124 ARGUMENTS: MONOTHEISTIC CONCEPTIONSlifetimes in which he has behaved so viciously as to deserve this
treatment. Bad things happen to good people because they were not
always good people. This view entails, then, that:
(EN) For any evil E that occurs to a person in lifetime N, E is the just
consequence of wrong actions by that person in lifetime N or in her
lifetimes prior to N.
Whether (EN) is true or not, it is logically consistent. Thus it is relevant
to a use of the Consistency Strategy that we will consider shortly. Since
there is little if any solid evidence in favor of the truth of the doctrines
of reincarnation and karma,^2 it would be intellectually risky to offer
them as part of a theodicy of which they formed an essential part, or a
defense regarding evil.^3
To begin by offering a defense regarding evil would be premature.
One would need first to have reason to suppose that evil is evidence
against the existence of God. Unless there is good reason to think this,
there is no need for a defense regarding evil. While it is often assumed
that the religious believer should provide evidence that God exists and
also provide a defense regarding evil, the idea that the religious believer
should always be the one who offers arguments is without justification.
The place to start in considering God and evil is by asking whether there
is any successful, or at least initially plausible, argument from evil.
There is quite a variety of attempts to offer a successful argument from
evil. It is time to consider some of them.
The problem of evil
What philosophers call the problem of evil concerns whether or not the
existence of evil counts against the existence of God, makes belief that
God exists unreasonable, or the like. The pastoral problem of evil – how
one is to deal with the evil that one faces in one’s own life and the lives
of those one loves – is obviously important, but it is not the
(philosophical) problem of evil. A theodicy is an account of why God
allows, or even causes, evil – of the role evil plays in the great scheme of
things, how it relates to divine providence, how God can bring good
from evil, how God’s love can triumph over evil, and the like. It is
understandable that someone wants a theodicy. But offering a theodicy
is not necessary in order to deal with the problem of evil, and it is a
large topic all by itself. Here, the concern is with the problem of evil,
itself quite enough to occupy one’s attention.