The “Heaven Ab Initio” Argument from Evil

Abstract

Logical and evidential arguments from evil are generally thought to have been rebutted by various refutations, defenses, and theodicies. While disparate, these responses employ similar strategies to show that God has morally sufficient reasons to permit evil and suffering in the world, either to preserve human freedom, for the sake of the moral growth of human souls, or to train humans to be able to act freely without sinning once in heaven. In this paper, I defend the heaven ab initio argument from evil (HAIAFE), which demonstrates that God could have accomplished all these goals, without the need for evil and suffering, by creating human beings directly as spiritual beings in a non-physical state of eternal bliss. Moreover, I will argue that the HAIAFE is both a logical argument from evil and a “deodicy”, i.e., a vindication of a deistic god.

Keywords

• Alvin Plantinga
• John Mackie
• James Sterba
• evil
• deism
• heaven