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#743 God, Freedom, and Evil

August 01, 2021
Q

Dear Dr. Craig,

My name is klil, I'm a teenage boy, and I live in Tel Aviv, Israel. Although I'm coming from a non-christian place, I find a lot of interest in Christianity, and also in the philosophy of religion. Right now I'm writing an essay as part of my philosophy studying at the Bar Ilan University of Israel. The essay is about the problem of evil, and I'm currently struggling with the omnipotence paradox. I wonder how can an all-powerful god have no choice but to permit evil, even if it is a logically necessary component for the sake of the greatest good.

What is your solution to the omnipotence paradox? how would you explain omnipotent god being subjected to logical laws, so that he cannot but permit evil? And even if you'll prove the possibility of god being subjected to logical laws, how would you prove that evil is logically necessary for the best of all possible worlds? if evil is a means to an end, can't god just provide us the end without using the means? is there any logical contradiction in that possibility? if so, why? Thanks a lot in advance. by the way, I enjoyed and learned so much from watching your debates and the content of your YouTube channel, even as a curious agnostic!

Klil

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Dr. craig’s response


A

It’s wonderful to hear from someone in Israel, Klil! We’ve treasured the few times we’ve been able to visit your beautiful country. I’m glad to hear of the interest in the Christian faith and in the philosophy of religion.

It seems to me that your puzzlement is due to the assumption that “an all-powerful god [can] have no choice but to permit evil.” I doubt that anybody holds to that assumption, Klil, since it seems obviously false. There are certainly possible worlds in which God refrains altogether from creation and therefore no evil exists. So God can certainly choose not to permit evil.

So there is no logical necessity that evil exists. Indeed, there are possible worlds in which free moral agents created by God exist and always do what is good, so that moral goodness exists without moral evil. Such worlds might even be feasible for God, given the true counterfactuals of creaturely freedom about how people would freely choose in whatever circumstances God might create them. But such worlds might be wanting in other respects, so that on balance God doesn’t prefer them over worlds with evil. Alvin Plantinga has even suggested that the self-sacrificial death of Christ for the sins of the world is such an incommensurable good that it overwhelms the evils in the world that it entails and so justifies God’s choice of a world with moral evil!

I think it’s a misnomer to speak of an “omnipotent god being subjected to logical laws.” God isn’t subjected to anything; rather logical laws are simply descriptive of how God, a supremely rational being, is. Moreover, think about it:  if God is able to violate the laws of logic, then the problem of evil immediately evaporates. Is it logically impossible that an omnipotent God and evil coexist? No problem! God can bring about the logically impossible!

Similarly, there may not be any such thing as “the best possible world.” That’s a very controversial claim! It may be that possible worlds just get better and better without limit. So God is under no obligation to create the best possible world, since there is no such thing. And even if there is, it may be a world without evil. Although such a world is logically possible, it may not be feasible for God to actualize, given the counterfactuals of creaturely freedom that are true.

If evil is a means to an end, can't god just provide us the end without using the means?” Not necessarily!  For suppose the end is the actualization of certain creaturely free decisions. In that case, actualization of the end entails that creatures themselves freely choose what they do, and some choices may be evil. In such a case it would be a logical contradiction to actualize the ends without the means because the ends entail the means. Suppose the end that God has in mind is that you freely worship Him. God could magically create you worshipping Him without your choosing to do so, but that would not be the end of your freely worshipping God but a quite different end, one foreign to God’s purpose. Of course, God’s giving you freedom of choice implies that you may freely choose to frustrate God’s purpose for you.

Klil, I’m glad you’re wrestling with such questions. I’d encourage you to read Alvin Plantinga’s discussion of the problem of evil in his God, Freedom, and Evil (1974). Then I think that things will become a lot clearer to you.

- William Lane Craig