Evil most certainly exists. What I meant was we can’t judge God’s actions as evil as we don’t know everything as He does.
I’m a little confused by your initial post then. Please correct me my train of thought, but this is what I thought your analogy was:
You were responding to rjung, who wrote: “If God is indeed the Creator of Everything™, then He not only created Evil, but freely indulges in it from time to time.”.
You brought up an analogy of a father and son and some candy, where the father denied the kid some candy because he had the kid’s best interest in mind. This seems to answer rjung’s question because what we think of as evil isn’t actually evil-it’s just that we can’t understand how it’s good.
I then said if candy was truly evil, then why create it in the first place, because to create it to then explain it’s existence is somewhat circular. If there was no candy, then the kid would never ask for it to begin with and wouldn’t spoil his dinner.
I don’t believe you responded to that, but you did respond to rjung’s next post; the one where rjung said “Just because the three-year-old thinks an act is evil doesn’t necessarily make it so.”, to which you responded ‘exactly’.
So I guess I’m confused because this indicates that there isn’t any evil act to commit.
To expand a little further because it also seems here that you say that God doesn’t commit evil acts; but no matter how you slice it God either created evil or allowed it to exist (which isn’t necessary) either of which is evil.
In order to say that God doesn’t commit evil acts, that means that there aren’t evil acts to commit or that God either didn’t create the universe, isn’t powerful enough to stop it, or ______?
Also, without explaining to the child why you are taking the cookie, the child would have every right to view the act as evil. If this is the case, then not worshipping/loving/accepting the God who commits ‘evil acts’ is noble and it would be ‘wrong’ to punish these people by sending them to Hell (or otherwise repremand them).
Then again, I might have misconstrued either your intentions or your point.
Would you agree that by the same token we can’t judge God’s actions as good, either?
The candy itself isn’t evil, it’s the taking away of the candy which could be perceived as an evil act by a three year old.
I suppose so, but if He truly is all-knowing (which I believe He is), then who am I to judge?
Well, you can be omniscient and omnipotent but not omnibenevolent. It’s easy enough to imagine an alternate universe where God is a right evil bastard in all but the most convoluted definitions of “evil”.
True.
what do you mean “alternate”?
seriously, though, the argument goes like this:
- god created the universe.
- evil exists in the universe.
- god is wholly benevolent.
- god is omnipotent.
- a wholly benevolent being would not create evil if he could do otherwise.
- an omnipotent being can do otherwise.
so we have by (1) and (2) that god created evil. by (3) and (5) we have god would not create evil if he could do otherwise. we then have, by (4) and (6) that god could do otherwise, which is a contradiction with the implied “god created evil.” so one must reject one of these assumptions.
the easiest one to reject, it seems to me, is (2). in order to claim (2) we need a clear definition of “evil”, which i don’t think we have. to me, “evil” (or, “something that is bad”) is anything that causes me displeasure. surely there are things that cause me displeasure, so evil surely exists. i wonder what definitions of “evil” others operate under. it seems that we can’t continue this discussion in a meaningful manner without that piece of the puzzle.
To be certain, some people do reject the idea that “evil” exists. I certainly am not stopping them from thinking of it that way, but I would propose that unless absolutely necessary, when adopting a proposition to discuss philosophically, that the terms be defined as close to “natural language” definitions as possible, so that the results make sense.
And I would agree that we need a common language definition of evil. But I’m too tired to think of one 
[generalized philosophical rant ahead…pay no mind]
However, some people might define evil as “the absence of God”, and thus, since God is everywhere, evil doesn’t exist. Or evil is the absence of God and, being an absence and not a concrete “thing”, doesnt have existence.
If one goes down this path, though, the results, while seeming to be quite awesome, natural language wise, are pretty useless. For instance “evil doesn’t exist” may sound great, but what was really demonstrated is “evil, as minutely defined in a way that no one else in their right mind agrees with, and subject to these weird metaphyscial assumptions, doesn’t exist.”
[/rant]
I’d say it’s easier then imagining a ‘good’ God that allows for evil or even events that seem to be evil-after all, how can we trust God if we perceive him to be evil, just because we don’t understand him?
Good point.
I’d say this point doesn’t effect the Deist’s God, but certainly a personal God…
I agree with the need to define “evil”. I think a lot of the confusion arises from the Judeo-Christian culture most of us were raised in. The two sources of that tradition are already in conflict.
“Judeo” - Ancient Judaism was strongly monistic - God is the author of *both * good and evil. “Evil” in this context means “bad stuff”. If my crops fail, or my son dies, that’s evil.
“Christian”- Christianity is strongly dualistic - there is a good God and an evil power, Satan, that are in constant struggle. In this context, “evil” is an abstract principle that is utterly opposed to “good”. If my crops fail, it’s more likely to be attributed to a drought than to Satan. Intentions are much more important. If I run over someone while driving, it makes a great deal of difference whether I did it on purpose or by accident.
If you want to relate it back to God, we could say that Judaism softens God’s omnibenevolence, while Christianity softens God’s omnipotence. When forced to face the logical contradiction, though, they both have the same response: “It’s a mystery.”