As you can see science itself does not put any pressure whatsoever on classical orthodoxy. I did not mention the many theories and hypothesis that scientism depends on simply because they are flawed; which is why they remain hypothesis and theories. Atheists should not bring a sort of atheistic tone to their science as theists should not bring a theistic tone. Chalk and cheese are two different things and they should not be used to describe each other.
The second analysis is the matter of origin. In the classical orthodox perspective there is an infinite Trinitarian God—who spoke all that we see into existence. Many place scrutiny on this claim accusing it of depending on a young earth, but this is not the case. The original scriptures were
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This is said to be the rock of atheism. When it comes to philosophical naturalism there is one argument against classical orthodoxy. It is an inquiry as to how could an all-powerful, and loving God think free will of evil doers more important than innocent deaths? When it comes to the problem of evil it is utterly heartbreaking to think of real life examples. As Ivan Karamazov said in The Brothers Karamazov “with the tears of humanity the earth is soaked from its crust to its center.” The correct answer in a historical orthodox perspective is that the world is now under God’s curse (Genesis 3:17) because of man’s rebellion against God’s Word. This “bondage of corruption,” with the “whole world groaning and travailing together in pain” (Romans 8:21-22), is universal, affecting all men women and children everywhere. God did not create the world this way, and one day will set all things right again. In that day, “God shall wipe away all tears from their eyes; and there shall be no more death, neither sorrow, nor crying, neither shall there be any more pain” (Revelation 21:4). Many Christians have misrepresented God by giving reasons that evil serves some greater good—as if God arranges a cost benefit ratio. He could indeed change our free will in order for sin to dissipate, but without the choice of right and wrong we be programmed to do right; which would mean no meaningful relationships between Him and His creation. The problem of evil is not a matter of why does it exist, the Bible clearly expresses as to why it does, and how it will ultimately affect the righteous as well as the wicked. With that being said, which view makes more sense of evil? The naturalist view that simply says ‘it happens’, or the one that explains it in many different ways and
The problem of evil is a difficult objection to contend with for theists. Indeed, major crises of faith can occur after observing or experiencing the wide variety and depths of suffering in the world. It also stands that these “evils” of suffering call into question the existence of an omnibenevolent and omnipotent God of the Judeo-Christian tradition. The “greater good defense” tries to account for some of the issues presented, but still has flaws of its own.
There is a lot of evil in the world, and much of it happens unexplainably. In the history of life on Earth bad things have happened and evil has caused problems. In relation to some world wide events, 6 million people died in the holocaust, 65 million people died in the war, 800 thousand died in the Rwanda genocide and 230 thousand people died in the 2004 boxing day tsunami. There is a lot of human suffering in the world, but there is also suffering of animals too. A lot of suffering in humans is due to other humans, however some of it can be caused by non-human causes, such as natural disasters etc. Under religious beliefs god was the creator of life on Earth, so if he was all good, powerful and knowing then he would be capable of at least preventing natural disasters from erupting as they cause life to undergo suffering. Likewise, capable of preventing human suffering from natural disasters, i.e. saving people from hurricanes, tornados, earthquakes etc…
In a world of chaos, he who lives, lives by his own laws and values. Who is to say that the death of millions is any worse or better, for that matter, than injuring a cockroach. And in the case of an existing power in the form of God, who is presumed to be all which is good, presiding and ruling an organized universe, why then does evil exist? The prosaic response of “without evil, there is no good” no longer holds any validity in this argument as the admitted goal of good is to reach an existence without evil. So even if a God does exist, I think it is fair, at this point, to say that he is the embodiment of both good and evil. And if humoring those who would answer the previous question with the response that there can be no good without evil, then can we assume that evil is simply a subsection of a defined good? Or perhaps even a good thing? If it is essential, those who chose the side of evil are simply abiding by good values. In the case of a world ruled by Chaos, evil is a non-existent word or value, rather. The system upon which a person’s actions are judged also disappears leaving nothing but an instinct for natural survival as basic and primary as the life within the forests which we tear down to build our houses.
The problem of reconciling an omnipotent, perfectly just, perfectly benevolent god with a world full of evil and suffering has plagued believers since the beginning of religious thought. Atheists often site this paradox in order to demonstrate that such a god cannot exist and, therefore, that theism is an invalid position. Theodicy is a branch of philosophy that seeks to defend religion by reconciling the supposed existence of an omnipotent, perfectly just God with the presence of evil and suffering in the world. In fact, the word “theodicy” consists of the Greek words “theos,” or God, and “dike,” or justice (Knox 1981, 1). Thus, theodicy seeks to find a sense of divine justice in a world filled with suffering.
In order to explain man’s path from the one to the other, he sets up a system of dichotomies that originate from Adam’s fall and are hinged upon the role of the will in earthly life. At the top, God is the source of the “supreme good,” and evil is its opposite (XII, 3). Up to this point, he is in agreement with the ancients, but he diverges again when he equates the good with nature, and evil with a defect of nature—an absence of the good (XII, 3). In this we have the first division of what “supremely is” between nature and vice, with nature arising ...
In light of Craig Stern’s excerpts, from the book, A Higher Law by Jeffrey A. Brauch, he writes concerning four Christian ideas-doctrines “Four Christian ideas-doctrine in fact-are both especially important to that religion and especially important to the rule of law in the common law tradition.” Stern’s begin to explain what formulates the doctrinal belief of the Christian faith. “The first of these is the doctrine of God himself, that is, his being and his work.” By this, Stern’s means that God is the creator of all things he is the beginning and the end. “The Christian faith holds that God is the “I AM,” the uncreated creator of all that is, who is from everlasting to everlasting.” He is also the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, a God of relationship, of covenant. In this way, he is both transcendent and immanent.”
The history of opposition between science and religion has been steady for about half of a century. As early as the 1500's, science and religion have been antagonistic forces working against each other. Science was originally founded by Christians to prove that humans lived in a orderly universe (Helweg, 1997). This would help to prove that the universe was created by a orderly God who could be known. Once this was done, science was considered by the church to be useless. When people began to further investigate the realm of science, the church considered them to be heretics; working for the devil. According to Easterbrook (1...
God is the source of evil. He created natural evil, and gave humans the ability to do moral evil by giving them a free will. However, had he not given people free will, then their actions would not be good or evil; nor could God reward or punish man for his actions since they had no choice in what to do. Therefore, by giving humans choice and free will, God allowed humanity to decide whether to reward themselves with temporary physical goods, and suffer in the long run from unhappiness, or forsake bodily pleasures for eternal happiness.
It is perhaps the most difficult intellectual challenge to a Christian how God and evil can both exist. Many of the greatest minds of the Christian church and intellects such as Augustine and Thomas Aquinas spent their entire lives trying to solve this problem, and were unsuccessful (Erickson, 2009, p.439). However, this dilemma is not only an intellectual challenge, but it is emotional. Man feels it, lives it. Failing to identify the religious form of the problem of evil will appear insensitive; failure to address the theological form will seem intellectually insulting. This conundrum will never be completely met during our earthly life, but there are many biblical and philosophical resources that help mitigate it.
The problem of evil has been a huge debate between atheists and theists. The problem of evil is how can evil occur in the world if God, a perfect being, created the world, and why do bad things happen to good people if God is in charge. Used to critique theism, the problem of evil questions God’s perfection and his existence. It questions God’s perfection by saying, “Whoever does not chose the best is lacking in power, or in knowledge, or in goodness” (Leibniz 89). This means that people do not think that God can be all powerful or perfect because they do not think that this world was the best possible choice. The problem of evil also critiques the question of God’s existence by saying, “If there is more evil than
Many atheists have used science as a way to disapprove the existence of God. Science is not an accurate way of disapproving the existence of God(2). Scient...
...lized by – God, Dr. Roth’s Divine Dichotomy of the Christian God is now comparable to the duality of the Eastern yin-yang. “Good” and “Evil” are clearly inherent in the universe, and are inevitably built into the fabric of all models of the Divine.
In the past centuries scientific innovations have occupied people’s mind. People have been looking for answers about their existence with the help of science and the scientific method. But nothing has changed with people’s culture or behavior. However, something happened two thousand years ago that influenced and changed how some people perceive the world and self existence. It was the beginning of Christianity.
This essay is a conclusive look at the problems and contradictions underlying a belief in God and the observable traits of the world. This problem is traditionally labelled The Problem of Evil. This essay will be an analysis into the Problem of Evil and a counter rebuttal to objections levied against the Problem of Evil. This analysis will be on the nature of god and the world of evil, the world as a mixed creation, ‘sorting’ into heaven and hell objection, God’s ‘mysterious ways’ objection, the inscrutability of god objection, values presupposing pain objection, inherent contradictions in ‘God’s freewill’ and finally non-human
First off, it is important to realize that religion and science have to be related in some way, even if it is not the way I mentioned before. If religion and science were completely incompatible, as many people argue, then all combinations between them would be logically excluded. That would mean that no one would be able to take a religious approach to a scientific experiment or vice versa. Not only does that occur, but it occurs rather commonly. Scientists often describe their experiments and writings in religious terms, just as religious believers support combinations of belief and doubt that are “far more reminiscent of what we would generally call a scientific approach to hypotheses and uncertainty.” That just proves that even though they are not the same, religion and science have to be related somehow.