Program / Course 15: The Problem of Evil and Suffering / Lesson 1.4
What you will learn
- Define defense and theodicy and state the difference between them.
- Explain why a defense can be modest and still answer a particular argument.
- Describe why some Christian thinkers distrust theodicy as a project.
- Match a given reply to evil with the kind of challenge it is meant to meet.
The big idea
A defense tries to show that a particular argument against God does not work, usually by offering a possible reason why God might permit evil, without claiming that it is the true reason. A theodicy tries to give the actual reasons, or at least a plausible account of them. The first is a modest task and the second is an ambitious one. Knowing which of the two a writer is attempting prevents many confused debates, and explains why some thoughtful Christians accept the first and refuse the second.
Key terms
- Defense
- A reply to an argument from evil that offers a possible explanation of why God might permit evil, without claiming that the explanation is true.
- Theodicy
- An attempt to explain, as truly or plausibly as possible, why a good and all-powerful God permits evil.
- Greater-good reply
- The claim that God permits an evil because doing so makes possible a good that outweighs it.
- Anti-theodicy
- The view that attempts to justify God’s permission of particular evils are mistaken or morally harmful.
- Mystery
- In theology, a truth that is real but not fully grasped by human reason. It does not mean a puzzle that will be solved.
- Horrendous evil
- A term of the philosopher Marilyn McCord Adams for evil so deep that it threatens to make a person’s life a failure as a whole.
- Consolation
- Comfort offered to a person in sorrow, as distinct from an argument.
Background
The word theodicy was coined by the German philosopher Gottfried Leibniz in a book published in 1710. He wanted to show that this world, with its evils, is the best of all possible worlds that God could have made. The book was admired by some and mocked by others, notably Voltaire in Candide. The word has since been used more widely, for any project of justifying God’s ways.
In the twentieth century, philosophers such as Alvin Plantinga drew a clear line between two kinds of reply. A defense answers an argument. A theodicy states a positive account. The difference is that a defense is judged by whether it is possible and consistent, while a theodicy is judged by whether it is true or likely to be true.
This lesson sets out the difference and the reasons for caution. It closes Module 1. From the next module on, the particular replies are studied one by one, and each should be asked: is this offered as a defense, a theodicy or both?
Step-by-step explanation
Step 1: What a defense does
A defense is a response to a specific argument, usually the logical argument of the previous lessons. Its logic is simple. The critic says that God and evil cannot both exist. The defender says: here is a story under which both could exist. If the story is possible, the claim of impossibility fails.
Since the defender does not say the story is true, he does not have to know God’s mind. This makes a defense hard to refute and also limited. It can show that belief is not contradictory, but it does not explain any particular suffering. Plantinga was explicit that his free-will defense was of this kind.
Step 2: What a theodicy does
A theodicy aims higher. It claims to say why God permits evil. Soul-making theodicy, for example, says that a world with hardship allows persons to grow into mature moral beings. A theodicy needs to be plausible, and plausibility is tested against the facts of suffering, such as the death of infants or evils that seem to destroy rather than build character.
Because it makes a larger claim, a theodicy is much easier to attack. Critics may grant that the proposed good is real and still ask whether it justifies the amount of suffering. Defenders who offer theodicies usually do not claim to explain every evil, but say that a combination of goods may explain much.
Step 3: Why the difference matters for the evidential problem
The evidential argument claims that evil makes God improbable. A mere defense, which says only that a reason is possible, may not be enough to answer a claim about probability. If a possible story is very unlikely, it does little to lower the improbability. For this reason many philosophers say that against the evidential argument a theodicy, or at least a plausible partial account, is needed.
Others, the skeptical theists, reply that the argument depends on human judgments of what is likely about God’s reasons, and that these judgments are weak. They hold that a defense, joined with an account of human limits, is enough. So the question what counts as an adequate reply depends on which argument is being answered.
Step 4: Objections to the whole project of theodicy
Some believers and some critics argue that theodicy is a mistake. They argue that to explain a child’s death as serving a greater good is to say that it was justified, and that this is morally ugly. In Dostoevsky’s novel The Brothers Karamazov, the character Ivan returns his ticket to a world whose harmony is bought by the torment of one child. Whether Dostoevsky agreed with Ivan is a separate question, since the novel gives powerful replies through other characters.
Other thinkers hold that theodicies treat God as a being whose actions humans can audit, and that Scripture, especially Job, rejects the demand. Still others, such as Marilyn McCord Adams, do not reject the project but say it must address horrendous evils, and must show that God defeats them within the life of each person and not only in the overall design of the world.
Step 5: A fair way to use both
A balanced student keeps both tools. Use defense language when the claim is that belief in God and evil is contradictory. Use theodicy language, modestly, when asking what goods might explain some of what is seen. And remember that neither is the same as pastoral care. A person at a graveside is not asking for a defense.
The strongest versions of Christian reply combine these with something else: the claim that God does not stand outside suffering, but enters it in Christ. Module 5 takes up that claim.
- Why does a defense not need to be true to do its job?
- What kinds of arguments from evil can a defense not answer by itself?
- What makes a theodicy easier to attack than a defense?
- Is it morally wrong to say that a particular child’s suffering served a good purpose? Give your reasons.
- Which of the two tasks does a grieving friend need from you?
- What does it mean to say that God defeats evil within a person’s life?
Examples
A defense in outline
A critic says it is impossible for a good God to create free beings who sometimes do wrong. A defender replies that it is possible that God could not have given beings real freedom and guaranteed they always choose rightly. This does not say that the story explains any actual wrongdoing. It only shows that the claim of impossibility has not been proved.
A theodicy in outline
A writer says that the pains of the world work to form people into loving and wise persons, and that many people in fact grow through hardship. This claims to say what God is doing, and so can be tested against counterexamples, such as people destroyed by suffering.
Ivan’s ticket
In Dostoevsky’s novel Ivan tells his brother Alyosha that even if the final harmony of the world were certain, he would refuse it if it required the unavenged suffering of a single tortured child. His protest is aimed at theodicy as a project, and a student should read the chapter in the novel for its full force.
Different perspectives
Catholic
Catholic thought has a strong tradition of theodicy in Aquinas and a strong tradition of mystery. The Catechism teaches that God permits evil only because he can bring good from it, yet it also says that only Christian faith as a whole answers the question. Modern Catholic writers like Eleonore Stump offer detailed accounts that attend to the individual sufferer.
Orthodox
Orthodox writers are generally suspicious of rationalizing theodicies. They put the emphasis on Christ’s victory over death and on the church’s liturgy of lament and hope. Evil is treated as an enemy to be defeated and not as a part of a plan to be explained.
Protestant
Protestants are divided. Philosophers such as Plantinga favor defense. Others, such as John Hick, offer broad theodicies. In the Reformed tradition Calvin and others urge restraint, saying that God’s purposes are just but often hidden, and that believers should not demand an accounting.
Secular and Jewish voices
Some Jewish thinkers, reflecting on the Holocaust, reject theodicy as obscene, though they continue to protest and to pray. Secular critics hold that the shift from theodicy to defense is a retreat that leaves the believer with no positive reason to expect that evil is justified.
Why it matters
Many conversations about suffering go wrong because the speakers do different jobs without noticing. One is defending the coherence of belief, one is explaining, one is grieving. Learning to tell these apart makes the rest of this course clearer and makes a student a kinder and more exact reader of other people.
Common misunderstandings
Misunderstanding: A defense and a theodicy are two names for the same thing.
Correction: A defense shows that an argument against God fails, by offering a possible reason. A theodicy claims to give the real reason. They are judged by different standards.
Misunderstanding: Christians who refuse to explain suffering are avoiding the question.
Correction: Many refuse on principle, because they hold that Scripture and moral sense forbid claiming to know God’s purposes in particular cases. Their view can be examined and argued with, but it is a position and not an evasion.
Misunderstanding: Leibniz’s best possible world is the standard Christian view.
Correction: It is one philosopher’s view. Many Christians, including Aquinas, hold that God could have made a better or different world, and that the goodness of creation does not depend on it being the best possible.
Knowledge check
What is the difference between a defense and a theodicy?
A defense offers a possible reason God might permit evil in order to show that a particular argument against him fails. It does not claim that the reason is the true one. A theodicy tries to say why God does permit evil, and so makes a larger claim that can be tested against the facts of suffering.
Why might a defense be enough for the logical problem but not for the evidential problem?
The logical problem claims impossibility, and a single possible story shows that claim false. The evidential problem claims improbability. A possible but unlikely story does not lower that improbability much, so more is needed, such as a plausible partial account or a reason to distrust human judgment of probability.
Why do some thinkers reject theodicy altogether?
Some think it morally wrong to explain suffering as serving a purpose, since that seems to justify it and to belittle the sufferer. Others think it presumes to audit God, which Job rejects. Others, like Marilyn McCord Adams, keep the project but insist that it must show how God defeats horrendous evil in each person’s life.
Who coined the word theodicy and what did he argue?
Gottfried Leibniz coined it in a work published in 1710. He argued that God, being perfectly wise and good, would choose to make the best of all possible worlds, so the world with its evils is the best that could exist. Many Christians and other critics have found the claim unconvincing, and Voltaire mocked it in Candide.
Think it through
- When someone you know suffered, did you find yourself wanting to explain it? What did that explanation do for you, and for them?
- Is it more honest to say I do not know why, or to offer a possible reason? When is each better?
- Which reading of Ivan’s protest seems most serious to you, and how might a Christian reply?
Independent assignment
Sort the replies
In your own notebook, write about 400 words. Make a table with three columns: the reply (for example free will, soul-making, the fall, mystery), what it claims, and whether it works best as a defense, a theodicy or an act of consolation. Fill in what you can from this module and leave blanks to return to after later modules. Close with a short paragraph on which job you think a Christian reply to evil should do first. Keep it private.
Further study
- Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy, The Problem of Evil Read the part on kinds of response, including defense and theodicy.
- Alvin Plantinga, God, Freedom, and Evil Look for Plantinga’s own explanation of why a defense differs from a theodicy.
- Eleonore Stump, Wandering in Darkness: Narrative and the Problem of Suffering Read the opening chapters for a case that the problem should be asked about individual lives.
- Job 42:7 God says of Job’s friends that they have not spoken rightly, a warning against confident explanation.