Griffin on the Traditional Theological Approaches to the Problem of Evil

Abstract

One of the most important issues in theology and philosophy of religion is the problem of evil and its relation to God and his omnipotence and omnibenevolence. Contemporary theologian and philosopher, David Ray Griffin, regards the efforts to answer the problem of evil as inconclusive. He designates traditional theists, who believe in God’s supernatural interference in the cause and effect chain of events, Supernaturalists. He believes that they interpret evil as only appearing evil. He tries to identify and refute certain beliefs, in traditional theology, which do not tolerate the co-existence of God and evil. Griffin criticizes traditional worldviews and proves that traditional theology, on one hand, by presuming God’s omnipotence, faces serious issues in justifying evil; and on the other hand, considering the idea of creatio ex nihilo, it virtually fails to answer the problem of evil. Allover he holds that defense will not suffice in responding to the problem of evil and that the right path for theists is to propose a theodicy which would explain evil better than atheist accounts.

Keywords

• the problem of evil
• apology
• theodicy
• omnipotence
• david ray griffin