Name: Leah Drumheller_____________

Writing Style Used: ____________MLA________________

Course and Section Number: ______THEO 202 B22 LUO________

Hamartiology: The Problem of Evil (Theodicy)

An age-old question that has been and is being asked from various religions, cultures, and socioeconomic backgrounds is how can a loving and good God allow evil to come into the world? It is a problem that has come up several times by mostly atheists and non-believers, but few Christians are asking it as well. This paper is going to address the problem of evil, why bad things happen to good people, and state the theodicies that explain and answer the problem. The problem of evil has been brought up and used as an argument by non-believers for a long time. How can a loving and good God allow evil to come into the world? They claim that these two Christian beliefs are self-contradictory and that nothing can make sense of it. They state that Christians believe that God is all-powerful, that God is good and loves His people, and that an all-powerful God is capable of doing anything and everything. They say that This question has been used to unjustifiably contradict the Christian worldview in its attempt to prove that it is flawed. They are biased and desire to convince other people and themselves that their worldview is correct by discrediting the Christian religion and/or the Bible. (Feinberg, 414). The deductive reasoning that atheists have are that if God is all powerful, kind and generous, humans are the cause of evil, an all powerful God is fully capable of doing anything and everything, then God should be able to remove evil and he will. The reason why these are a mistake is that there is not just one universal problem with evil, but several. There are religious, and philosophical problems or more commonly known as moral and natural evils. The problem of the degree of evil questions why can't God accomplish the same amount with less evil and pain. One can answer all of the problems separately but not together; the answer that would be given to someone else's mistake for example Hitler, would be because of free will, but for cancer, the answer would be different (Feinberg, 414).
Evil is categorized into two parts, moral and natural evil. Moral evil is defined when people actually carry out evil. A perfect example of moral evil is when Hitler decided to kill all the Jews. The Lord gave his children free-will. With free-will man chooses what he does and does not do. Hitler decided to encourage and demand for all the Jews to die. (Feinberg,414) Natural evil is evil that stems from a natural occurrences such as a hurricanes, natural disasters and diseases. (Feinberg, 413) Where there is evil naturally (cancer, etc) (Feinberg, 883) the reasons could be; judgment for sin, chastisement- to prove to Satan that people do the right thing because they love God, not because they want an easy life, imitation of Christ, and finally, Reward in Heaven. There are so many because there are so many different types of natural evil.
Theodicies is the Christian argument against atheists and others who bring up the problem of evil. God can be all powerful and all good while evil exists (Feinberg, 1184) The following are the theodicies and the faults with each one. Gottfried Leibniz's theodicy isthat God always creates the best of everything . He created the world and even though there is evil in the world it is the best thing that he created. The next theodicies is the Free Will defense. If evil did not exist and people were not “free” to commit evil then we wouldn't be free as human beings and we wouldn't have the choice to do what is right which is what God wants from us. God desires for us to do the right thing because we LOVE him not because we have to. The last is the soul building theodicy which states that God created us to grow closer to Him and to eternity, evil and suffering that comes our way actually helps us to grow in our virtue. There are no flaws within any of these arguments because they are all consistent and there are no contradictions. They are logical and Biblical, although they all differ in theologies, they answer the same problem. (Feinberg, 1185)

It is important to make sure that when making an argument for or against theodicy that it should be internally consistent, because if it is not people are not going to take them seriously. God is all powerful, all good and evil can exist at the same time because of free will for moral evil. I do not believe that someone can dispute a certain belief without attacking God himself in regards to the problem of evil. God is the creator and the center of everything, to contradict what he says or to argue for or against anything involves God.

Word Count [793]

Bibliography Feinberg, J.S. ”Evil, Problem of.” Evangelical Dictionary of Theology. ed. Walter A Elwell, 2nd ed., 413-415 . Grand Rapids, MI: Baker, 2001.

Feinberg, J.S. ”Theodicies.” Evangelical Dictionary of Theology. ed. Walter A Elwell, 2nd ed., 1184-1187. Grand Rapids, MI: Baker, 2001.

Feinberg, J.S. ”Pain.” Evangelical Dictionary of Theology. ed. Walter A Elwell, 2nd ed., 882-883. Grand Rapids, MI: Baker, 2001.