HOW AND WHY GOD CAN CO-EXIST WITH EVIL - PART 3

WHY GOD CAN CO-EXIST WITH EVIL
(Morally justifying God's tolerance of evil)

1. Augustinian Theodicy

In the beginning, God created a perfect world without evil or suffering. When Adam and Eve disobeyed God, it allowed evil to enter the world. Evil and suffering thus become the just punishment for this original sin.

Furthermore, according to the Augustinian tradition, any killing, suffering and pain as inflicted upon an enemy when encountered in a just war is positively justified.

2. Irenaean Theodicy

Humans are created in a two-stage process: made first in the image of God whereby the potential for moral perfection is bestowed; and secondly, made in the likeness of God when perfection is actually achieved. To complete this second stage, humans need to have free will and must experience suffering. Such evil is necessary to allow humans to develop as moral agents in this process of spiritualization and soul-making.

3. Eleonore Stump's Theodicy

In her view, the natural evils of disasters, disease, old age and death work to humble humans and make them realize their own frailty and the temporary nature of their satisfaction with themselves and their worldly possessions. This may help them turn their attention to spiritual things and make it more conducive for them to accept the gift of salvation from God.

4. God's Mysterious Plan:

Like a form of predestination, all events have been willed by God. He has a plan whereby each episode of suffering and evil serves a purpose, either to punish us for our misdeeds, to teach us a valuable lesson, to test our faith or free will, to liberate us from more pain or to serve a higher historical purpose or greater good; so just trust God that everything happens for a reason. If life is considered as a whole, misfortunes fall into a certain pattern such that the suffering will not be more than you can bear, the good will eventually exceed the evil and in cases of apparently undeserved or uneven distribution of suffering, the joys of heaven will more than compensate for those. So, each episode of suffering only has a (human) meaning if we attach our own meaning to it, because ultimately, God's plan is beyond human understanding.