The Philosophy Society Presents: The Understanding of Evil in Religious Philosophy

Philosophy Society Presents: A discussion of Evil within Religion./T'Neil Gooden

By T’Neil Gooden 

 The  Brooklyn College (BC)  Philosophy Society enlightened students on how evil comes in many forms, beliefs, and customs in different religious settings. BC students listened to the words of Professor Andrew Arlig and other audience members as they questioned the meanings and the knowledge of why evil exists in religious traditions. 

   Arlig explained that all the understandings of teachings being emphasized in the discussion were from the book “Dialogues Concerning Natural Religion” by David Hume. David Hume, a Scottish philosopher, wrote works that influenced many scholars, and Hume was recognized as a thinker of philosophical naturalism. 

   “Natural religion refers to the kinds of theological principles and truths one could discover using human reason by itself,” Arlig told the audience. “This is in contrast to revealed religion, which is where our minds, because they’re finite, can’t quite get something, and we need divine aid. And usually divine aid is especially Abrahamic faith.”

   In this seminar, students were open to the concept of Theodicy. Theodicy is defined as the attempt to solve the issue of evil that surfaces with power and all goodness. Theodicy extends students’ wisdom on the two types of evils clarified in this deliberation: Natural Evil and the Free Will of Evil. 

   “Hume has a series of characters who are trying to figure out precisely what unaided human reason could discern about several theological issues, including evil. And this comes up later on in the dialogue,” Arlig said. 

   These philosophical characters include: Demea, Philo, and Cleanthes, who are debating the nature of God’s existence.  

    “They’re interested like God. They all agree that it’s easy to prove God exists, but then that’s the easy part. Then it’s like, okay, well, what kind of thingamajigger is this? And the issue comes up of, well, is God benevolent? Is God all good? And here’s where a riddle comes in. And it’s as good as any kind of intro to the classic problem of evil,” Arlig told the audience.

   Arlig continues to uncover the dynamic of God and evil by letting students understand the problem that encompasses evil. 

   “Evil picks up on a trilogy of divine attributes, power, knowledge, and goodness. We need to fill in the knowledge part,” Arlig told the audience. “And one way can construe it, God can be unable in the sense that he just fails to foresee. It is unable to foresee an evil consequence. That would be a failure of power, of intellectual power, or foresight.” 

   Arlig begins this dialogue with a general understanding of God and provides students with the concepts from each character. 

   “A very common answer in philosophical theology to this problem. The problem being: God’s allegedly all-powerful, God should be all good, and God should be all knowing,” Arlig said. “So how can this thing happen? Well, the common answer is, it’s not from God, it’s from us. Because God gave us free will, God gave it to us. But we have freedom of will. And so we are the ones who muck up the works, not God.”

   Arlig articulated this ideology by explaining that evil is within the power of humans, as God is not the one in charge of our bodies; we are. 

   “We’re all creations, we’re the effects of this thing. And so, that means God allowed us to exist with free will. God knows exactly what we’re gonna do with our free will,” Arlig said. 

   Arlig transitions from the idea of free will evil to the idea of natural evil by questioning whether evil was given to us by God. Arlig uses theologian Al-Ghazali’s concepts to explain the understanding of natural evil.  

   “[Al-Ghazali] has a great example of [natural evil], all the intelligences in the creative world, even if they collectively work together, couldn’t understand even a gnat, even a little flea, let alone all of creation and how it works,” Arlig told the audience. 

   Al-Ghazali had a very common mindset of recognizing the origin of the nature of our souls to explain how natural evil is viewed in a world centered on God. 

   “God’s knowledge and mastery are infinite. And so we’re just unable to kind of see the big picture. So the things we think are natural evils, it’s a failure of perspective on our part to see exactly why it all fits, but it does fit, and it fits with God’s perfection and planning and perfect knowledge, power, and goodness,” Arlig said. 

   Before opening up the floor to students to have a conversation about the concept of evil in our lives, Arlig had one more concept to explain from Al-Ghazali. 

   “Ghazali is a very hard line. He’s got an occasional tendency. And what I mean by that is he does think God’s a micromanager. Everything that exists at every moment is due to God’s immediate active creative power,” Arlig told the audience. 

   Students eagerly explained their opinions on God and evil with their understanding of religion and why people choose to worship different beings. 

   “The more and more you attribute evil to the devil or to dark forces that are at war with the divine and the pure and stuff, the more you’re moving in that manikin direction,” David Ortiz, a student at BC,  told the audience. “But I don’t think the devil is an easy fix, it looks like a nice easy fix, but it’s not. And medieval theologians knew that. So, for instance, a guy named Saint Anselm, historically, this is not called on evil, it’s called on the fall of the devil.”

   Many students had opinions on the idea of evil, but it is all up to interpretation from every individual’s perspective. 

   “There will be people who will say that, saying there is no evil is an easy fix, but then there would be no problem with evil,” Arlig told the audience. “But most of us aren’t buying that because life sure seems to have evil within it.” 

 

For students interested in joining the Philosophy Society, you can go to the Philosophy Society website to learn more. 

   

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