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The logical problem of evil holds that any evil whatsoever disproves God’s existence. If there is just one person with a painful hangover, this suffering is enough to know that God does not exist. No need for abstract speculation, too many wine coolers at a Prince concert is all you need to disprove the existence of the Almighty.

What is the argument for this view? The ancient Greek philosopher Epictetus put the argument this way: “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?”

Now, one way to critique the logical problem of evil is to say that evil is an illusion. But this way out of the problem contradicts common sense, for if anything is hard to deny, it is pain and suffering. Moreover, a consistent Christian cannot deny evil, because the Christian faith recognizes both moral evil like vices and sins and nonmoral evil like illness and death.

But a denial of evil is not needed to call into question the logical problem of evil. As Eleonore Stump points out, “The propositions (1) there is suffering in the world and (2) there is an omniscient, omnipotent, perfectly good God are not by themselves logically incompatible.” To hold that God exists and that there is suffering is therefore not like holding that this man is both married and a bachelor. To be a bachelor is to be an unmarried man of marriageable age. But if you are married, then you cannot at the same time in the same respect also not be married. A married bachelor is a self-contradictory notion like a square circle. Jeremy Bentham provides other self-contradictory concepts: “a species of cold heat, a sort of dry moisture, a kind of resplendent darkness.” It would indeed be a logical contradiction to say, “There is suffering in the world,” and also say, “There is no suffering in the world.” It would be a logical contradiction to assert, “There is an omniscient, omnipotent, perfectly good God,” and also to assert, “There is not an omniscient, omnipotent, perfectly good God.” But there is no contraction in holding that (1) there is suffering in the world and that (2) there is an omniscient, omnipotent, perfectly good God.

#God #Christianity #Catholic #faith #reason #Aquinas #CS Lewis #Jordan Peterson #theodicy