Jake Bishop

Jan 26, 2001

Reason and Religious Belief

Chapter 6

In the evidential argument of evil against the existence of God, philosophers such as Rowe have argued that the fact that “pointless evil” exists in the world must mean that God does not exist. For if He did, the argument continues, an all knowing, all powerful, perfectly good being would only allow the evil in the world that served some greater purpose.

Philosophers such as Plantinga offer a rebuttal to this argument, called the Free Will Defense, which states that in order for God to create a world where creatures could possess free will, it would have to be possible for them to chose to do evil, and in fact see “pointless evil” occur in order to have truly free will.

Another possible defense for God against the problem of “pointless evil” is the possibility that there is a second being separate from God who is perfectly evil and is free to cause evil in the world, not having the moral obligation to let free will in humans work alone, but influencing humans to be evil, and causing the “pointless evil” we perceive to distract us from our belief in God.  In most western religions this being is called Satan, or the devil.

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