Two of the most popular theodicies which try to answer these questions whilst protecting God’s classical, benevolent image are the Irenaen theodicy advocated by St Irenaus (130-201 AD), which was later adopted and adapted by John Hick (1922-present), and the Augustinian theodicy proposed by St Augustine, or Augustine of Hippo (254-430 AD). Both theodicies work towards the same goal; to explain the existence of God whilst maintaining the three fundamental qualities of the God of classical theism, yet they take very different paths.
St Augustine thought that God was the source of everything, which he believed had been created ex nihilo (out of nothing) according to the Divine will. As a result, everything in the world was created perfect, a paradise for Adam and Eve to live in – “God saw all that he had made, and it was very good” (Genesis 1:31). This calls a contradiction into question - why would an all-loving God create a world for his children and then fill it with suffering? Augustine argued that, despite being created good, because the world was created ex nihilo, it was also capable of becoming corrupt, or being corrupted (as it is a secondary and contingent realm i.e. matter is not eternal). Hence, he maintained that evil came into the world through original sin, where fallen angels tempted the Fall of humanity after the disobedience in the garden of Eden (through eating the forbidden fruit from the tree of knowledge, directly against God’s wishes). From this view, man is responsible for evil by being led astray by Satan.
In comparison, Hick’s Irenaean theodicy takes as its starting point the notion that, far from being created good (and a state from which we have fallen) there was in fact a ‘two-stage’ process in the act of bringing forth humanity into the world. Firstly humans have evolved into beings capable of social interaction, moral behaviour and reflection on their environment (alongside the capacity for awareness of the Divine). However, this development did not appear suddenly overnight but evolved through a long process of struggle against a hostile environment. It is this which forms the backdrop for what Hick sees as the second stage in human development, whereby humans, through their own free will, are being made in the Divine ‘likeness’. Human beings were not created as the perfect beings which Adam and Eve allegedly were, but immature creations with immense capacity for spiritual and moral development, the idea being that the human race was created in a state of imperfection leading to a state of perfection. In other words, humans are being created into children of God. Thus perfection, rather than lying in the past, lies in the future.
Irenaeus suggested that human “goodness” comes from its response to moral decisions made in an imperfect world; that when temptation is resisted it is infinitely more valuable a lesson learnt than if it had been an inherent part of the being.
2.) How far do they succeed?
St Augustine’s argument that evil originated from the Fall of humanity, not only absolves God of creating evil but also allows Him to show the world His love by bringing Christ into the world, to die for everyone’s sins. However the problem is that to claim that God created a perfect world for Adam and Eve is held to be scientifically inaccurate nowadays; studies of the earth have told us that natural disasters such as earthquakes have been happening almost as long as the earth is old, as a result of the make-up of the planet, (for example plate tectonics in the case of earthquakes), not original sin. Indeed, the idea of original sin is generally accepted as scientifically inaccurate as well, as the majority now accepts the concept of man’s evolution from lesser mammals.
Many object to the free will theodicy on the grounds that there is much pain that has been caused by natural occurrences that have nothing to do with man’s will. Animals other than humans suffer; we witness floods, hurricanes, and plagues; as well as many other forms of pain and suffering in the world. However the theodicy argues back, claiming that man is responsible for many of these disasters due to his behaviour, (that these evils are punishments for our sins), and that there are also other forces in the world, besides men, contributing to evil.
To some, evil occurrences appear to happen randomly, without purpose. To illustrate this, we can look to the story of Job in the Old Testament as an example. Job himself is the victim of numerous misfortunes, although he is an extremely pious man, so there is no apparent reason for any of these events. St Irenaeus offered an explanation for this difficulty presented by the problem of evil, when he spoke of evil existing for the purpose of “soul-making”, or spiritual development. From his point of view, evil provides the necessary problems through which we take part in this bettering of the soul. He claims that the pains and sufferings of the world are meant by God to act as a means of producing a truly good person. This view, however, was rejected famously by the Russian novelist Fyodor Dostoevsky in The Brothers Karamazov, where one of the characters, Ivan, discards this explanation on the grounds that the suffering of a child can never be justified in terms of how good the results are.