Problem of Evil

[jackfaire]

Or does God put more value on the murderer's free will than on the victim's?

By not stepping and stopping the murder I don't really say that as God affecting the victims free will at all.

If he stepped in and say made the victim choose to do what God wants him to do that would certainly but leaving the situation alone and just watching.

This of course then removes the benevolence angle as an observer cannot be benevolent.

The reason I say this is because once you desire to do good and be good and act you stop being an observer.

[Ghel]

So your definition of God includes God knowing all past events and all current events, but only knowing future possibilities without knowing for certain which of those possibilities will happen? I don't see this as omniscience, but I think I can work with your definition.

Does that mean that God can only act in the present, and not in the past? Even in that case, I would think that God would be able to stop a murder (for example) right before it happens. Or does God put more value on the murderer's free will than on the victim's?

[Kheldarson]

I'll bite.

You're forgetting the other side of the issue. Particularly with the argument of omnibenevolence. The issue is free will. Sure, God can prevent evil. He can keep us from ever committing a sin. But if He does that, He violates free will. This is the problem which the Church struggled with following the Protestant Revolt/Reformation.

The answer came from the Jesuits. The theology is known as media scientia, or middle science. This is the belief that God is omniscient in the fact that He knows all paths. He knows every single possible decision you might make at any given time and all potential ways you might go. He will send His grace to support you making the right choice, but, just like Adam and Eve, we can always make the wrong choice.

Besides, not to denigrate anyone's pain at the loss of someone, but this was something pointed out to me a while back. How do we know the loss of that good man didn't bring about a greater good? We're not God. We don't see what He sees. He's got this whole huge picture in front of him. So how are we to know what's really good and really evil?

[Ghel]

This is a tangent to another thread: To former Christians: Why do you no longer believe?
The logical structure of the problem of evil begins with four premises:

1. God is omniscient.
2. God is omnipotent.
3. God is omnibenevolent.
4. Evil exists.

We can see the contradiction here. If God is omnibenevolent, he wants to prevent evil. If he is omniscient, he knows about all evil in the world. If he is omnipotent, he can do something about the evil he detects. Thus, evil should not exist. Yet evil does exists, so one or more of the premises must be incorrect.

I don't expect this argument, by itself, to cause anyone to become an atheist. But I hope that it does cause believers to examine their beliefs and try to be consistent.

This argument, phrased slightly differently, was what started me thinking about what I believed and why. I thought (and prayed): Why would God take a good man away from his family who loved and needed him? The eventual answer that I came to was that God did not have the characteristics that I was brought up to believe that he had.

If anyone has comments or objections to this argument, I would like to discuss them. Granted that this argument only applies to gods that have the characteristics listed in the first 3 premises.