(Surin, Kenneth. "Theodicy?" The Harvard Theological Review 76, no. 2 (1983): 225-47. http://www.jstor.org/stable/1509502; p. 225.) The essential form of theodicy calls for a theist to reconcile the existence of evil with that of an all powerful and omnibenevolent and omniscient god. The problem of evil predates even Christianity and can be traced right back to Epicurus. He articulated it in the form of dilemma which has been thus captured by David Hume:
"Is he willing to prevent evil, but not able? Then he is impotent. Is he able to prevent evil, but not willing? Then he is malevolent. If he is both able and willing, whence then is evil?" (Dialogues Concerning Natural Religion Hume, David (1779) (Second ed.). London. Retrieved 20 June 2016. via Google Books). The thread of theodicy runs through the history of Christianity right from Augustine and Aquinas to Schleiermacher and the contemporary times (John Hick, Evil and the God of Love).However theodicy is a theological problem that is not deemed to have been resolved to any appreciable degree of satisfaction. A number of solutions have been proposed throughout history. However, none has had any real convincing strength. Kant's comment on metaphysics seems applicable to theodicy has well (Kant, Critique of Pure Reason).
Most of these theodic solutions appear to err on the side of optimism. Many of these theodicies even appear to run against the grain of realism. There are various reasons why enterprises in theodicy fail. The belief in an omnipotent, omniscient and morally perfect God and the profound reality of evil exist in a state of tension with respect to each other (Pathways in theodicy: Preface). Theologians right from the inception of Christianity to the present age have pondered over the problem of evil. There are a whole host of questions that surround the problem of evil. Why does God allow evil in such quantity and with such depths of horror. It is not a question of mere theoretical ibnterest, but has immediate existential consequences. Part of the question pertains to the relationship between God and evil in theology.
The sheer urgent immediacy of the question can engender a sense of abandonment and of being forsaken similar to one that Christ experienced on the cross: "Eli, Eli, lama, sabachthani?" (My God,y God, why has thou forsaken me?) (Bible, Gospel of |Matthew). Such an experiencer can be a result of a personal tragedy or by a pondering over the pain that haunts the world that we live in.(Karl Rahner, “Why Does God Allow Us to Suffer?” in Theological Investigations XIX, Faith and
Ministry, trans. Edward Quinn (New York: Crossway, 1983 [1961]), 194). Karl Rahner expatiates on the existential implications of the problem of evil. on the question of why God permiots suffering in this world of his creation. It is, according to Rahner, "one of the most fundamental questions of human existence." It is a universal question and also one of immediate urgency which "touches our existence at its very roots." It is not a question that can be simply dismissed out of hand. Theological problems are of all sorts, but none more urgent than than the problem of evil.
It is a significant concern of both ancient and modern Christian texts. One simply needs to open a TV news channel to witness the depth and range of evil in life. The force of evil lashes out with blind indiscrimination. It affects everyone with the immediacy of experience and is not merely a question for the armchair specialist. It's a fundamental question of the human condition.
Another theologian who has closely studied this question is Jurgen Moltmann. Moltmann remarks that theodicies have failed to adequately deal with the problem of evil.(Jürgen Moltmann, The Trinity and the Kingdom: The Doctrine of God, trans. Margaret Kohl
(Minneapolis: Fortress Press, 1993), 49.) Divine justice, by no means, appears to have been established. Evil remains perennially rampant. Moltmann proposes that the problem of theodicy can neither be resolved to any appreciable degree of satisfaction nor can it be altogether ignored. Even though theodicy does not provide us with any definitive solutions, it does approach the problem in a way as to pry it open for closer investigation.The question of theodicy is both unanswerable and inevitable at the same time. Moltmann calls this the open wound of life. One must learn to live with this open question. It calls for an ability to live without any absolute theodical convictions.
(Simpson, Robert. "Some Moral Critique of Theodicy Is Misplaced, but Not All." Religious Studies 45, no. 3 (2009): 339-46. http://www.jstor.org/stable/27750022.) Moral objections have been some of the more significant objections to theodical projects. Moral objections attack the very roots of the idea of theodicy. A counterclaim to the claims of moral objections avers that such claims misunderstand the very idea of theodicy and that in certain situations theodical enterprises are called for. However, the moral critique of theodicy is not altogether misplaced. Albeit, some of the criticisms do hold.
To properly understand the theodical project, one has to analyse the central themes and motifs running through the Jewish, Christian and other theological contexts. The aim of such an analysis cannot be to discover any absolute and conclusive answers. In fact, such an analysis might very well culminate in a proliferation of questions and one might even end up with more questions than one began with. Theodicy is more about generating perspectives through which one views the problem than coming up with solutions. It has, however, the potential to bring us closer to reconciliation with evil.
In the end theodicy is but a conversation with the various interlocutors through the ages who have grappled with the problem of evil and sought to propose various solutions and perspectives. Through such nuanced and open dialogue one seeks to retrace the various trajectories of the theodical path. This can only be the beginning of the theodical process and not its end. All mysteries will ultimately be revealed with the dawn of the eschaton. Until then, all that all of us have are enterprises in theodicy.
(SHEARN, SAMUEL. "Moral Critique and Defence of Theodicy." Religious Studies 49, no. 4 (2013): 439-58. http://www.jstor.org/stable/43659174).The most significant and trenchant form that the moral critique of theodicy has taken is antitheodicy. It is the most important current among the moral objections to theodicy currently. It rejects God in the face of the horrendous suffering in this world. It refuses to let human suffering be tricialized and refuses to lower the bar for divine justice. Either God is held accountable or he is completely done away with, argues the antitheodicist.
Its most vitriolic criticism is reserved for Ambitious Theodicy. Ambitious theodicy holds that good comes from evil (a slander that Paul famously rejects in Romans). Such a theodicy not only trivializes both the suffering and the sufferer, but does a lot of damage to the theodical project itself. An oft-repeated charge against moral anti theodicies is that they are more morally too demanding. Even the least ambitious of theodicies are charged by antitheodicists are also charged with philosophical pessimism.
Let us look at antitheodicy in a little more detail. Moral antitheodicy is the raising of objections to the practice of theodicy for moral reasons. A moral antitheodician can either be a theist or an atheist. Antitheodicy in essence is a moral argument. Historically various kinds of theodicies have been proposed. They are differentiated along a spectrum from the least ambitiopus to the most ambitious. This classification is based on the logic that the theodicy is founded upon. (Trakakis, N. (2008) 'Theodicy: the solution to the problem of evil, or part of the problem?',Sophia 47, 161-191.)
Two well-known exponents of exponents of low-ambition theodicy would be John Hick (Evil and the God of Love; 1966 McMillan) and Alvin Platinga (The Analytic Theist: The Alvin Platinga Reader (1998). William B. Eerdmans Publishing Company: Michigan/Cambridge, U.K.). Even though Hick's and Platinga's theodicies have certain significant differences between them, they both fall on the low-ambition end of the spectrum. The morality of a theodicy and its ambition share a correlationship.
All theodicy can only be provisional and speculative in nature. Although theodicy (unconscious and nontheoretical) is a universal enterprise, its answers can never be absolute and final. The profound and radical evil of this world far outstrips all our emotional and spiritual resources to deal with it. The immense suffering of this world seems, at times, to give the lie to divine justice. Man seems to walk in the shadow of the valley of death (Bible) and swings between hope and despair.
The question of theodicy, in its turn, hangs on the most fundamental question of theology - Does God exist? It is the foundational questiopn of theology and of theodicy. In fact, the whole project of antitheodicy hinges on countering 'divine claims.' Theodical objections can potentially turn into theological objections. Objections to the moral goodness and omnipotence of God can turn into objections to the existence of God.
Thomas Aquinas turns himself to this foundational question in his Summa Theologica. He raises the strongest imaginable objections to the existence of God. The tool that he uses to counter the the claim about the existence of God is that of the problem of evil. He begins by posing the existence of evil and an omnipotent and omnibenevolent God as mutually contradictory. The reality of evil undermines the concept of God. He concentrates primarily on the attribute of infinity associated with God. Most of the adjectival attributes of God begin with the adverbial qualifier 'infinitely' - omnipotent (infinitely powerful), omniscient (infinitely knowing), omnibenevolent (infinitely good), and so on. He states the problematic in the following terms (Thomas Aquinas, Summa Theologiae Ia, q.2, a.3, ob 1 in Thomas Aquinas: Summa Theologiae
Questions on God, eds. Brian Davies and Brian Leftow (Cambridge: Cambridge University
Press, 2006), 24.):
It seems that there is no God. For if one of two contraries were infinite, the other would be completely destroyed. But by the word "God" we understand a certain infinite good. So, if God existed, nobody would ever encounter evil. But we do encounter evil in the world. So, God does not exist.
Theodicy has always been an important element of the Judeo-Christian tradition and runs through the Biblical texts. An example of such a theodic text is the book of Lamentations in the Old Testament. (Boase, Elizabeth. "Constructing Meaning in the Face of Suffering: Theodicy in Lamentations." Vetus Testamentum 58, no. 4/5 (2008): 449-68. http://www.jstor.org/stable/20504424.) The Book of Lamentations explores two aspects of theodicy: the retributive and the educative. A host of theodic responses are raised and subverted through these poems. The book of Lamentations does not articulate a conscious theodic structure. Theodic implications, however, emerge, through the underlying themes and motifs of the text.
The problem of evil is an existential problem. Theodicy is the attempt to defend divine justice in the face of aberrant phenomena that appear to indicate the deity's indifference or hostility toward virtuous people. (D. Penchasky, P. L. Redditt (eds), Shall not the Judge of all the Earth Do What is Right? Studies on the nature of God in tribute to J. L. Crenshaw, Winona Lake 2000.) It is the great calamities of the recent times such as the world wars and the holocaust that have set the theodic enterprise on a new trajectory. The freewill arguments do not have the same potency anymore. They run against the grain of history and reason. The faithful's struggle against evil has become more intense over the years. The idea of a divine cosmic order, after these tragic events, does not have the same currency.
Unmerited suffering seems to dominate in this world. In fact, the theological and philosophical consensus now seems to be that the problem of unjust suffering is not susceptible to any resolution at all. If it is deemed that God is the source of all this gratuitous suffering, then it may potentially trigger an existential crisis in the believer. The modern times have seen the rise of atheism as it becomes increasingly difficult for man to understand and explain suffering in terms of religion. But even abandoning religion does not seem to help. Explaining evil and its consequent suffering in terms whether human or divine is equally impossible.(Theodicy in the World of the Bible by A. Laato, Johannes Cornelis de Moor, Antti Laato, and Johannes Demmor. https://ebookcentral.proquest.com/lib/britishcouncilonline-ebooks/reader.action?docID=253705&ppg=8).
"Is he willing to prevent evil, but not able? Then he is impotent. Is he able to prevent evil, but not willing? Then he is malevolent. If he is both able and willing, whence then is evil?" (Dialogues Concerning Natural Religion Hume, David (1779) (Second ed.). London. Retrieved 20 June 2016. via Google Books). The thread of theodicy runs through the history of Christianity right from Augustine and Aquinas to Schleiermacher and the contemporary times (John Hick, Evil and the God of Love).However theodicy is a theological problem that is not deemed to have been resolved to any appreciable degree of satisfaction. A number of solutions have been proposed throughout history. However, none has had any real convincing strength. Kant's comment on metaphysics seems applicable to theodicy has well (Kant, Critique of Pure Reason).
Most of these theodic solutions appear to err on the side of optimism. Many of these theodicies even appear to run against the grain of realism. There are various reasons why enterprises in theodicy fail. The belief in an omnipotent, omniscient and morally perfect God and the profound reality of evil exist in a state of tension with respect to each other (Pathways in theodicy: Preface). Theologians right from the inception of Christianity to the present age have pondered over the problem of evil. There are a whole host of questions that surround the problem of evil. Why does God allow evil in such quantity and with such depths of horror. It is not a question of mere theoretical ibnterest, but has immediate existential consequences. Part of the question pertains to the relationship between God and evil in theology.
The sheer urgent immediacy of the question can engender a sense of abandonment and of being forsaken similar to one that Christ experienced on the cross: "Eli, Eli, lama, sabachthani?" (My God,y God, why has thou forsaken me?) (Bible, Gospel of |Matthew). Such an experiencer can be a result of a personal tragedy or by a pondering over the pain that haunts the world that we live in.(Karl Rahner, “Why Does God Allow Us to Suffer?” in Theological Investigations XIX, Faith and
Ministry, trans. Edward Quinn (New York: Crossway, 1983 [1961]), 194). Karl Rahner expatiates on the existential implications of the problem of evil. on the question of why God permiots suffering in this world of his creation. It is, according to Rahner, "one of the most fundamental questions of human existence." It is a universal question and also one of immediate urgency which "touches our existence at its very roots." It is not a question that can be simply dismissed out of hand. Theological problems are of all sorts, but none more urgent than than the problem of evil.
It is a significant concern of both ancient and modern Christian texts. One simply needs to open a TV news channel to witness the depth and range of evil in life. The force of evil lashes out with blind indiscrimination. It affects everyone with the immediacy of experience and is not merely a question for the armchair specialist. It's a fundamental question of the human condition.
Another theologian who has closely studied this question is Jurgen Moltmann. Moltmann remarks that theodicies have failed to adequately deal with the problem of evil.(Jürgen Moltmann, The Trinity and the Kingdom: The Doctrine of God, trans. Margaret Kohl
(Minneapolis: Fortress Press, 1993), 49.) Divine justice, by no means, appears to have been established. Evil remains perennially rampant. Moltmann proposes that the problem of theodicy can neither be resolved to any appreciable degree of satisfaction nor can it be altogether ignored. Even though theodicy does not provide us with any definitive solutions, it does approach the problem in a way as to pry it open for closer investigation.The question of theodicy is both unanswerable and inevitable at the same time. Moltmann calls this the open wound of life. One must learn to live with this open question. It calls for an ability to live without any absolute theodical convictions.
(Simpson, Robert. "Some Moral Critique of Theodicy Is Misplaced, but Not All." Religious Studies 45, no. 3 (2009): 339-46. http://www.jstor.org/stable/27750022.) Moral objections have been some of the more significant objections to theodical projects. Moral objections attack the very roots of the idea of theodicy. A counterclaim to the claims of moral objections avers that such claims misunderstand the very idea of theodicy and that in certain situations theodical enterprises are called for. However, the moral critique of theodicy is not altogether misplaced. Albeit, some of the criticisms do hold.
To properly understand the theodical project, one has to analyse the central themes and motifs running through the Jewish, Christian and other theological contexts. The aim of such an analysis cannot be to discover any absolute and conclusive answers. In fact, such an analysis might very well culminate in a proliferation of questions and one might even end up with more questions than one began with. Theodicy is more about generating perspectives through which one views the problem than coming up with solutions. It has, however, the potential to bring us closer to reconciliation with evil.
In the end theodicy is but a conversation with the various interlocutors through the ages who have grappled with the problem of evil and sought to propose various solutions and perspectives. Through such nuanced and open dialogue one seeks to retrace the various trajectories of the theodical path. This can only be the beginning of the theodical process and not its end. All mysteries will ultimately be revealed with the dawn of the eschaton. Until then, all that all of us have are enterprises in theodicy.
(SHEARN, SAMUEL. "Moral Critique and Defence of Theodicy." Religious Studies 49, no. 4 (2013): 439-58. http://www.jstor.org/stable/43659174).The most significant and trenchant form that the moral critique of theodicy has taken is antitheodicy. It is the most important current among the moral objections to theodicy currently. It rejects God in the face of the horrendous suffering in this world. It refuses to let human suffering be tricialized and refuses to lower the bar for divine justice. Either God is held accountable or he is completely done away with, argues the antitheodicist.
Its most vitriolic criticism is reserved for Ambitious Theodicy. Ambitious theodicy holds that good comes from evil (a slander that Paul famously rejects in Romans). Such a theodicy not only trivializes both the suffering and the sufferer, but does a lot of damage to the theodical project itself. An oft-repeated charge against moral anti theodicies is that they are more morally too demanding. Even the least ambitious of theodicies are charged by antitheodicists are also charged with philosophical pessimism.
Let us look at antitheodicy in a little more detail. Moral antitheodicy is the raising of objections to the practice of theodicy for moral reasons. A moral antitheodician can either be a theist or an atheist. Antitheodicy in essence is a moral argument. Historically various kinds of theodicies have been proposed. They are differentiated along a spectrum from the least ambitiopus to the most ambitious. This classification is based on the logic that the theodicy is founded upon. (Trakakis, N. (2008) 'Theodicy: the solution to the problem of evil, or part of the problem?',Sophia 47, 161-191.)
Two well-known exponents of exponents of low-ambition theodicy would be John Hick (Evil and the God of Love; 1966 McMillan) and Alvin Platinga (The Analytic Theist: The Alvin Platinga Reader (1998). William B. Eerdmans Publishing Company: Michigan/Cambridge, U.K.). Even though Hick's and Platinga's theodicies have certain significant differences between them, they both fall on the low-ambition end of the spectrum. The morality of a theodicy and its ambition share a correlationship.
All theodicy can only be provisional and speculative in nature. Although theodicy (unconscious and nontheoretical) is a universal enterprise, its answers can never be absolute and final. The profound and radical evil of this world far outstrips all our emotional and spiritual resources to deal with it. The immense suffering of this world seems, at times, to give the lie to divine justice. Man seems to walk in the shadow of the valley of death (Bible) and swings between hope and despair.
The question of theodicy, in its turn, hangs on the most fundamental question of theology - Does God exist? It is the foundational questiopn of theology and of theodicy. In fact, the whole project of antitheodicy hinges on countering 'divine claims.' Theodical objections can potentially turn into theological objections. Objections to the moral goodness and omnipotence of God can turn into objections to the existence of God.
Thomas Aquinas turns himself to this foundational question in his Summa Theologica. He raises the strongest imaginable objections to the existence of God. The tool that he uses to counter the the claim about the existence of God is that of the problem of evil. He begins by posing the existence of evil and an omnipotent and omnibenevolent God as mutually contradictory. The reality of evil undermines the concept of God. He concentrates primarily on the attribute of infinity associated with God. Most of the adjectival attributes of God begin with the adverbial qualifier 'infinitely' - omnipotent (infinitely powerful), omniscient (infinitely knowing), omnibenevolent (infinitely good), and so on. He states the problematic in the following terms (Thomas Aquinas, Summa Theologiae Ia, q.2, a.3, ob 1 in Thomas Aquinas: Summa Theologiae
Questions on God, eds. Brian Davies and Brian Leftow (Cambridge: Cambridge University
Press, 2006), 24.):
It seems that there is no God. For if one of two contraries were infinite, the other would be completely destroyed. But by the word "God" we understand a certain infinite good. So, if God existed, nobody would ever encounter evil. But we do encounter evil in the world. So, God does not exist.
Theodicy has always been an important element of the Judeo-Christian tradition and runs through the Biblical texts. An example of such a theodic text is the book of Lamentations in the Old Testament. (Boase, Elizabeth. "Constructing Meaning in the Face of Suffering: Theodicy in Lamentations." Vetus Testamentum 58, no. 4/5 (2008): 449-68. http://www.jstor.org/stable/20504424.) The Book of Lamentations explores two aspects of theodicy: the retributive and the educative. A host of theodic responses are raised and subverted through these poems. The book of Lamentations does not articulate a conscious theodic structure. Theodic implications, however, emerge, through the underlying themes and motifs of the text.
The problem of evil is an existential problem. Theodicy is the attempt to defend divine justice in the face of aberrant phenomena that appear to indicate the deity's indifference or hostility toward virtuous people. (D. Penchasky, P. L. Redditt (eds), Shall not the Judge of all the Earth Do What is Right? Studies on the nature of God in tribute to J. L. Crenshaw, Winona Lake 2000.) It is the great calamities of the recent times such as the world wars and the holocaust that have set the theodic enterprise on a new trajectory. The freewill arguments do not have the same potency anymore. They run against the grain of history and reason. The faithful's struggle against evil has become more intense over the years. The idea of a divine cosmic order, after these tragic events, does not have the same currency.
Unmerited suffering seems to dominate in this world. In fact, the theological and philosophical consensus now seems to be that the problem of unjust suffering is not susceptible to any resolution at all. If it is deemed that God is the source of all this gratuitous suffering, then it may potentially trigger an existential crisis in the believer. The modern times have seen the rise of atheism as it becomes increasingly difficult for man to understand and explain suffering in terms of religion. But even abandoning religion does not seem to help. Explaining evil and its consequent suffering in terms whether human or divine is equally impossible.(Theodicy in the World of the Bible by A. Laato, Johannes Cornelis de Moor, Antti Laato, and Johannes Demmor. https://ebookcentral.proquest.com/lib/britishcouncilonline-ebooks/reader.action?docID=253705&ppg=8).
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