Maybe god does prevent Evil and the Universe is totally just and fair. The problem is humans thinking their version of Evil is the correct one. Maybe.
Maybe god does prevent Evil and the Universe is totally just and fair. The problem is humans thinking their version of Evil is the correct one. Maybe.
Common* christian theology posits that God is a perfect judge of law and fact, seeing as she has both infinite patience, infinite subjective time, and accurate knowledge of everyone’s points of view.
“Why does evil persist on Earth then” comes down to either said evil being necessary for some unseen purpose, said evil being irrelevant to God’s plans, or said evil being the consequence of some mortal privilege. Or some combination thereof.
There has been a lot of christian thought about why evil persists, and settling on an answer to it is essentially the base of all persistent ecumenical schisms. Other religions add even greater complexity, because once you examine perspectives off the abeahamic tree you quickly find that not even “Good” is consistently defined.
The moral and philosophical questions don’t get much easier if you remove God from the equation, or even if you adopt a nihilistic “only the momentary physical now matters” perspective.
If you don’t believe me, try coming up with an answer to “why is killing bad” that you can get agreement on. (Not just “is killing bad,” but an actual casual why.)
Morality is only made complex because humans like inserting their ego into things.
No, all morality is are the behaviours that benefit us as a social species, put to language and culture.
Why is rape bad? Theft bad? Indiscriminate killing bad? Because if we did these things we’d be unable to use our unique species’ power to overcome hardships and thrive; creating and maintaining social groups that allow for the division of tasks.
*: and by “common” I mean “as I believe most Christians understand it.”. I’m sure some don’t, and that there’s at least one sect that would call me funny names for saying anything.
I just wish we could collectively realize the whole enterprise is epistemologically bankrupt.
It is okay to stop trying to apply reason once you have encountered the first unreconcilable contradiction.
There are no such things as unreconcilable contradictions.