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A theodicy (from Ancient Greek θεός theos, "god" and δίκη dikē, "justice"), meaning 'vindication of God', is an argument in the philosophy of religion that attempts to resolve the problem of evil, which arises when omnipotence (omnipotence) and omnibenevolence (omnibenevolence) are attributed to God simultaneously.
Unlike a defense, which tries only to demonstrate that God and evil can logically coexist, a theodicy additionally provides a framework in which God and evil's existence are considered plausible.A defence is "an effort to show that there is no formal contradiction between the existence of God... and the existence of evil." Michael Rea and Louis B. Pojman, eds., Philosophy of Religion: An Anthology (Cengage Learning, 2015, 7th ed.), 229. The German philosopher and mathematician Gottfried Leibniz coined the term theodicy in his book Théodicée (1710), though numerous responses to the problem of evil had previously been offered.
Similar to a theodicy, a cosmodicy attempts to justify the fundamental goodness of the universe, while an anthropodicy attempts similar justification of human nature.
Another definition of theodicy is the vindication of divine goodness and providence in view of the existence of evil. The word theodicy derives from the Ancient Greek words , and . is translated as 'God', and can be translated as either 'trial' or 'judgement'. Thus, theodicy literally means 'justifying God'.
In the Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy, philosopher Nick Trakakis proposes three additional requirements that must be included in a theodicy:
As a response to the problem of evil, a theodicy is distinct from a defense. A defense attempts to demonstrate that the occurrence of evil does not contradict God's existence, but a defense does not propose that rational beings are able to understand why God permits evil. A theodicy shows that it is reasonable to believe in God despite evidence of evil in the world, and it offers a framework that can account for why evil exists.Bunnin & Tsui-James 2002, p. 481 A theodicy is often based on a prior natural theology, which seeks to prove the existence of God; a theodicy seeks to demonstrate that God's existence remains probable after the problem of evil is posed, by giving a justification for God's permitting evil to occur.Geivett 1995, pp. 60–61 Defenses propose solutions to the problem of evil, while theodicies attempt to answer the question.
Pseudo-Dionysius, a Greek philosopher and theologian, defines evil by those aspects that show an absence of good. Writers in this tradition saw things as reflecting "forms", so evil was a failure to reflect the appropriate form adequately—as a deficit of goodness where it should have been present. In the same vein, the theologian and philosopher St. Augustine also defined evil as an absence of good; the theologian and philosopher Thomas Aquinas defined evil similarly, stating that "a man is called bad insofar as he lacks a virtue, and an eye is called bad insofar as it lacks the power of sight." The issue of the bad as an absence of the good resurfaces in the work of the philosophers Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel and Martin Heidegger, in addition to the theologian Karl Barth. Similar views are held by the Neoplatonists philosophers, such as Plotinus and the contemporary Denis O'Brien, who state that evil is a privation.
The worldview of Marxism, "selectively elaborating Hegel", defines evil in terms of its effect. (2025). 9780830834150, Intervarsity Press. ISBN 9780830834150 The philosopher John Kekes states the effect of evil must include actual harm that "interferes with the functioning of a person as a full-fledged agent".Kekes 1998, 217 Christian philosophers and theologians such as Richard Swinburne and N. T. Wright also define evil in terms of effect, stating that an "act is objectively good (or bad) if it is good (or bad) in its consequences". (1998). 9780198237990, Oxford University Press. ISBN 9780198237990 Hinduism defines evil in terms of its effect, saying that "the evils that afflict people (and indeed animals) in the present life are the effects of wrongs committed in a previous life." Some contemporary philosophers argue that focusing on the effects of evil is inadequate for a definition, since evil can observe without actively causing harm, while remaining evil.
The philosopher Susan Neiman states that "a crime against humanity is something for which we have procedures, ... and can be ... fit into the rest of our experience. To call an action evil is to suggest that it cannot be".
The philosopher Immanuel Kant was the first to offer a purely secular theory of evil, giving an evaluative definition of evil based on its cause, which is having a will that is not fully good. Kant has been an important influence on philosophers such Hannah Arendt, Claudia Card, and Richard Bernstein. (2025). 9780521590495, Cambridge University Press. ISBN 9780521590495 "Hannah Arendt ... uses the term 'radical to denote a new form of wrongdoing which cannot be captured by other moral concepts." Claudia Card says that evil is excessive wrongdoing; other philosophers such as Hillel Steiner say that evil is qualitatively, not quantitatively, distinct from mere wrongdoing.
The philosophers John Locke and Thomas Hobbes, in addition to Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz, define good and evil in terms of pleasure and pain. (2025). 9781512486094, Lerner Publishing Group. ISBN 9781512486094 (2025). 9781616402952, Cosimo. ISBN 9781616402952 Others such as the philosopher Richard Swinburne find the preceding definition to be inadequate, saying that "the good of individual humans ... consists ... in their having free will ... the ability to develop ... character ..., to show courage and loyalty, to love, to be of use, to contemplate beauty and discover truth ... All that good ... cannot be achieved without ... suffering along the way."
Some theorists define evil by the emotions that are connected to it. "For example, Laurence Thomas believes that evildoers take delight in causing harm or feel hatred toward their victims (Thomas 1993, 76–77)." Buddhism defines various types of evil, one type being defined as behavior resulting from a failure to emotionally detach oneself from the world. (2025). 9789552403163, Buddhist Publication Society. ISBN 9789552403163
Christian theologians generally define evil in terms of both human responsibility and the nature of God: "If we take the essentialist view of Christian ethics ... evil is anything contrary to God's good nature ... (character or attributes)." (2025). 9781532601347, Wipf and Stock. ISBN 9781532601347 The Judaic view, while acknowledging the difference between the human and divine perspective on evil, is rooted in the nature of creation itself and the inherent limitations in matter's capacity to be perfected; the action of free will includes the potential for perfection from individual effort and leaves the responsibility for evil in human hands. (1995). 9780521417242, Cambridge University Press. ISBN 9780521417242
As Richard Swinburne notes, "It deeply central to the whole tradition of Christian (and other western) religion that God is loving toward his creation and that involves him behaving in morally good ways toward it." Within Christianity, Swinburne continues, "God is supposed to be in some way personal ... a being who is essentially eternal, omnipotent, omniscient, Creator and sustainer of the universe, and perfectly good. An omnipotent being is one who can do anything logically possible ... such a being could not make me exist and not exist at the same time but he could eliminate the stars ... An omniscient being is one who knows everything logically possible for him to know". Swinburne adds that "God's perfect goodness is moral goodness."
The philosopher Richard Swinburne says that "most theists need a theodicy, they an account of reasons why God might allow evil to occur."
According to the theologian Andrew Loke, theodicies might have a therapeutical use for some people, though their main purpose is to provide a sound theistic argument rather than succeed as therapy. However, theodicies do "seek to provide hope to the sufferers that... evils can be defeated just as minor tribulations can be defeated."
In The Catholic Encyclopedia (1914), Constantine Kempf made the following argument: inspired by Leibniz's work, philosophers called their works on the problem of evil "theodicies", and philosophy focusing on God was brought under the discipline of theodicy. Kempf argued that theodicy began to include all of natural theology, meaning that theodicy came to consist of the human knowledge of God through the systematic use of reason.
In 1966, the British philosopher John Hick published his book Evil and the God of Love, in which he surveyed various Christian responses to the problem of evil and then developed his own.Cheetham 2003, p. 40 In his book, Hick identified and distinguished between three types of theodicy:
In the dialogue "Is God a Taoist?",Smullyan 1977, p. 86 published in his book The Tao Is Silent (1977), Raymond Smullyan claims to prove that it is logically impossible to have sentient beings without allowing "evil", even for God—just as it is impossible for God to create a triangle in the Euclidean plane having a sum of angles other than 180 degrees. Therefore, the capability of feeling implies free will, which may allow for "evil", understood here as hurting other sentient beings. The problem of evil happening to good or innocent people is not addressed directly in this dialogue, but both reincarnation and karma are hinted at. (2019). 9783038975359, Multidisciplinary Digital Publishing Institute. ISBN 9783038975359
Philip Irving Mitchell of Dallas Baptist University notes that some philosophers have cast the pursuit of theodicy as modern, since earlier scholars used the problem of evil for other purposes—to support the existence of one particular god over another, explain wisdom, or explain a conversion—rather than to justify God's goodness.
The historian Sarah Iles Johnston argues that ancient civilizations—such as the ancient Mesopotamians, ancient Greece, Ancient Rome, and Ancient Egypt—held polytheistic beliefs that may have enabled them to deal with the concept of theodicy differently. These religions taught the existence of many deity and , who controlled various aspects of daily life. These early religions may have avoided the question of theodicy by endowing their deities with the same flaws and jealousies that afflicted . No one god or goddess was fundamentally good or evil; this teaching explained that bad things could happen to good people if they angered a deity, because the gods could exercise the same free will that humankind possesses. Such religions taught that some gods were more inclined to be helpful and benevolent, while others were more likely to be spiteful and aggressive. In this sense, the evil gods could be blamed for misfortune, while the good gods could be petitioned with prayer and sacrifices to make things right. There was still a sense of justice, in that individuals who were right with the gods could avoid punishment.Johnston 2004, pp. 531–547
The Epicurean paradox, however, had already been raised by the philsopher Epicurus, according to the David Hume in 1779. According to Hume, this paradox describes the problem of reconciling an omnipotent deity, with its benevolence, and the existence of evil. However, if Epicurus did discuss these particular problems in the writing that Hume attributes to him, the discussion would not have been linked with the question of an omnibenevolent and omniscient God, as Hume assumes. (Hume does not cite a source or imply that he had knowledge of Epicurus's writings on this suject holding any greater weight than academic rumor or folklore.)
It is generally accepted that God's responsive speeches in the Book of Job do not directly answer Job's complaints. In this book, God does not attempt to justify himself or reveal the reason for Job's suffering; instead, these speeches focus on increasing Job's overall understanding of his relationship with God. This approach exemplifies Biblical theodicy. Bible scholars generally agree that the Bible "does not admit of a singular perspective on evil ... Instead we encounter a variety of perspectives ... Consequently the moral and spiritual remedies, not rational or logical justifications ... It is simply that the Bible operates within a cosmic, moral and spiritual landscape rather than within a rationalist, abstract, ontological landscape." (2025). 9781451464702, Fortress Press. ISBN 9781451464702
The view presented in the preceding paragraph is demonstrated by God's first and second speeches in the Book of Job:
In his book Strange Fire: Reading the Bible After the Holocaust, the scholar Tod Linafelt writes that "Isaiah is generally recognized as one of the most progressive books of the prophetic corpus." (2025). 9780814751657, New York University Press. ISBN 9780814751657 Christian theologians comment that in the Bible, "suffering is understood as having transcendent meaning ... human agency can give particular instances of suffering a mystical significance that transforms it into something productive." (2025). 9780791455234, State University of New York Press. ISBN 9780791455234
Theodicy in the Book of Ezekiel (and in the Book Jeremiah 31:29–30) confronts the issue of personal moral responsibility. The book explicates the power of sin in that "The main point is stated at the beginning and at the end—'the soul that sins shall die. To Christians, the "power of sin" was abolished in the death and resurrection of Jesus, through which all Christians were forgiven and made righteous. The main point of the Book of Ezekiel "is explicated by a case history of a family traced through three generations". The book is not about heredity, but rather about understanding divine justice in a world under divine governance. (1990). 9780804231183, John Knox Press. ISBN 9780804231183
In his book Thematic Threads in the Book of the Twelve, the scholar Paul L. Redditt comments that "Theodicy in the Minor Prophets differs little from that in Isaiah, Jeremiah and Ezekiel." (2025). 9783110175943, Walter De Gruyter. ISBN 9783110175943 For example, the first chapter of the Book of Habakkuk raises questions about God's justice, laments God's inaction in punishing injustice, and looks for God's action in response—and then objects to what God chooses. Rather than engaging in debate, God gives Habakkuk a vision of the future that includes five oracles (or prophetic messages from God) forming a theodicy:
In Redditt's view, Joel and the other minor prophets demonstrate that theodicy and eschatology are connected in the Bible.
In the Psalms, Psalm 73 presents the internal struggle created by personal suffering and the prosperity of the wicked. The writer gains perspective when he "enters the sanctuary of God " (Psalm 73:16–17), seeing that God's justice will eventually prevail. The writer reaffirms his relationship with God, is ashamed of his resentment, and chooses trust. Later in the Book of Psalms, Psalm 77 contains true outspokenness toward God, in addition to determination to hold on to faith and trust.
John M. Frame and Joseph E. Torres comment on these issues in their book Apologetics: A Justification of Christian Belief: For Christians, the scriptures provide assurance that the allowance of evil is for a good purpose based on relationship with God. In his book Providence and the Problem of Evil, Richard Swinburne writes that "Some of the good ... cannot be achieved without delay and suffering, and the evil of this world is indeed necessary for the achievement of those good purposes. ... God has the right to allow such evils to occur, so long as the 'goods' are facilitated and the 'evils' are limited and compensated in the way that various other Christian doctrines (of human free will, life after death, the end of the world, etc.) affirm ... the 'good states' which (according to Christian doctrine) God seeks are so good that they outweigh the accompanying evils."
The comments in the preceding paragraph are somewhat illustrated—according to Christian interpretation—in the Book of Exodus, when Pharaoh is described as being "raised up" so that God's name would be known throughout the world (Exodus 9:16). In Christian theology, this illustration is mirrored in Romans 9, where Paul appeals to God's sovereignty as sufficient explanation, with God's goodness known experientially by Christians.
In the Roman Catholic reading of Augustine, the issue of just war—as developed in his book The City of God—substantially established his position on the positive justification of killing, suffering, and pain as inflicted upon an enemy when encountered in war for a just cause. Augustine asserted that peacefulness—in the face of a grave wrong that could only be stopped by violence—would be a sin. Defense of oneself or others could be necessary, especially when authorized by a legitimate authority. While not elaborating the conditions required for war to be just, Augustine nonetheless originated the phrase just war in his work The City of God. In essence, the pursuit of peace must include the option of fighting with all of its eventualities, in order to preserve peace in the long term. Such a war could not be pre-emptive but rather defensive to restore peace. Thomas Aquinas, centuries later, used the authority of Augustine's arguments in an attempt to define the conditions under which a war could be just.
Given the strong version of this theodicy, if evils will be compensated, the existence of some good is enough to justify them, even though there will be no resulting greater good in this world. Likewise, if evils will be compensated, it is not necessary for them to be distributed equally. Even if evil has no good for an individual, while it has some good for others, it is reasonable for it to occur.
Critics, such as Bruce R. Reichenbach, argue that compensation theodicy fails to adequately justify the existence of horrendous evils, particularly when such evils do not lead to greater goods or when they disproportionately affect innocent individuals. He contends that the theory risks treating individuals merely as means to an end, undermining their intrinsic value.
In response, proponents argue that God's unique guardianship over humanity allows for the infliction of suffering when it serves a greater purpose in the afterlife. These proponenents maintain that God’s omnipotence ensures that all suffering will be compensated in a manner that ultimately leads to greater satisfaction for the sufferer.
A defense has been proposed by the American philosopher Alvin Plantinga, which is focused on showing the logical possibility of God's existence. Plantinga's version of the free-will defense argued that the coexistence of God and evil is not logically impossible and that free will further explains the existence of evil without contradicting the existence of God.
Ash'ari theology insists on ultimate divine transcendence; moreover, it teaches that human knowledge regarding this transcendence is limited to what has been revealed through the prophets, so that on the question of God's creation of evil, revelation must be accepted (without asking how).
According to the Maturidite school of thought, ontological evil serves a greater purpose and is in essence secretly good.Miles, L. (2018). Introduction to the Study of Religion. Vereinigtes Königreich: EDTECH. p. 70 God's wisdom is not considered to focus on choosing between good and evil; rather, it is concerned with putting things in their proper place. The existence of evil as distinct from good (or opposing good) is rejected throughout sources from Maturidite thinkers. Maturidi himself criticizes believing in the opposition of good and evil as a remnant of Persian religion dualistic religions. Rumi likewise said in his refutation of Ahriman (the principle of evil) that "good cannot exist without evil" and "there is no separation between them".
Ibn Sina, the most influential Muslim philosopher, analyzed theodicy from a purely ontological, neoplatonic standpoint; he aimed to prove that God, as the absolutely good First Cause, created a good world. Ibn Sina argued that evil refers to either to a cause affecting an entity (such as being burned in a fire), in which case evil is a quality of another entity, or to an entity's imperfection (such as blindness), in which case evil does not exist as an entity. According to Ibn Sina, such qualities are necessary attributes of the best possible order of things, so that the good they serve is greater than the harm they cause.
Philosophical Sufi theologians such as Ibn Arabi were influenced by the neoplatonic theodicy of Ibn Sina. The scholar Al-Ghazali anticipated the optimistic theodicy of Leibniz in his dictum "There is nothing in possibility more wonderful than what is". The theologian and philsopher Fakhr al-Din al-Razi, who represented the mainstream Sunni view, challenged Ibn Sina's analysis and argued that it merely sidesteps the real problem of evil, which is rooted in the human experience of suffering in a world that contains more pain than pleasure.
, a French Jewish philosopher ]] The Holocaust prompted a reconsideration of theodicy in some Jewish circles.Pinnock 2002, p. 8 The French Jewish philosopher Emmanuel Levinas, who had been a prisoner of war in Nazi Germany, declared theodicy to be "blasphemous", arguing that it is the "source of all immorality"; he demanded that the project of theodicy be ended. Levinas asked whether the idea of moral absolutism survived after the Holocaust—he proposed that it did. He argued that humans are not called to justify God in the face of evil, but to attempt to live godly lives; rather than considering whether God was present during the Holocaust, the duty of humans is to build a world where goodness will prevail.Patterson & Roth 2005, pp. 189–90
The scholar David R. Blumenthal, in his book Facing the Abusing God, supports the "theology of protest", which he saw as presented in Elie Wiesel's play The Trial of God (1979). Blumenthal supports the view that survivors of the Holocaust cannot forgive God and so must protest about it. Blumenthal believes that a similar theology is presented in the Book of Job, in which Job does not question God's existence or power, but instead his morality and justice.Blumenthal 1993, pp. 250–51 Other prominent voices in the Jewish tradition include the Nobel Prize-winning author Elie Wiesel (mentioned above) and Richard L. Rubinstein (especially in his book The Cunning of History).Rubinstein, Richard L. The Cunning of History.
, the seventh Rebbe of Chabad]]Menachem Mendel Schneerson, the seventh Rebbe of Chabad (a Hasidic Judaism Jewish dynasty), sought to elucidate how faith (or trust, ) in God defines the full, transcendental preconditions of anti-theodicy. Rabbi Schneerson endorsed the attitude of "holy protest" found in the stories of Job and Jeremiah, as well as those of Abraham (Vayeira) and Moses (Ki Tissa); he argued that a phenomenology of protest, when carried to its logical limits, reveals a profound conviction in cosmic justice—as first exemplified in Abraham's question: "Will the Judge of the whole earth not do justice?" (Genesis 18:25). Recalling Kant's 1791 essay on the failure of all theoretical attempts at theodicy, Über das Misslingen aller philosophischen Versuche in der Theodizee http://cas.uchicago.edu/workshops/germanphilosophy/files/2013/02/Kant-On-the-Miscarriage-of-all-Philosophical-Trials-at-Theodicy.pdf Rabbi Schneerson identifies a viable practical theodicy with messianism. His faithful anti-theodicy is worked out in a long letter, dated 26 April 1965, to Elie Wiesel.http://www.chighel.com/opening-statement-7a/ The original letter in Yiddish is found in R. Menachem Mendel Schneerson, Likutei Siḥot, Vol. 33 (New York: Kehot, 1962–2001), pp. 255–60.
Hannah Arendt offers notable resistance to this trend of anti-theodicy in her works The Origins of Totalitarianism and—more sensationally—in her reporting on the Eichmann trial, which was collected in her book Eichmann in Jerusalem. Without resorting to transcendental authority, purely by observation, Arendt arrives at a conclusion similar to Augustine's theodicy: She ascribes Eichmann trial evil actions to a lack of empathic imagination and to the thoughtlessness of his conformity to norms of careerism within the Nazi Germany. She finds a thoughtlessness or total absence of consideration for other perspectives at the center of his behavior. The quality of this lack she describes as "the banality of evil". Arendt did not intend to propose "the banality of evil" as a technical term or fixed denomination by which to describe the void of empathic imagination that she observed—it simply happened to be a phrase in her description that was appropriated by the reviewing press and by other scholarly responsa. Banality is only a facet or particular quality of her vantage point in looking into this emptiness.
, an American philosopher and theologian]] In an essay for The Hedgehog Review, the scholar Eugene McCarraher called David Bentley Hart's 2005 book The Doors of the Sea "a ferocious attack on theodicy in the wake of the previous year's tsunami" (in reference to the 2004 tsunami in the Indian Ocean). As Hart states on page 58 of the book: "The principal task of theodicy is to explain why paradise is not a logical possibility." Hart's unwillingness to concede that theodicy has any positive capacity to explain the purpose of evil is consistent with many Greek church fathers. For example, in his book Theophany: The Neoplatonic Philosophy of Dionysius the Areopagite, the philosopher Eric D. Perl writes as follows:
The theologian Karl Barth viewed the evil of human suffering as being ultimately under the "control of divine providence".Karl Barth, Church Dogmatics (T & T Clark, 1957), IV-1, 246. Given this view, Barth deemed it impossible for humans to devise a theodicy that establishes "the idea of the goodness of God".Barth, Church Dogmatics, III-1, 368. For Barth, only the crucifixion could establish the goodness of God. In the crucifixion, God bears and suffers what humanity suffers.Barth, Church Dogmatics, II-2, 165. This suffering by God Himself makes human theodicies anticlimactic.Barth, Church Dogmatics, IV-1, 246. Barth found a "twofold justification" in the crucifixion:Barth, Church Dogmatics, II-2, 223. the justification of sinful humanity and "the justification in which God justifies Himself".Barth, Church Dogmatics, IV-1, 564.
The Christian Science religious movement offers a solution to the problem by denying that evil ultimately exists.Ben Dupre, "The Problem of Evil", 50 Philosophy Ideas You Really Need to Know, London, Quercus, 2007, p. 166: "Denying that there is ultimately any such thing as evil, as advocated by Christian Scientists, solves the problem at a stroke, but such a remedy is too hard for most to swallow."Whale, J. S. The Christian answer to the problem of evil. 1948 Mary Baker Eddy (the founder of Christian science) and Mark Twain had contrasting views on theodicy and suffering, which are well-described by the historian Stephen Gottschalk."Rolling Away the Stone: Mary Baker Eddy's Challenge to Materialism" (Indiana University Press, 2006) 83, 123, etc.
Redemptive suffering, based in Pope John Paul II's theology of the body, embraces suffering as having value in and of itself. In her book Wandering in Darkness, the philosopher Eleonore Stump uses psychology, narrative, and exegesis to demonstrate that redemptive suffering, as found in Thomism theodicy, can constitute a consistent and cogent defense for the problem of suffering.
In his book, Evil, Sin and Christian Theism (2022), the theologian Andrew Loke develops a "big picture" free-will defense, arguing that God's justification for allowing suffering is not based primarily on an argument from future benefits, but instead on the nature of love which involves "allowing humans to exercise their free will in morally significant ways". Loke employs an approach in which "Christian theism provides the big picture and uses a combination of theodicies" in defense of a moderate version of skeptical theism. This big-picture approach, according to him, helps to put the problem of evil and suffering in a larger perspective that answers the major questions inherent in a worldview. Such questions include the following: "What is the greatest good? What is the meaning of life? Where do I come from? Where am I going?" Loke argues that Christian theism provides the most comprehensive and consistent answers to these questions: "the greatest good is to have a right relationship with God, the source of all good. The meaning of life...is to live our lives for the greatest good;...to glorify God and enjoy him..." In Loke's view, the bigger picture of a just, all-powerful, and loving God who will ultimately defeat evil serves as the backdrop against which all temporal suffering can obtain a meaningful understanding.
Considering the relationship between theodicy and cosmodicy, the theologian argued that the choice between theodicy and cosmodicy is a false dilemma.Van der Ven 1989, p. 205 The theologian Philip E. Devenish proposed what he described as "a nuanced view in which theodicy and cosmodicy are rendered complementary, rather than alternative concepts".Devenish 1992, pp. 5–23 The theologian J. Matthew Ashley described the relationship between theodicy, cosmodicy and anthropodicy as follows:
The theologian effectively refutes any view that holds that God has restricted his power because of his love, saying that it creates a "metaphysical dualism"; moreover, it would not alleviate God's responsibility for evil, because God could have prevented evil by not restricting himself. Van den Brink then elaborates an explanation of power and love from a Trinity perspective which equates these two qualities; he also explains what he calls "the power of love" as representative of God's involvement in the struggle against evil.
Maturidism
In contrast to Ash'arism, Maturidism adheres to moral realism—the human mind is able to grasp good and evil independently from revelation—yet disagrees with the Mu'tazilite assertion that God's wisdom entails creating only what is good. Good and evil, though real, are considered to be created by God; thus God is not subject to good and evil, and humans merely learn whatever God created. Blaming God for a violation of right and wrong is thus considered unmerited, since God created right and wrong originally. Whatever is considered evil by humans would ultimately be good. A distinction exists between those who follow tawhid (or monotheism) and those who reject it. Maturidi cites Surah Al Imran, verse 178, to indicate that God does not regard believers and unbelievers as equal; God would increase the sin of the sinners (and guide the believers).
Atharism
The Hanbali legal scholar Ibn Taymiyya, whose writings became influential in Wahhabism, argued as follows: while God creates human acts, humans are responsible for their deeds as the agents of their acts. Ibn Taymiyya held that divine creation is good from a causal standpoint, since God creates all things for wise purposes. Thus, apparent evil is actually good in view of its purpose, and pure evil does not exist. This analysis was developed further with practical illustrations by Ibn al-Qayyim, a scholar, jurist, and theologian.
Mu'tazilism
Mu'tazila theologians approached the problem of theodicy within a framework of moral realism, according to which the moral value of acts is accessible to unaided reason, so that humans can make moral judgments about divine acts. These theologians argued that the divine act of creation is good despite the existence of suffering, because it allows humans the compensation of a greater reward in the afterlife. The theologians posited that individuals have free will to commit evil, and they absolved God of responsibility for such acts. God's justice thus consists of punishing wrongdoers. Following the demise of Mu'tazila as a school, its theodicy was adopted in the Zaydi and Twelver branches of Shia Islam.
Alternatives
Jewish anti-theodicy
In 1998, the Jews theologian Zachary Braiterman coined the term anti-theodicy in his book (God) After Auschwitz; the term was used to describe Jews, in both a biblical and a post-Holocaust context, whose response to the problem of evil is protest and a refusal to investigate the relationship between God and suffering. An anti-theodicy acts in opposition to a theodicy and places full blame for all experience of evil onto God, but it must rise from an individual's belief in and love of God. Anti-theodicy has been likened to Job's protests in the Book of Job.Marty & Taliaferro 2010, p. 17 Braiterman wrote that an anti-theodicy rejects the idea that there is a meaningful relationship between God and evil, or that God could be justified for the experience of evil.Gibbs & Wolfson 2002, p. 38
Christian alternatives to theodicy
A number of Christian writers oppose theodicies. The theologian J. Todd Billings deems constructing theodicies to be a "destructive practice".Todd Billings, "Theodicy as a 'Lived Question': Moving Beyond a Theoretical Approach to Theodicy", http://www.luthersem.edu/ctrf/JCTR/Vol05/billings.htm Accessed 25 September 2013. About the author: http://www.westernsem.edu/about/faculty-staff/. In the same vein, the philosopher Nick Trakakis observes that "theodical discourse can only add to the world's evils, not remove or illuminate them".Nick Trakakis, "Theodicy: The Solution to the Problem of Evil, or Part of the Problem?", Springerlink.com, accessed 19 December 2009. As an alternative to theodicy, some theologians have advocated "reflection on tragedy" as a more appropriate reply to evil.Donald W. Musser and Joseph L. Price, eds., A New Handbook of Christian Theology (Abingdon Press, 1992), s.v. "Tragedy." For example, Wendy Farley believes that "a desire for justice" and "anger and pity at suffering" should replace "theodicy's cool justifications of evil".Wendy Farley, Tragic Vision and Divine Compassion: a Contemporary Theodicy (Westminster John Knox Press, 1990) 12, 23. Sarah K. Pinnock opposes abstract theodicies that would legitimize evil and suffering. However, she endorses discussions of theodicy in which people ponder God, evil, and suffering from a perspective of practical faith .Sarah Katherine Pinnock, Beyond Theodicy (SUNY Press, 2002), 135, 141.
Free-will defense
As an alternative to a theodicy, a defense may be offered as a response to the problem of evil. A defense attempts to show that God's existence is not made logically impossible by the existence of evil; God's existence does not need to be true or plausible, merely logically possible. The American philosopher Alvin Plantinga offers a free-will defense: in this argument, he claims that human free will sufficiently explains the existence of evil; at the same time, he maintains that God's existence remains logically possible.McGrath 1995, p. 193 Plantinga argues that, if God's existence and the existence of evil are to be logically inconsistent, a premise must be provided which, if true, would make them inconsistent; since none has been provided, the existence of God and evil must be consistent. Free will furthers this argument by providing a premise which, in conjunction with the existence of evil, entails that God's existence remains consistent.Plantinga & Sennett 1998, pp. 22–24 Opponents have argued that this defense is discredited by the existence of evil not related to humans—such as droughts, tsunamis, and malaria.
Cosmodicy and anthropodicy
A cosmodicy attempts to justify the fundamental goodness of the universe in the face of evil, and an anthropodicy attempts to justify the fundamental goodness of human nature in the face of the evils produced by humans.Carsten Meiner, Kristin Veel, eds., The Cultural Life of Catastrophes and Crises (Walter de Gruyter, 2012), 243.
Essential kenosis
Essential kenosis is a form of process theology (related to "open theism") that allows a person to affirm that God is almighty, while simultaneously affirming that God cannot prevent genuine evil. In this view, because God—out of love—necessarily gives freedom, agency, self-organization, natural processes, and law-like regularities to creation, God cannot override, withdraw, or fail to provide such capacities. Consequently, God is not culpable for failing to prevent genuine evil. The work of the philosopher Thomas Jay Oord explains this view fully.
See also
Citations
(2025). 9780631219088, John Wiley & Sons. ISBN 9780631219088
(2025). 9780415266123, Psychology Press. ISBN 9780415266123
(2025). 9781441111975, Continuum International Publishing Group. ISBN 9781441111975
(2025). 9780295985473, University of Washington Press. ISBN 9780295985473
(1998). 9780802842299, Wm. B. Eerdmans Publishing. ISBN 9780802842299
(2025). 9781564785718, Dalkey Archive Press. ISBN 9781564785718
External links
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