djmullen

I haven't seen anybody argue that evil is really the result of human free will and thus not God's responsibility, but I'll comment on it anyway.

First of all, an awful lot of evil has nothing to do with humans, except that we are it's victims. I'm thinking of things like earthquakes, floods, famines, diseases, tornados and other things that are often termed "acts of God". I do hold God responsible for such things, if He exists.

Another argument is that in giving us free will, God also gave us the ability to kill, torture, starve and otherwise generally fold, spindle and mutilate other human beings and that evil is therefore our responsibility, rather than God's. However, I have free will, yet there are a lot of things I can't bring myself to do, such as eating excrement. I don't feel that my free will is the least bit compromised because I'm unable to smack my lips while eating a big juicy turd. If God is really omniscent, then he knows how to give me free will while making it impossible or extraordinarily difficult to kill, torture, etc other people. And if God is really omnipotent, he not only knows how to do it, he can do it, but doesn't.

Therefore, God is responsible for much of the evil on this earth.

Wyrdsmyth

Oh, you can do a little better. I think you may be close to an epiphany. Think about it: who tempts the devil?

Jamie_L

As Dr. Rick has said, we would appreciate that kind of world if God wanted us to. We could grow and advance if God wanted us to. Or, more likely, God could have made us without need of growth and advancement. Whatever we learn from experiencing evil, God could create us with.

Furthermore, I have experienced very little personal evil in my life, yet I have grown and advanced. So, I believe it is quite possible to grow and advance in the absence of evil. Evil and suffering are not the only types of challenges human beings can face.

In response to the OP question: evil does not disprove all gods. Just certain classes of gods. These gods, however, happen to be the ones most Westerners belive in - i.e. those of the omnimax variety.

Jamie

Theli

A world without cancer? I don't think I would miss cancer that much, and it's pretty difficult to "grow and advance" having a terminal illness.

Wiploc

He could have left us in the garden. Or he could have started us off in heaven. There is no possible excuse for a perfectly benevolent god to want us to suffer.

Quote:

Sure He could have created the world without suffering and struggle, with all harmony and lovey-dovey symbiosis. Would you really appreciate that kind of creation?

Absolutely.

Quote:

There are good reasons to disbelieve in God, but I don't think evil is one of them.

Hey, there are all kinds of gods that could exist, but what cannot logically exist is a god who is both perfectly benevolent and deliberately hurtful. That's a logical contradiction. It is also the traditional Christian god. Your opinion that you wouldn't like a nice god --- as well as my opinion that I wouldn't like a mean god --- is irrelevant to what the problem of evil proves.
crc

yguy

Not God.

yguy

How?

Silent Acorns

Please enlighten us, yguy. What is the third option?

1) possible possibility
2) impossible and possible at the same time
3) neither possible nor impossible
4) none of the above
5) all of the above

Bonus question: Is it possible for (5) to be the correct answer?

Silent Acorns

Let's get something clear. While it is often easier to define something as the opposite of another (e.g. love vs. hate) it does not follow that this is the only way to define something. One does not require an understanding of the concept of hate (or betrayal) in order to understand and recognize love. For example, I love my wife and I don't need to hate someone to appreciate this love, nor do I need to have someone hate me in order to appreciate her love for me. All I need is to recognize the fact that I don't love all things equally and that all things don't love me equally.

I'll use the analogy of temperature to illustrate my point. There is no opposite of temperature; no anti-temperature or negative temperature. And yet, it's obvious to all of us that it exists because we can recognize differences in temperature.

emotional

So the question boils down to: can God be good at the same time that His creation is full of evil? Can a supervisor over his creation be called good if evil runs rampant through it while it is under his supervision?

But even Deists have that problem. Voltaire and Thomas Paine believed God created the natural universe and let it run freely. They believed that the lion eating the lamb was the natural order of God. And yet they called God "good", "Loving Father" and other such epithets. Does that make sense? Ingersoll in his article "The Great Infidels" criticised Voltaire for this:

If you believe God can be good while evil runs unrestrained, what basis have you for judging between good and evil? If God is good while the mouse is crying under the cat's claws, isn't it time to take every dictionary and change the definition of "good"?