Sunday, August 23, 2009

Evil

Since the Arminian blogosphere's argument du jour happens to be "Calvinism makes God the author of evil" I thought I would come at it at a slightly different angle than the one that Steve has already taken. The problem with throwing around a phrase like "author of evil" is that it's kind of important that two words ("author" and "evil") get defined, yet Arminians seem to think such a step is too burdensome to enact. Steve has recently focused a great deal on what "author" means, so I want to look at the other term. This also ties in to my recent posts on Divine Command Theory, and I must point out in passing that for some strange reason we never see Arminians attempt to ground morality in a like manner to how I have argued for it in DCT.

With that said, what do we mean by evil when we ask if God is the author of evil?

Well, evil could mean simply those things as natural disasters—hurricanes, famines, floods, etc. Indeed, these are often called "natural evils" for that very reason. But most Christians would have no problem saying that God is the "author" of natural evils given the myriad examples of God causing/sending/creating disasters. A few specifics from Scripture will suffice to validate this point:
"For in seven days I will send rain on the earth forty days and forty nights, and every living thing that I have made I will blot out from the face of the ground" (Genesis 7:4).

"And I will heap disasters upon them; I will spend my arrows on them; they shall be wasted with hunger, and devoured by plague and poisonous pestilence; I will send the teeth of beasts against them, with the venom of things that crawl in the dust" (Deuteronomy 32:23-24).

"Then they will say, 'Because they abandoned the LORD their God who brought their fathers out of the land of Egypt and laid hold on other gods and worshiped them and served them. Therefore the LORD has brought all this disaster on them'" (1 Kings 9:9).

"I form light and create darkness, I make well-being and create calamity, I am the LORD, who does all these things" (Isaiah 45:7).
Because of how plentiful such descriptions are in Scripture, most people who contend that God is not the author of evil ought not mean evil in the sense of natural disasters (although given the state of inconsistency that plagues a certain branch of theology, I am hesitant to be dogmatic). Instead, they should mean it in the sense of immorality, unrighteousness, sinfulness.

When we are talking about moral evils—sins—then we have to have some kind of moral framework in place. That is, we have to have a proper frame of reference to determine whether something is good or evil in the first place before the question "Is God the author of evil?" is even meaningful.

Now as I've argued before, since I am a Divine Command Theorist, God is the standard of good. There is nothing else that God can point to other than Himself to say "This is what the definition of good is." As such, anything God does will be, by definition, good. That means that it is ruled out by definition that God could ever do anything evil Himself.

But saying that God is good isn't the whole picture, for that does not tell us how we ought to behave in order for us to be good too. Thankfully, there is something that tells us what the standard of behavior we ought to uphold are: God's commands (i.e., laws).

Now of God's commands, the apostle Paul writes:
What then shall we say? That the law is sin? By no means! Yet if it had not been for the law, I would not have known sin. For I would not have known what it is to covet if the law had not said, "You shall not covet." But sin, seizing an opportunity through the commandment, produced in me all kinds of covetousness. For apart from the law, sin lies dead. I was once alive apart from the law, but when the commandment came, sin came alive and I died. The very commandment that promised life proved to be death to me. For sin, seizing an opportunity through the commandment, deceived me and through it killed me. So the law is holy, and the commandment is holy and righteous and good (Romans 7:7-12).
Now there is a lot to this passage that addresses the issue we are looking at. First, Paul states that "if it had not been for the law, I would not have known sin." Indeed, he insists "apart from the law, sin lies dead." Therefore there is no sin if there is not first a commandment from God. That means that if we are to look at evil as a function of immorality instead of natural evil, then evil can only exists because a commandment first exists. Consequently, Paul says "I would not have known what it is to covet if the law had not said, 'You shall not covet.'"

The logical conclusion of this must therefore be that it is impossible for any immorality to come about if God does not issue any commands. Yet despite this, Paul maintains "the commandment is holy and righteous and good." We can ask rhetorically: How can it be anything but good? God is, after all, the definition of good, and His commands must be good too even if evil cannot come about unless they exist. This doesn't mean the commands are sufficient for evil to occur, but it does mean that the commands are necessary for evil to occur.

Let us then examine the scope of the commandments. It is one thing to say that men are under the commands of God; but is God bound by those same commands? I merely point back to the above natural evils that God authors and ask, "If you did that would you be doing evil?" If you flooded the Earth and killed all but 8 people, would such genocide by considered good or evil? If you sent famines and plagues on people, would you be good or evil? Obviously you would be considered evil, yet God is not evil for doing so.

That's because God is not under His commands but rather He issues those commands. This is why James says: "There is only one lawgiver and judge, he who is able to save and to destroy. But who are you to judge your neighbor?" (James 4:12). God has the right to judge while you do not. That is why along a similar vein Paul writes: "Who are you to pass judgment on the servant of another? It is before his own master that he stands or falls" (Romans 14:4). We who have been created by God do not have the same rights as He who created us. God does not have to obey the commands that He gives us, and therefore even if we think we have seen a conflict between what we are not allowed to do and what God is allowed to do, that is not grounds for us to say that God has committed evil.

Finally, God can also use instruments of evil without Himself being evil. We read, for instance: "Now therefore behold, the LORD has put a lying spirit in the mouth of all these your prophets; the LORD has declared disaster for you" (1 Kings 22:23). We see that God is the one who "put a lying spirit in the mouth of all these…prophets." We read Jeremiah's words: "Then I said, 'Ah, Lord GOD, surely you have utterly deceived this people and Jerusalem, saying, "It shall be well with you," whereas the sword has reached their very life'" (Jeremiah 4:10). And if it weren't enough for Jeremiah to say God deceived fallen Israel, he also says: "O LORD, you deceived me, and I was deceived" (Jeremiah 20:7).

While this last passage is part of a lament of Jeremiah, it is nevertheless evidence that Jeremiah didn't have any problem with the concept of God deceiving people for His own reasons. Yet Hebrews 6:18 says that it is impossible for God to lie. How would it be possible for God to deceive someone without lying? One way would be by putting "a lying spirit in the mouth of [false] prophets." For in that case, God is not the one who lies (the lying spirit lies), but God does put the lying spirit in the position where it will be believed. We see this again when Paul asserts "Therefore God sends them a strong delusion, so that they may believe what is false" (2 Thessalonians 2:11). The thrust of the passage cannot be ignored: God is the one who sends the delusion so that sinners believe what is false even though God Himself does not lie.

In other words, when God uses evil instruments that does not mean ipso facto that God Himself is evil. If God uses evil people with their penchant to lie in order to deceive other evil people that does not mean God is evil. And just as God can use a liar to establish His purposes without being evil, so too can He use other types of sinners for the same reason.

So let us take stock of where we are. Is God the author of evil? Well, He is obviously the author of natural evils, and He gave the commands without which there could be no evil at all. So yes, He is the author of evil (when the term is properly defined). The reason why so many hesitate to accept this is because they believe it would make God evil, but I have shown that despite God being the author of evil (again, as properly defined) He is not evil, for 1) God is good by definition; 2) God's commands are for us and not for Him; and 3) we have Biblical examples when God used evil instruments that increased sin without being evil Himself.

Given this, it is improper for Arminians to claim that "God is the author of evil" is a defect of Calvinism. They must show how God's authoring of evil actually makes God evil, and that requires them to A) ground morality somewhere and, B) deal with the Scripture I have presented above showing God using evil to increase sin without being culpable.

18 comments:

  1. It would seem you excuse God from His own standard of righteousness?

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  2. I've made it plain: 1) God is the definition of good; 2) God is not under His commands (which are for us, not for Him); and 3) God can use evil without being evil.

    Do you have a counter argument to any of those points?

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  3. A.M. Mallett,

    If you knew the proposition >>my neighbor will murder his wife unless I intervene<<, and you also had the power to stop the murder with no harm to your life or to your neighbor's wife (or even to your neighbor, for the matter), and you did nothing, would God hold you responsible? Yes.

    But God does this.

    Therefore it seems you excuse God from his own standard of righteousness.

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  4. Mallett,

    You seem to ask a lot of drive-by sorts of questions etc. (e.g. here, here, and here). Of course, you can ask or say more or less whatever you like. At least I don't object to anything you've asked or said so far.

    But I'm wondering, is there a reason for your drive-bys? If you have so many questions, or want to make an argument for or against a particular position, why don't you engage or interact more substantially? Why merely ask a (loaded) question, and when we respond, ask another (loaded) question in its place?

    Again, I don't object at this point, but it does make me wonder what you're trying to get at (if anything).

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  5. Mr Patrick,
    That is an interesting situation but unfortunately, it is fallacious. I am not omniscient and by nature lack the ability for which you might try to hold me accountable. On the other hand, there is nothing in the law that makes men accountable for the sins of another man. You and I both know that somebody with a gun will murder somebody tonight. Are you culpable of murder for not supporting the seizure of all guns from private hands? I suspect you would state otherwise.
    God's standard of righteousness is reflected in His law. That does not mean that He is held to the same required acts as much of this law was for ceremonial and purification purposes and since He is a thrice Holy LORD, there is never to be any need for such law to be applied to Him. However, the sum of the law as it is revealed to men reflects His standard of righteousness and not ours.
    Would you dare state the LORD is a hypocrite by our standards and then excuse Him for being such because He is God?

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  6. My earlier comment was in response to the Dude's scenario.
    Mr. Patrick, the reason for my inquiries is to understand the driving points of the posts here. There is a great deal of vitriolic enmity espoused towards the greater body of Christ that is not generally reflected among the Calvinist brethren I personally fellowship with. To the contrary, some are appalled by what they see here and elsewhere.
    I have found that by asking the question, I can garner a better understanding of your thought process through the manner in which you reply.
    I am assuming you realize that if your purpose is to generate traffic and make a name for yourselves in the kingdom of God, you should be thankful for whatever inquiries you can generate. As for myself, I have no interest in making any name for myself other than the one I have.

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  7. Mallett said:
    ---
    God's standard of righteousness is reflected in His law. That does not mean that He is held to the same required acts as much of this law was for ceremonial and purification purposes and since He is a thrice Holy LORD, there is never to be any need for such law to be applied to Him.
    ----

    It's true that God is not held to the ceremonial or purification law, but it is more than that. "You shall not murder" is neither ceremonial nor part of purification, yet God has actively killed people in such a manner that if we were to have done it, it would have constituted murder on our part. Some quick examples would be: Uzzah touching the Ark of the Covenant; Ananias and Sapphira, etc.

    You said:
    ---
    However, the sum of the law as it is revealed to men reflects His standard of righteousness and not ours.
    ---

    Depends on what you mean by that. The law reflects what God expects of us. To some extent we can extrapolate that back to understand some of the character of God, but we cannot put God under the law, for He is not a man. Nor is He in our situation, for God is not a sinner who has been separated from communion with Himself as we have been separated from God. Remember, the primary purpose of the law is to serve as a tutor to drive us to Christ (see Galatians). God obviously doesn't need such a tutor.

    Therefore, it doesn't follow for you to say:
    ---
    Would you dare state the LORD is a hypocrite by our standards and then excuse Him for being such because He is God?
    ---

    God is not in our position, so He is not being hypocritical for not being under the law.

    Now that I have answered all of your points of contention, I'm still left looking for you to present an argument against any of the three points I wrote about in this post and mentioned in my first comment. You can dance around as much as you want, but those points remain unchallenged thus far.

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  8. A.M. MALLETT SAID:

    "There is a great deal of vitriolic enmity espoused towards the greater body of Christ that is not generally reflected among the Calvinist brethren I personally fellowship with...I am assuming you realize that if your purpose is to generate traffic and make a name for yourselves in the kingdom of God..."

    There's a great deal of vitriolic enmity espoused towards Calvinists by all but one (Dan Chapa) of the Arminian epologists I've encountered. Are they doing so to generate traffic and make a name for themselves?

    BTW, who do you include in the greater body of Christ? For example, Arminius espoused a great deal of vitriolic enmity towards the papacy. Do you include Catholics in the greater body of Christ? If so, was Arminius trying to make a name for himself?

    And what about the vitriolic enmity which John and Charles Wesley espouse towards Reformed theism? How does that figure in your analysis?

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  9. A.M. MALLETT SAID:

    "To the contrary, some are appalled by what they see here and elsewhere."

    Mere expressions of disapprove carry no weight. That's just an exercise in emotional coercion. Where's the supporting argument to justify the disapproval?

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  10. A.M. Mallett,

    Your rejoinder is sufficiently flawed for, but not limited to, the following reasons:

    First off, you don't need to be omniscience to know that your neighbor will kill his wife if you don't intervene. In fact, your rejoinder here is fallacious, not my scenario. You cannot logically infer from the proposition that you do not know all truths (omniscience) the proposition that you do not know some truths.

    Secondly, I take it as obvious that you would be morally responsible within a Christian ethic for not stopping the murder of an innocent neighbor if you could stop it through no harm to yourself (even with some harm, but let's leave that aside). I doubt you could find one Arminian epologist that would disagree with me here.

    But if that isn't enough, we could add that protection of the innocent is part of the general equity of the 6th commandment (as the WLC puts it in the answer to Q136 about sins forbidden in the sixth commandment, "... the neglecting or withdrawing the lawful and necessary means of preservation of life..."), not to mention the law that you love your neighbor.

    Third, knowing the general proposition that >>someone will murder someone tonight<<, coupled with the fact that we do not bear any moral responsibility for the murder, is not even remotely analogous to my case. For starters, you are not in a position to stop any of those murders!

    Now, I obviously believe there's a good answer here, but the problem is that the answer is one that can be used by the Reformed apologist in deflecting the so-called problem of evil for Calvinism. At any event, my surejoinder has shown that my initial claims can no longer be the object of rejoinder.

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  11. THE DUDE SAID:

    "First off, you don't need to be omniscience to know that your neighbor will kill his wife if you don't intervene."

    I'd add that infallibility is hardly a prerequisite to justify intervention. If that were a prerequisite, then we could never *prevent* a crime since we don't for a fact, until after the fact, what will occur. We can only act on the basis of probabilities.

    A police sharpshooter doesn't positively know that a schoolyard sniper will gun down a 10th student after having gunned down 9 others. It's always possible that the sniper will suddenly have a change of heart. Does this mean that if the he gets a clear shot of the sniper, the policeman should refuse to take him out?

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  12. A.M. MALLETT SAID:

    "Would you dare state the LORD is a hypocrite by our standards and then excuse Him for being such because He is God?"

    This is so typical of the way Arminian apologists conduct themselves. They pretend to raise an intellectual objection to Calvinism. But when we answer them on their own grounds, they retreat into mock pious indignation.

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  13. A.M. Mallett said:

    Mr. Patrick, the reason for my inquiries is to understand the driving points of the posts here.

    To what end? For your own enlightenment? If so, then why the tendentious line of questioning, etc.?

    There is a great deal of vitriolic enmity espoused towards the greater body of Christ that is not generally reflected among the Calvinist brethren I personally fellowship with. To the contrary, some are appalled by what they see here and elsewhere.

    Steve's already replied with good questions for you.

    Personally speaking, I could likewise say there's a great deal of vitriolic enmity espoused towards Calvinists that's not generally reflected among the Arminian brethren I personally fellowship with. (In fact, here is a recent case.)

    But would my personal appall be an argument against anything you've said at all? Nope.

    I am assuming you realize that if your purpose is to generate traffic and make a name for yourselves in the kingdom of God, you should be thankful for whatever inquiries you can generate. As for myself, I have no interest in making any name for myself other than the one I have.

    But why make the assumption in the first place? Why do you suppose our purpose is "to generate traffic and make a name for [our]selves in the kingdom of God"? On what basis do you make the assumption?

    In fact, why do you suppose the two are even connected to one another?

    In any case, Mr. Mallett, I'm assuming you realize that if your purpose is to generate understanding and make a name for yourself in the kingdom of God with such questions, you should be thankful for whatever responses you receive. As for myself, I have no interest in making any name for myself other than the one I have.

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  14. As many Calvinists have pointed out, "sin" by definition is the breaking of God's commands by the creatures to whom the commands were given. Since God is not a creature, He's not obligated to obey His commands to His creatures. While God's commands are rooted and grounded in God's nature and so reflect His character, it doesn't make sense for His commands to apply to Himself (in the exact same way).

    For example, there's no sense in God obeying the command not to steal. Since, being owner of all things, He cannot steal from anyone else. No one else owns anything in the ultimate sense like He does.

    Here's another one. When God commands us not to murder, that's because it would be assuming a perogative only God has as creator, sustainer, and terminator of life.

    1 Sam. 2:6 The LORD killeth, and maketh alive: he bringeth down to the grave, and bringeth up.


    Deut. 32:39 See now that I, even I, am he, and there is no god with me: I kill, and I make alive; I wound, and I heal: neither is there any that can deliver out of my hand.

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  15. Now therefore behold, the LORD has put a lying spirit in the mouth of these your prophets. The LORD has declared disaster concerning you.

    I commented on this verse on my blog already, which is used by Calvinists as an alleged proof of God willing evil. Lets see how Calvinists actually twist the verse, ignoring the entire context.

    Yes, this example shows that one must look a little deeper at the context in order to determine whether God is ordaining evil here and what the text is all about anyway. Tearing this verse out of its context and looking at it in isolation, is really proof-texting and misses the message carried by this text. So what’s this text (which occurs in 2 Chr. 18:22 also) about? Turning to Chronicles and reading the entire chapter 18 reveals the following:

    Ahab, the king of Israel together with Jehoshaphat, the king of Judah were considering waging war against the Arameans. Jehoshaphat asked Ahab to consult the prophets before, whether such a battle would be successful. Yet many false prophets appeared who univocally suggested engaging in battle because God would be with Israel and Judah against the Arameans and secure victory. Jehoshaphat doubted that these prophets were speaking the truth and wondered whether they were true prophets of the LORD.

    Now it becomes interesting. Ahab knew that Micah was the true prophet of the LORD, yet Ahab hated Micah, because he had been giving so many prophecies to Ahab’s disadvantage. Therefore Ahab rejected Micah and rather had his ears tickled by false prophets who spoke good about him. Micah wasn’t promising Ahab victory and hadn’t prophecied much good about Ahab (verse 18:6). That’s why Ahab had been disregarding Micah’s words and hence, had been disregarding the word of the LORD. Micah, who is now consulted again due to Jehoshaphat’s pressure, explains that Ahab wouldn’t survive if he went against the Arameans. And he explains why all the other “prophets” were suggesting the opposite. God gave them a spirit of deception, BECAUSE AHAB HAD BEEN REJECTING GOD’s WORD SPOKEN THROUGH HIS PROPHET MICAH. So the Lord was acting forensically by admitting false prophets to speak among Israel because of Ahab’s rejection of Micah.

    So we see again, the Lord put a lying spirit in the mouths of the false prophets because of Israel’s prior rejection of the true prophet. So is God doing inscrutable evil here which has some mysterious good purpose according to the “greater good view” of reformed theology? By no means! Again, the Lord brings judgment on a wicked world, yet there is no good purpose in evil itself and God has no “second will” to the contrary.

    For now I renounce commenting on the rest of this miserable post, that once again tries to make the righteous God the author of sin. It's really a shame how Calvinists apply vain man-made thinking patterns and twist the scriptures just to uphold their sinful doctrines whatever the cost. Yes, it's really a shame...

    -a helmet

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  16. AH, the context is interesting, but I missed the argument where you are supposed to make the case that the context refutes the Reformed position. Can you take care of that little oversight? Thanks...

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  17. AH said:
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    I commented on this verse on my blog already, which is used by Calvinists as an alleged proof of God willing evil
    ---

    I know it ruins your pat rejoinder to actually pay attention to what the other side is presenting, but I just can't take you seriously if you only interact with what you imagine I say instead of what I actually say. This post isn't about the will of God. It's about what constitutes evil in the first place.

    One of the ways you can tell what a blog article is about is (go with me now) if you read the article. I mean, from the title ("Evil") and then the fact that the post never talks about the will of God, it would be really easy to recognize that I'm not talking about God willing evil.

    Don't make me open another can of Troll-B-Gone. Granted these things are cheap, but when you have to use them every couple minutes....

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  18. I would add that God also causes things to happen that for Him are not evil, but are evil for the people he causes to do these things. Joseph being sold into slavery was intended by his brothers as evil and by God as good. The very same act (not just different identical acts), but different motives. Both had intent and necessary causation albeit from different physical/metaphysical perspectives. However, God did what was good and Joseph's brothers did what was evil. We can't hold the Master to a behavioral standard that for us requires evil intent, for he himself has no evil intent.

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