I have been reviewing Alvin Plantinga’s article The Free Will Defense. I must say it is an amazing philosophical work, but when I reviewed his response to the existence of natural evils, I could not agree with his argument on the whole. Plantinga uses an argument presented by St. Augustine that attributes natural evil to actions of non-human creatures. These non-human creatures are obviously evil spirits, but more specifically, the Devil and his angels. Plantinga uses his argument of free will to support St. Augustine’s argument. He doses this by demonstrating that the free actions of non human beings influence natural occurrences, and these “natural occurrences” are aimed at causing men misery. I think that this argument is valid if we can readily show that these evil spirits have control over nature and other phenomena. If we were to approach this argument using scripture, is has very little support. One may be tempted to use the Book of Job as justification that Satan can in fact control nature. However, if we read in chapter 1 and 2 we find that Satan was unable to curse Job with any natural evils unless God allowed it. Thus, it would seem that Satan has no complete or colossal power over nature, especially in the quantity that we experience, without the permission given from God.
If God were to give Satan such permission without a morally sufficient reason for doing so, then God would obviously appear as malevolent. Furthermore, from a theological point of view, the idea that Satan would want to have power over nature seems somewhat unavailing to his principle purpose. Satan is charged with causing men to sin, so to assume that Satan has power over the elements so that men can sin seems inconsistent with him being the source of sin. Sin has to do with humans not obeying God’s commandments, or following the immoral teachings of the adversary.
From a philosophical view we seem to run into a similar problem. The problem of evil exists because of a contradiction between “God is omnipotent and omni-benevolent” and “evil exist”.
Plantinga’s argument supporting Free Will is amazing, and I feel that it satisfies moral evils and the previous contradiction. However, his argument that Satan is the cause of natural evils because of Satan’s free will seems to provide a response, but how successful is it?
Plantinga’s argument is a theodicy; he is assuming that Satan is free to exercise dominion over the natural world. This seems fallacious because of the following reasons:
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1. If Satan is a spiritual being (not consisting of anything physical), then he has no influence or effect on physical objects.
2. Satan is spiritual.
3. Therefore he has not influence over physical worlds.
If the previous is true, then the idea that Satan causes natural evils is false. This is because Satan is a being commonly accepted as a spirit living on this earth, yet in a separate dimension. Now to avoid arguing time and space held dimensions, we shall say that this dimensions in which Satan lives, is purely a spiritual dimension (This is assuming that Satan is not omnipotent, for if he were omnipotent then he would logically have control over the natural world). A spiritual dimension would consist of maxims that are only acted upon spiritually. This is to say that Satan is free to act and do as a sentient being only according to things that are spiritually related. The physical world consist of elements, atoms, and actions that are not necessarily spiritual, thus, it would seem that Satan would not have any control over the natural world.
It dose, however, provide some very interesting insight about the possibility of men, who are spiritual and physical creatures (from a theology view) could be influenced by a evil spirit that is acting freely according to spiritual (non physical) things. Thus, we see that Plantingas’s support of St. Augustine’s argument is not one hundred percent conclusive.
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March 24, 2007 at 4:51 pm
poppies
There’s two simple things to realize in order to clear up many of the issues you see.
Isaiah 14:13-14 You said in your heart, “I will ascend to heaven; I will raise my throne above the stars of God; I will sit enthroned on the mount of assembly, on the utmost heights of the sacred mountain. I will ascend above the tops of the clouds; I will make myself like the Most High.” This passage, along with many others, shows that Satan’s principle desire is to supplant God. It’s totally in keeping with his purposes that he would manipulate nature in a sort of mockery of God’s control over creation. Tempting man to sin and accusing man are secondary practices which stem from his main desire.
As for spiritual beings having influences or effects on physical objects: God is a spirit, and he clearly controls the physical universe. Since this is the case, why would other spirits be barred from interacting with the physical realm?
March 24, 2007 at 6:39 pm
john
Poppies,
Thank you for the comment. I think the reason why God is able to control elements and the natural world is becuase he is omnipotent. Satan is not. If Satan were omnipotent then he would have control over the natural world. However, becuase he is not omnipotent then it would follow that he is bound by the world in which he exist.
Sincerly,
JOhn
March 24, 2007 at 11:31 pm
Joe
John, the argument works well enough. But, by parody, the argument works against God too. For Satan, fill in “God.” Thus, God has no influence over the physical world.
Moreover, a critic might argue that if God could influence the physical world, then God would manifest Himself in a physical way. God doesn’t manifest Himself physically. So, God couldn’t influence the physical world.
The argument is a tight one, but it works well against Satan and God.
Best,
Joe
March 25, 2007 at 4:46 am
john
Joe,
I see what you are saying, and that really seems to be true.
In the argument I refer to the limits that spiritual beings have because of their existence in spiritual worlds. By saying that God cannot affect natural things because he is spiritual seems to limit his omnipotence.
Would it be possible to exclude God from this argument by saying:
If God is omnipotent, then he is not limited by world restrictions.
God is omnipotent
Therefore, God is not limited by world restrictions
I don’t know if that works, but it would seem to alleviate the fact that God is also affected by my conclusion.
Thank you for the insight, I need it especially since that is more or less what my thesis will most likely be related to.
John
-Joe, do you think that is a good path to down for the paper?
March 25, 2007 at 8:51 pm
Steven Carr
What reason does Plantinga give for God creating beings that He knew would freely choose evil?
March 26, 2007 at 6:53 am
Joy
John – I don’t really know what you’re talking about here, but I think this link might help. It’s late and I’m really tired so maybe it won’t. LOL
Anyway, go here: http://en.fairmormon.org/index.php/Search_for_the_Truth_DVD:Who_Is_Jesus%3F
And then scroll down to the part that says “Does Colossians 1:17 teach that Jesus created all things and even the angels (including Satan) out of nothing?”
There’s a great explanation that I think convers part of what you’re discussing.
If not, never mind…
March 29, 2007 at 2:32 pm
Brody
Regarding Satan’s motives in natural evil:
Ephesians 2: 1 As for you, you were dead in your transgressions and sins, 2 in which you used to live when you followed the ways of this world and of the ruler of the kingdom of the air, the spirit who is now at work in those who are disobedient. (NIV)
So the fact that Satan holds some power over the terrestrial realm isn’t totally without precedent. The idea is (in my opinion) that Satan has a stake in promoting evils like this because suffering is one of those oddly polarizing things that either makes people bitter or builds character (but more often the former). How much one ought to attribute these sorts of things (especially when dealing with natural disasters where we understand the basic natural phenomena that occur) to the supernatural is another story altogether.
Whether or not the supernatural (immaterial) can interact with the natural (material) realm seems to be an epistemological qualm rather than an ontological one; that is, we just don’t know how the mechanism by which it occurs in the same way that we know how heat transference occurs, for instance. Omnipotence solves any ontological qualms to a degree, but it doesn’t really help determine the aforementioned mechanism. An analogous example would be creatio ex nihilo – how does God create out of nothing? He just does. No mechanism is described, but we know it must have happened unless we just circumvent the need for a Creator by other means (e.g. an eternal universe).
March 29, 2007 at 3:01 pm
john
Brody,
I think that you have raised some very important points. However, I think that Satan has ability to cause natural disorders etcetera when God allows him to do so (Job 1). Thus, God must have a morally or spiritually significant reason to allow Satan such power, however, I don’t think that he has the power to randomly cause natural disasters and destructions. I do however think that it is possible that Satan causes moral evil.
The idea of omnipotence is, of course, to provide a justification for God in being able to effect a natural world. This would not be necessary if one were to believe that God is physically and spiritually composed in a perfect manner because he would then be able to have dominion in a physical world without having to be omnipotent.
The idea of ex nihilo is intrusting. Is nothing referring to no-organized or actualized energy/matter, or is it refer to voids in time space, and energy? I think that it is logically difficult to assume that there is a possible ex nihilo creation.
Best,
John
March 29, 2007 at 5:59 pm
Brody
I agree with you regarding Satan’s abilities; they would most certainly have to be granted by God (and I deleted some thoughts I had on omnipotence that would have likely clarified the matter). However, I don’t think it impossible to find ways of rationalizing God permitting Satan to wreak some havoc on the terrestrial realm through theodicies; for instance, God could allow Satan some reign to illustrate the consequences of a universe that is losing His sustaining power (or one could just omit any talk of Satan altogether and say that God has removed some of His sustaining power from the universe as a result of man’s sinfulness, causing it to unravel in some rather destructive ways).
I am still quite unsure as to what you mean by your comments on omnipotence. You call omnipotence an attempt to “justify” God’s abilities, but I don’t think this is foolproof. For one, omnipotence cannot be defined as “the ability to do anything” because then you run into all sorts of problems (e.g. “Can God create a stone so heavy He can’t lift it?” or “Can God make square circles?”). If you define it as “the ability to do anything that is logically possible”, then you won’t find your justification unless you grant that it is conceivable for the immaterial to interact with the material without knowing the mechanism. The only other way to circumvent this is (as you implied) positing God as a being with both material and immaterial parts, like the dualist idea of man. I’m not sure where you stand on this, but I’ll refrain from stepping on any toes with that idea. What I will say is formulating a dualistic God with the thought in mind that a physical God wouldn’t have these problems of transgressing the material/immaterial boundary means that you will probably need to do the same for Satan since he obviously has some dominion over the physical world.
On creatio ex nihilo: As best I can tell from my brief studies, ‘out of nothing’ refers to the idea that the universe is the result of God’s creative act and not simply molding pre-existing matter (like Plato’s Demiurge, for instance). The Biblical chronology of creation follows thus: God exists alone; God creates all matter from His very word (“the heavens and the earth” is a melism which signifies all of creation, akin to “from east to west”), which is formless; God creates the distinct parts of creation from that matter. The book Creation Out of Nothing by William Lane Craig and Paul Copan is an excellent resource for Biblical, scientific, and philosophical perspectives on the subject, and it’s not too difficult a read.
April 3, 2007 at 6:30 pm
Joe
Steven,
I think Plantinga is very sketchy about his reason for thinking God created a being He knew would causal natural evils to occur. He mentions in God and Other Minds that Satan “rebelled against God” and he “has since been creating whatever havoc he could” (p. 150).
Your question is a poignant one that Plantinga doesn’t seem to adequately address.