Challenges to religious belief-

The problem of evil:

The Inconsistent Triad

God has the power and motivation (love and goodness) to eliminate evil

God isn't omnibenevolent/omnipotent OR evil doesn't exist. Experience tells is evil does exist, so God is not benevolent/potent and is therefore not the God of classical theism. To remain logical, one premise must be removed.

Augustine's Theodicy: Soul-deciding

♦The Fall: Genesis 3. God created a PERFECT world (Genesis 1-2), Humans were created perfect with FREE WILL. "Evil" entered with disobedience of Adam and Eve. They fell from grace when they turned away from God and were unable to resist temptation. We are all guilty, all deserve to be punished as we're all SEMINALLY present because "original sin" is passed on through sex.

♦Evil isn't a "thing"; it's a privation of goodness.Evil enters when something in the world renounces its proper role in the divine scheme and ceases to be what it was meant to be. God's creation is "ex nihilo" rather than "ex deo" (out of God) so although God cannot be less than perfect, his creation can be destroyed/deprived. He is not the author of corruption due to free will- with freedom comes the capability of actualizing "evil"

♦God foresaw man's fall (omniscience) from the foundation of the world and planned their redemption through Christ- divine exchange was essential for our redemption from sin (salvation and repentance)

Irenaeus Theodicy: Soul-Making

♦Adam had the form "image", but not CONTENT of God. He was expelled from the Garden of Eden because of being immature and needed to develop and grown into the LIKENESS of God.The world is a vale of soul-making and Christ sets the example for everyone to follow. The presence of evil allows us to grow and develop. Some moral goods are responses to evil and wouldn't exist without it, for example Courage and Forgiveness. Perfect likeness of God through intelligent and informed responses to evils leads to eternal life in heaven.

Hick:

♦God made man in his image. We evolve the possibility of existing in a conscious fellowship with God. The existence of making responsible moral choices in situations is the necessary pilgrimage within life of each individual. In order to give people FREEDOM to come to God- he create us at an EPISTEMIC DISTANCE (not spatial distance but distance from knowledge of God). It enables free will because if we were to encounter God directly, , it would destroy the potential for fiath and individual growth into the likeness of God.

Natural and moral evil:

♦Natural comes from other sources than humanity for example volcanoes, disease, earthquakes, famine. Surely it is god's responsibility as it is his creation?. Moral evil is humanities doing; e.g. rape, murder

Strengths:

♦Free will is so valuable it justifies the risk of moral evil. Genuine free will includes the possibility of natural evil too.

Even if humans freely choose good, if God designed us to always choose good, we wouldn't be free and probably wouldn't know why and what is goodness. (Plantinga)

Evil is necessary to make a free choice (Swinburne)

Part of our essence to do evil is from when Satan infected the world with evil

Weaknesses:

Sending some people to heaven shows irrational consistency- questions God's benevolence

Darwin: falling from perfection seems contrary to evolution

It is a logical contradiction that a perfectly created world went wrong

God created a being whom he foresaw would do evil- responsible??

Existence of hell not consistent with a loving God

Everything depends on existence by God= must be casually involved in free human actions

Evil is a real ENTITY not, a privation

Scientifically, "seminally present" in Adam is rejected on biological grounds so we are not all guilty.

The extent of evil doesn't weigh up/isn't worth it- doesn't fit in with a loving God