Why God didn't desire a universe without evil?

  • Thread starter Thread starter STT
  • Start date Start date
Status
Not open for further replies.
STT said:
How this definition of evil resolve the problem?
Click to expand...
Obtaining some definition of what evil is will then help to understand any answers given as to why it might be that God desires a universe with moral implications.
btw, not sure about the word ‘desire’ in your thread-title. <<
Click to expand...
Click to expand...
So, if we know that evil is a perversion of good, then we can say that all aspects of evil, even the worst, are in some way ordered toward a moral good, even if the intention and application, is disordered.

(I think of evil is not so much a separate force; rather it is, that with the power one has from being in existence, one can use that power - of good - for disordered and unwise actions that are fundamentally disobedient).

So evil is more about use of good for a purpose that is disordered than it is about a universe with evil in it.

And so going back to the first point, once we have established a rough idea of what evil is, we can see how it is that a universe was Desired to be good and Willed to be good, even with ‘evil’ in it.

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Augustinian_theodicy

‘The Augustinian theodicy, named for the 4th- and 5th-century theologian, philosopher and (according to some Christian denominations) Saint Augustine of Hippo, is a type of Christian theodicy designed in response to the evidential problem of evil. As such, it attempts to explain the probability of an omnipotent (all-powerful) and omnibenevolent (perfectly loving) God amid evidence of evil in the world…They typically assert that God is perfectly (ideally) good; that he created the world out of nothing; and that evil is the result of humanity’s original sin. The entry of evil into the world is generally explained as punishment for sin and its continued presence due to humans’ misuse of free will. God’s goodness and benevolence, according to the Augustinian theodicy, remain perfect and without responsibility for evil or suffering.’

'Augustine of Hippo was the first to develop the theodicy. He rejected the idea that evil exists in itself, instead regarding it as a corruption of goodness, caused by humanity’s abuse of free will. '
 
Now compare the understanding of this idea to ones we consider flawed:

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Augustinian_theodicy

*‘The theodicy was criticised by Augustine’s contemporary Fortunatus, a Manichaean who contended that God must still be somehow implicated in evil, and 18th-century theologian Francesco Antonio Zaccaria criticised Augustine’s concept of evil for not dealing with individual human suffering. Hick regards evil as necessary for the moral and spiritual development of humans, and process theologians have argued that God is not omnipotent and so cannot be responsible for any evil.’
*
 
STT said:
Yes, we can.

No we can’t, because I don’t believe it is possible in the sense that creating a universe without the possibility of evil can be done for living beings. Once we are dead, that’s a different story. We have made the choice to do good and will always continue to do so. So God created heaven and it is without evil and without the possibility for evil. But while we exist in any universe outside heaven, where there is a choice to do good or not, there will always exist the possibility of choosing evil, until one dies. God did, after all, create a universe without evil, UNTIL Adam and Eve sinned. And there was always the possibility for them TO sin.

The chance of finding such a universe is small but it is not zero.
Again, outside of heaven where there is both no possibility of evil, and no free choice to do evil, there might theoretically exist a universe in which evil has not been chosen --yet–but there will always be the possibility that someone will choose to commit evil

Lets say God.
Click to expand...
Ok, let’s. He has said plenty to us. And plenty of ‘good people’ disagree on what He has said, to the point that some ‘good people’ say that things which God has said are wrong are not ‘really wrong’. And they make often very moving and sophisticated arguments that God ‘really’ didn’t say the wrong thing was wrong, or that it was only wrong for some people, or at some times, and that ‘now’ we are adult and brilliant, we know better. So, who are you going to believe? Are you going to take the chance that somebody, or some group, which is changing teachings, has the authority? That what was wrong in the time of the apostles is OK now? (We are talking big dogma here, not things like not reclining at table and not having to wear robes or herd sheep)
 
STT said:
No, He didn’t create a universe that people always do good. And I didn’t mean that God should create a universe which has no potential for evil.
Click to expand...
You mean a universe that has the potential for evil but that none of the potential is actualized: that is, you mean a universe where even though a Fall can happen, it doesn’t?

Christi pax.
 
The analogy of light works well.

Light is something. Darkness is an absence or a relative lack of that thing. The word “darkness” describes a human experience of a particular quality of light, or lack of it. But the thing that is, is light itself.

Darkness is the description of the experience of the negation of a real thing, or a void in the real thing.

God **is **good. What we experience as evil is un-reality, or “deception”. Satan is called the deceiver, after all.

Putting un-realty as an equal/opposite of reality doesn’t work. Good and evil are not competitors, and evil is not a standard by which to hold good accountable, it is simply the nothingness we choose when we refuse the light.
 
CHRISTINE77 said:
Exactly! Why SST cannot understand this is beyond me. You cannot have good without evil. How would you measure it?
Click to expand...
Whether it can be measured is not a valid criteria. God is good and exists. No evil is required for God to exist.
 
davidv said:
Whether it can be measured is not a valid criteria. God is good and exists. No evil is required for God to exist.
Click to expand...
God knows good and evil, so the idea of both exists. God’s knowing is not conditioned by time.

Genesis 3
21 And the Lord God made for Adam and his wife, garments of skins, and clothed them.
22 And he said: Behold Adam is become as one of us, knowing good and evil: …
 
Vico said:
God knows good and evil, so the idea of both exists. God’s knowing is not conditioned by time.

Genesis 3
21 And the Lord God made for Adam and his wife, garments of skins, and clothed them.
22 And he said: Behold Adam is become as one of us, knowing good and evil: …
Click to expand...
The only evil that can exist is, itself, necessarily something apart from God, i.e. something in His creation. And in a sense the awful truth is that all creation, while good, is nonetheless evil relative to God, isn’t it, lacking His infinite perfection as it were? This aligns with the definition of evil as being a lesser good. And this makes sense of our need to be and remain in communion with God. ‘With Him all things are possible’: Matt 19:26; ‘Apart from Him we can do nothing’: John 15:5. So long as creation is partnered with, subjugated to, aligned in will with God, justice reigns. Man is living proof that without that connection, injustice easily can and will thrive.

“Let us put it very simply: man needs God, otherwise he remains without hope.” Pope Benedict. Spe Salvi.

In his Compendium of Theology St Thomas wrote:

"This state [before the Fall] enjoyed by man depended on the submission of the human will to God. That man might be accustomed from the very beginning to follow God’s will, God laid certain precepts on him. Man was permitted to eat of all the trees in Paradise, with one exception: he was forbidden under pain of death to eat of the tree of knowledge of good and evil. Eating of the fruit of this tree was prohibited, not because it was evil in itself, but that at least in this slight matter man might have some precept to observe for the sole reason that it was so commanded by God. Hence eating of the fruit of this tree was evil because it was forbidden. The tree was called the tree of knowledge of good and evil, not because it had the power to cause knowledge, but because of the sequel: by eating of it man learned by experience the difference between the good of obedience and the evil of disobedience.

The bolded part is particularly significant because it gives reason why the Fall of man might be of benefit. The more that we know of evil, and its contrast with good, the greater should be our desire to turn and run towards the good alone, meaning the more we recognize our need for God. The more we know goodness, the more we know God, and the more we know God the more we love God; it cannot be helped. And the more we love God the more justice is fulfilled in us, and the more obedience flows of its own accord.

In the end God takes a risk by creating, especially when free will is added into the mix, because He necessarily creates something less perfect that Himself. But the upshot is that His creation-us-may come, not without His help, to willingly align itself with His will, to come to see what He sees and knows, to choose and embrace justice for itself, to come to love Him with its whole heart, soul, mind, and strength, worshiping at His feet as it comes to truly recognize His incomparable goodness. Then justice is complete; then God’s universe is in order. Then evil is finally excluded. God allows us-His creation-to participate in this decision, in this exclusion, to participate in the exclusion of evil within itself to the degree that union with Him is achieved.
 
fhansen said:
The only evil that can exist is, itself, necessarily something apart from God, i.e. something in His creation. And in a sense the awful truth is that all creation, while good, is nonetheless evil relative to God, isn’t it, lacking His infinite perfection as it were? This aligns with the definition of evil as being a lesser good. And this makes sense of our need to be and remain in communion with God. ‘With Him all things are possible’: Matt 19:26; ‘Apart from Him we can do nothing’: John 15:5. So long as creation is partnered with, subjugated to, aligned in will with God, justice reigns. Man is living proof that without that connection, injustice easily can and will thrive.

“Let us put it very simply: man needs God, otherwise he remains without hope.” Pope Benedict. Spe Salvi.

In his Compendium of Theology St Thomas wrote:

"This state [before the Fall] enjoyed by man depended on the submission of the human will to God. That man might be accustomed from the very beginning to follow God’s will, God laid certain precepts on him. Man was permitted to eat of all the trees in Paradise, with one exception: he was forbidden under pain of death to eat of the tree of knowledge of good and evil. Eating of the fruit of this tree was prohibited, not because it was evil in itself, but that at least in this slight matter man might have some precept to observe for the sole reason that it was so commanded by God. Hence eating of the fruit of this tree was evil because it was forbidden. The tree was called the tree of knowledge of good and evil, not because it had the power to cause knowledge, but because of the sequel: by eating of it man learned by experience the difference between the good of obedience and the evil of disobedience.

The bolded part is particularly significant because it gives reason why the Fall of man might be of benefit. The more that we know of evil, and its contrast with good, the greater should be our desire to turn and run towards the good alone, meaning the more we recognize our need for God. The more we know goodness, the more we know God, and the more we know God the more we love God; it cannot be helped. And the more we love God the more justice is fulfilled in us, and the more obedience flows of its own accord.

In the end God takes a risk by creating, especially when free will is added into the mix, because He necessarily creates something less perfect that Himself. But the upshot is that His creation-us-may come, not without His help, to willingly align itself with His will, to come to see what He sees and knows, to choose and embrace justice for itself, to come to love Him with its whole heart, soul, mind, and strength, worshiping at His feet as it comes to truly recognize His incomparable goodness. Then justice is complete; then God’s universe is in order. Then evil is finally excluded. God allows us-His creation-to participate in this decision, in this exclusion, to participate in the exclusion of evil within itself to the degree that union with Him is achieved.
Click to expand...
That is very insightful.

Rather than evil relative to God, I would phrase it as evil is the absence of what ought to be there, and what ought to be there is then good (even creatures). There has to be the idea of it at least.

Yes, the risk of moral evil was taken in giving free will to angels and mankind, but for God the outcome as it plays out in time was known, God being unconditioned by time.

Adam and Eve also decided to be a self-authority on morality rather than trust in God.

With the Fall of mankind we then received atonement with our possible transformation into the likeness of Christ with inheritance of the kingdom of heaven.
 
Vico said:
God knows good and evil, so the idea of both exists. God’s knowing is not conditioned by time.

Genesis 3
21 And the Lord God made for Adam and his wife, garments of skins, and clothed them.
22 And he said: Behold Adam is become as one of us, knowing good and evil: …
Click to expand...
There is a Jewish concept that G-d’s even thinking about something, creates it.
 
friardchips said:
Obtaining some definition of what evil is will then help to understand any answers given as to why it might be that God desires a universe with moral implications.
btw, not sure about the word ‘desire’ in your thread-title. <<
Click to expand...
The idea behind this thread is that a universe without evil is possible. Why God didn’t want/desire to create that universe?
Click to expand...
Click to expand...
 
Tantum_ergo said:
Ok, let’s. He has said plenty to us. And plenty of ‘good people’ disagree on what He has said, to the point that some ‘good people’ say that things which God has said are wrong are not ‘really wrong’. And they make often very moving and sophisticated arguments that God ‘really’ didn’t say the wrong thing was wrong, or that it was only wrong for some people, or at some times, and that ‘now’ we are adult and brilliant, we know better. So, who are you going to believe? Are you going to take the chance that somebody, or some group, which is changing teachings, has the authority? That what was wrong in the time of the apostles is OK now? (We are talking big dogma here, not things like not reclining at table and not having to wear robes or herd sheep)
Click to expand...
God then is responsible for evil if evil is irresistible.
 
Status
Not open for further replies.
Back
Top