cannot see our futures, then God does not know all and does not see all, therefor God is not omnipotent and you have in fact limited Gods power.

If God is in fact omnipotent, does in fact know all and see all, then he is able to see our lives before they are lived.

If God is the above mentioned and God is benevolent, then why would a benevolent, all loving, all good God create a life, that he knows ahead of time, will make choices that will send him or her to hell.

This is not a question of free will, rather it is a question of Gods ability to see our lives before they are lived.

**If you feel like responding, ’ its all about free will’, re-read the question, it has nothing to do with free will, as God see’s what choices we make before they are made,if he is in fact all knowing and all seeing.

If God is not all knowing or all seeing, then you have in fact limited God’s powers and he is in fact not omnipotent and is a prisoner to time…just like us.**

Why would a benevolent God create a life, that he knows will one day make choices that will send themselves to suffer an eternity in hell? That does not sound like benevolence in the least.

 

[t68ware]

There have been many great discussions about the problem of evil, which is a topic I studied while at college. Why would God create man if He in His foreknowledge knew what would happen? If God planned from the foundation of the earth the plan to send Christ to die for sins, did God know in advance what evil men would do? All these questions and many more make the topic worthy of discussion, for if it were as easy as “It’s just free will.”, why then are there hundreds of books and articles on the subject? For some, it is easy but for some like me, it is a very good topic of discussion. The “Free Will” argument is the most popular, however, it is not found in Scripture…it is implied. The Bible never gives us the answer to the “why” of evil, and the book of Job comes close, but God does not answer Job. I have always found that interesting that the One with the answer does not give the answer. Just as in my tradition we have doctrines that are implied, so is the “free will” argument. While some Christians think this is a topic of fruitless debate, others tend to think it is a topic worthy of the intellect God gave us.