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    Answering the Theodicy Question
    Answering the Theodicy Question
    Answering the Theodicy Question
    Ebook50 pages34 minutes

    Answering the Theodicy Question

    By John S. Pletz

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    The author proposes that an answer to the general theodicy question, which asks how a loving and all-powerful God could have created human beings and placed them into a world where so much suffering and evil could occur, can be found in three interrelated explanations that focus on the consequences of having certain shared key attributes.  Together they show why moral evil, natural evil and all other types of suffering that occur here would not be inconsistent with such a God.  If that is correct,the answer would meet the criteria not only for logical possibility but also for plausibility, thus providing rational support for belief in the omnibenevolence of an omnipotent God.

    This book is approximately ffity-three pages long.

    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherJohn S. Pletz
    Release dateFeb 21, 2023
    ISBN9798215744697
    Answering the Theodicy Question
    Author

    John S. Pletz

    John S. Pletz received a B.A. in philosophy from the University of California at Berkeley.  Following service in Colombia in the Peace Corps and in the U.S Air Force, he received a J.D. from the University of Missouri in Columbia.  He was Executive Director of the Missouri Elections Commission and Deputy Secretary of State for Missouri, following which he engaged in the private practice of law in Jefferson City.  His five previous books deal with ethics and epistemology.

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      Book preview

      Answering the Theodicy Question - John S. Pletz

      A.  INTRODUCTION

      The theodicy question asks how a deity who is both omnibenevolent and omnipotent could have put us in a place where so much evil and suffering occur.  If a God who created and controls everything also loves us, why do so many bad things to happen to us?

      This question has befuddled at least some believers over the centuries because none of the various answers that have been proposed have been able to erase all reasonable doubts about them.  Some people have even left their faiths specifically because the question appeared to be unanswerable, asking How can I worship a God who did such a lousy job in setting up and running the world?  The perceived failure to find a generally recognized solution has also led to the contention that because the theodicy question has proven to be unanswerable, an omnipotent God who is also omnibenevolent not only does not exist but cannot exist.

      The theodicy question sometimes is asked about evil, and sometimes it is asked about suffering.  Evil can be defined both in a broad sense and in a narrow sense.  In the broad sense of the word, it means anything that causes discomfort or repulsion.  Evil in its narrow sense adds both a causation element and an ethical dimension, for it is some harm which causes discomfort or repulsion for which someone is responsible and for which no adequate moral justification exists.[1]  In its broad sense, evil is closely related to the word suffering, which is the endurance of some affliction or imposition (or stated another way, something that is causing discomfort or repulsion).  The distinction between the two different types of evil is sometimes obscured when, after one of them has been specifically discussed, the conclusions drawn are assumed to apply to the other one as well, thereby conflating them.  Unless otherwise indicated, the narrow sense of the word evil is the one being used herein.

      Omnipotence means being all powerful; but power, which is the ability to do something, is always limited to the things which something or someone having a particular power can actually do with it.  A car with a certain horsepower can only move a load weighing at or below the upper limit of its engine’s capacity; it does not have the power to move heavier loads.  The human eye has the power to see electromagnetic radiation having wavelengths within a certain range (that is, what is known as visible light), but most human eyes do not have the power to see electromagnetic radiation having wavelengths beyond the ends of that range (e.g., infrared light or ultraviolet light).  A God who is all powerful would only have to able to do all the things that can actually be done, which would be everything that is possible.  Consequently, in order to have that attribute, God should not need to be able to also do all the impossible imaginary things that we might be able to think up to try to test that capability (e.g., make a stone so large that God could not roll it up a hill or create a prison so strong that God could not escape from it), nor should an omnipotent God need to be able to do things which are logically impossible (e.g., square the circle or make A equal to not-A).  All things that are possible would be possible for an omnipotent God, but that should not need to include doing truly impossible things, as well (if any such things really exist).[2]

      While omnibenevolence is often defined to mean being all loving, the word benevolence more specifically means being kind and being disposed to do good for others, particularly loved ones.  That in turn would lead to actually doing things which benefit others by providing them with an improvement or an advantage.  Consequently, omnibenevolence for God relative to human beings should mean always being disposed to do, and then doing, things which would be good for

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