Free Will, God, and Evil in Philosophy Essay Example

Introduction

Philosophy is based on the study of significant and general problems regarding issues such as knowledge, reason, existence, mind, values, and language. In other words, it's about discovering the truth behind various claims. For instance on free will, notably, free will is the ability posed by a person to choose between the different possible courses of action unhindered. It involves judgments like sin, guilt, praise, and responsibility which apply only to activities that are accepted willingly (Strawson, & Watson, 1998). Previously, actions that were freely willed were the ones that received credit or blame. Free will raises specific concerns varying on how people perceive it. In some instances, some people see the free will to be the ability to make decisions in which events that occurred in the past does not determine the outcome. However, the paper will be focusing on God and Evil. Notably, the existence between of God and evil has been much criticized by many philosophers, each trying to show the significance and factuality of their arguments. However, the paper attempts to bring forward points explaining the concept of God and evil

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Thesis statement

God and sin can coexist.

Brief Essay Plan

The essay will provide and discuss the arguments of evil as explained by J.L. Mackie and the state of the free will. The discussion will also include any criticisms of the cases by J.K Mackie on different paragraphs.

Further studies on the topic will be made, and finally, the essay will end up by concluding indicating whether God and evil can coexist or if Mackie is correct that evil proves there is no perfect god? Having in mind that philosophers should not base his or her facts on their personal feelings but on what is reasonable, and what has evidence indicating the points clear. In other words, philosophers produce a set of reasons that make the argument right. Hence the conclusion will consist of facts supporting one of the made cases based on the topic.

Essay

Mackie indicates the statements like God is entirely reasonable, God is omnipotent and still evil still exists, poses a challenge. As in this statement, Mackie sees a contradiction between the three propositions; Mackie goes ahead to state that one is false if the other two are said to be true (Mackie, 2014).In support of this many people believe that God and evil cannot coexistence due to various reasons like the way Gods nature is presented in the Holy books like the Bible, as all good and all powerful. Others state that God is merciful, yet there's evil. Besides, some people believe that good as opposed to bad things, in those good things should always eradicate evil or that a good omnipotent thing should get rid of evil entirely and not have the two coexisting (Adams, 2000). People tend to believe Mackie's arguments due to certain circumstances, for instance, the fact natural disasters occur, i.e., volcanoes and floods caused by physical processes or geological process and the happenings of such events are beyond the influence of an individual's free will. Besides, Natural disasters affect everyone including babies who have had no chance to exercise their free will. It is not correct to indicate that such accidents have anything to do with human's endeavors. Hence there's no good behind such occurrences, and the presence of universal evil shows that there's no good in God.

In contrary, God blessed humans with free-will. Besides, He sent His messengers to teach and encourage people to avoid evil and do good things. Also, His messengers discourage people from doing evil, and He also states that He will make up for those who suffered due to the wrongdoings of others. All this indicate that God and evil can coexist; it's up to humans to choose what they want to be involved (Plantinga, Pontes, & Silvestre, 2009). If people were to believe that God did not exist or He is not all good, then that would end up being problematic as humans would not bear the sweet or bitter fruit as a result of their actions. We cannot blame free will for natural disasters; however, we should understand those beneficial things like rain cause natural disasters (Strawson, & Watson, 1998). Nonetheless, in some circumstances, they end up creating chaos and destruction, i.e., floods. So, perhaps in this world, people can never find anything that is utterly evil, indicating that they both can coexist. Natural disasters are other forms of what is a blessing to humankind. The whole point lies in the fact that heaven is a land of rewards while earth is a place of trials and tests; hence the two cannot be similar (Adams, 2000).

Plantinga's criticizes Mackie arguments using the free will defense, the defense are based on the idea that it's moral to create humankind with freedom. However, if humans are given freedom there is a chance that they will misuse the liberty, probably they might end up engaging in evil acts. Though these evils are bad things and result in suffering, on the other hand, for God to have created humanity, He must allow their possibility of engaging in immorality (Plantinga, 1971). Plantinga's primary aim is to prove Mackie wrong. The free will defense shows that humans have a chance to decide, yet some choose to do evil, and that can only be blamed on the imperfect nature of humans.

Plantinga goes ahead and indicates that it was impossible for God to create a world containing only just good things without having one that includes evil. Hence it is conceivable that God had a moral reason for making a universe that contained free will and evil.

"If there is no logical impossibility in a man's freely choosing the good on one, or on several occasions, then there cannot be a logical impossibility in his freely choosing the good on every time."

Mackie tries to show that God can create humans in such a manner that they not only choose good one on occasion but all occasions. He assumes that God has the power to do so but instead still leaves man to have a nature that allows him to commit evil. Marcie bases his argument on a question. Why God could not have created men in a manner that they are always free to choose the good. The statement according to Marcie shows that God did not avail himself of the possibility of creating humans in a manner that they would always act right. Hence he states that God is inconsistent with being both entirely excellent and omnipresent. Mackie arguments are supported by several others, for instance, according to research, people who choose evil, God could rectify the real-life effect of life and merely allow the committee to feel its effect. The study argues that there's no need for harm to be evident due to a person's choice. In other words, evil could be chosen but not realized, as there's no reason for sin to cause suffering. If people decide to do the wrong thing rather than right, then why does the evil event has to cause pain? A forgiving God would instead rectify the mistake of person that allows them to incur suffering. The fact that God did not separate evil from its effects indicates that God was not interested in preventing harm.

Philosophers that disagree with Marcie indicate that God chooses to give people free will regarding morally crucial decisions. Hence God accepted the risk that humankind may decide to do the wrong thing. Notably, the fact that we are aware the world should not exist as it does shows that there's a way the world should be, hence they were an original design plan. Christians believe In Jesus Christ, they think that he will bring justice and put an end to all suffering when he returns. The perfect eternity that will be brought outweighs the current pain that exists in this world. Good and evil can coexist and not standalone, having in minded that each has characteristics that make its existence tribute the other (Plantinga, Pontes, & Silvestre, 2009). Notably, if God intervened and prevented each human from doing evil things, then there would be no free will. However, as long as there is free will some people might end up abusing this gift and tend to do evil things. Also, God provided adequate food for all mankind; however, poverty on Earth shows that some people gathered more than they needed, in contrary to Gods command, do not give away the share of others.

Conclusion

The fact that evil and suffering exist makes people believe that God does not exist and is not all powerful neither all good. Notably, these arguments are made by philosophers to indicate that God does not exist. However, God and evil can co-exist; having in mind that free will is the capability of a person to choose between different courses of actions without hindrance. Hence God created evil to give people a chance to choose between evil and right and make moral choices. Philosophers argue that God is said to be all powerful and all good yet God did not create a universe similar to heaven, a world free from evil and suffering since God is all good, but this would have denied people a free will, free will work regarding being able to choose independently (Peterson, 2018).

Theodicy is an effort to explain why there's coexistence between God and evil (Plantinga, Pontes, & Silvestre 2009). Notably, the most used argument to support the coexistence is that so that Humans could have free will. In other words, accord allows humans to make moral choices. In other words, the fact that free will exist acts as one of the reasons why God and evil coexistence. Some of the theists argue that suffering and pain exist because of human free will. In that the imperfect nature of humans causes people to make imperfect choices. Humans should understand that suffering caused by evil should not rise to disbelief somewhat it should strengthen peoples hope and faith in God. Similarly, the world looks dark and futile without God as God is the light of the world who gave beauty and hope to all humans.

References

Adams, M. M. (2000). Horrendous evils and the goodness of God. Cornell University Press.Mackie, J. L. (2014). Evil and omnipotence. Philosophy of Religion: An Anthology, 64, 256.

Peterson, M. L. (2018). God and Evil: an introduction to the issues. Routledge.Plantinga, A. (1971). The free will defense. Philosophy of Religion: An Anthology, 167-86.

Plantinga, A., Pontes, A. N., & Silvestre, R. S. (2009). God, evil and the metaphysics of freedom. FILOSOFIA UNISINOS, 10(3), 317-344.

Strawson, G., & Watson, G. (1998). Free will. Routledge encyclopedia of philosophy. London: Routledge.