St. Augustine, God and the Problem of Evil

 

By :  Moses Flores

 

 

            It has been suggested that St. Augustine was probably the most important Christian thinker of all time.  He was one of the first to actually offer any systematized theological treatises on various subjects as well as be in the front of major controversies in Church history.  But Augustine, it could be said, did not intend to write for future generations, however much he may have impacted them;  he was a man of his times who dealt with the consequences of the ideas of his day.  One of the most interesting philosophical subjects of his day was the “problem of evil.” We’ve all heard the problem stated in many ways:  If God is all knowing, all powerful and all good, then why is there evil in the world?  It was in seeking the answer to this question that Augustine became involved in various strains of philosophical circles, including Neo-Platonism and Manicheanism.  It wasn’t until Augustine became a Christian that he was able to find his cognitive rest in an answer.  The following paper will explore St. Augustine’s contribution to the ongoing discussion of the problem of evil and God.  This will not be an exhaustive presentation, but merely an overview of some of the major contributions of Augustine.

We will begin by examining the nature of the God in which Augustine professed his faith to be in.  The question of evil begins with assertions about the nature of God, so it is fitting that we begin there as well.  Before we begin, however, a word is in order about Manicheanism and its role in the development of Augustine’s answers to the problem of evil.

            Manicheanism was a cult that was founded by a Parthian aristocrat named Mani.  Mani’s answer to the problem of evil was that a dualism existed in the universe in which Light was constantly battling Dark, and vice versa.  It seemed to blend aspects of Christianity, Buddhism, and Zoroastrianism into a single religion.  The young Augustine became fascinated with this religion before his conversion to Christianity, but it, only raised more questions than it answered for Augustine.  When Augustine became a Christian, he believed to have found the answers that he was looking for and was able to write out his fullest treatment of the problem in “De Natura Boni Contra Manichaeos” (Concerning the nature of God against the Manicheans).  It is from this text that we will derive most of Augustine’s views of God and evil from, as well as others.

 

The nature of God

 

            Augustine begins by affirming that God is “the highest good (summum bonum), than which there is no higher” and concludes from this that, therefore, “[God] is unchangeable good, hence truly eternal and truly immortal.[1]”  As the “highest good”, Augustine places God in a position so that one cannot lay charge to God for any responsibility as the author of evil in the world.  As the Highest Unchanging Good, God is not able to produce anything that is contrary to His nature.  Thus, “all other good things are only from Him.[2]”  Augustine emphasizes that we are “from Him” and not “of Him” for the latter implies that all good would be God.  But since all things are “from Him” and are created “ex nihilo”, Augustine concludes that what is created is able to change because it is not “of God” but “from God”. 

            Augustine moves on to affirm the omnipotence of God by affirming that all things, great and small, that are created by God are good.  Augustine, further contends that no good thing exists apart from God.  Whatever exists is good, must be credited to God alone.  Augustine accentuates this point by noting that,

 

“All life…all power…all safety… all memory…all virtue…all intellect …all tranquility…all plenty…all sensation…all light…all sanity…all measure…all beauty…all peace great and small and whatever other like things may occur, especially such as are found throughout all things, whether spiritual or corporeal, every measure, every form, every order both great and small, are from the Lord God.[3]”

 

            The significance of this is that whatever is worthy of being called good must be credited to God alone who is the Highest Good.  From Him can proceed nothing that is contrary to the good that He is.  God is the Good.  All things that exist from God are good.  In a sense, it could be said that everything that exists is good.

            However, Augustine qualifies the good that proceeds from God by saying the good that is produced by God may vary in degree.  This partly follows from his previous statements that the good that God produces is not equal with God because then that product would bring about the contradiction of God “creating” another Himself.  The created order is good to a degree. 

 

The nature of evil

 

            Now the question comes to Augustine, “if God only produces good things from Himself, how is it that we experience evil?”  In answering this question, Augustine first attempts to define what evil is and to do it in such a way so as to not make God, the source of only good, evil for it.

            Augustine says that evil is “nothing else than corruption, either of the measure, or the form, or the order….therefore, that which has been corrupted, is called evil, for assuredly when it is uncorrupted it is good.[4]”  But what is the source of this corruption?  Is it another entity (essentia) other than God that is causing it?  Augustine believes that “evil”, the corruption of nature, is caused by a privation of the good.  Augustine often appealed to analogies of darkness and light.  For example, darkness, was not something that existed as separate from light, but was rather the absence of light.  That is, evil was not something with ontological status.  Evil is nothing, in a sense.  It is not caused by an evil being.  Augustine explicitly declared this as well:  “For evil has no positive nature; but the loss of good has received the name ‘evil’.[5]”  He also declares:

 

“Consequently, to that nature which supremely is, and which created all else that exists, no nature is contrary save that which does not exist.  For nonentity is the contrary of that which is.  And thus there is no being contradictory to God, the Supreme Being, and Author of all things whatsoever.[6]”

 

            Because evil is a corruption of the good, Augustine says that “evil cannot exist without good, because the natures in which evil exists, in so far as they are natures, are good.[7]”  It is also through the presence of evil in good that the creatures become able to appreciate the good[8].    The solution, says Augustine for removing evil is “not by removing any nature, or part of nature, which had been introduced by the evil, but by healing and correcting that which had been vitiated and depraved.[9]”

In the Christian argument of absolving God from the responsibility of creating “evil” in the world, this move by St. Augustine to declare evil as a “non-being” clears God from creating evil from Himself because evil is not a “thing” to be created, much less exist ontologically.  Instead, “evil” is good being suspended from coming into being.  This ruled out the possibility of Dualism which the Manicheans were highly involved with and was the most common answer to the question of evil in the world at that time.  This also adds an element of misunderstanding to Augustinian thought when asking about evil.  That is, it is usually common for critics of Christianity to ask where evil originates from.  However, the implication of “origin” is that it is a created thing with a beginning, which, is clearly something that Augustine would not agree with since evil is not a “thing” that exists.  It is more like “moral hole” in the good.  Thus, skeptics asking such a question would be refuted because their presupposition involves evil as having an ontological status within the created order, which Augustine would not be willing to submit to.

            But how do we deal with the fact that it is God who actively withholds the good in order to bring about “evil”?  Even the Scriptures say, “I form the light and create darkness, I make peace and create calamity; I, the Lord, do these things.[10]”  Augustine Himself admits:

 

“yet even these privations of things are so ordered in the universe of nature, that to those wisely considering they not unfittingly have their vicissitudes.  For by not illuminating certain places and times, God has also made the darkness as fittingly as the day.[11] (Italics mine)”

 

            Perhaps the question that we are really seeking to get is, does God arbitrarily choose to withhold the good in order to cause “evil”?  To this charge, Augustine believes that the “evil” that we see in the world among rational creatures (moral evil) is a result of the lack of conformity, or obedience, to God[12].  Therefore, God withholding good is a form of punishment for sin, and “when it is deservedly inflicted, there is no injustice on the part of God.[13]”  Therefore, it is by an act of will that creature bring evil upon themselves.

 

The nature of man[14]

 

            Knowing now that it is through the disobedience of the creature that evil is experienced in the world, we should ask what Augustine believed to be the nature of man who is constantly bringing evil into the world. 

            In the first place, Augustine believed that man, as a rational creature, was created “upright, and consequently with a good will.”  In terms of the freedom of his will, was able to sin (posse pecarre) and able to not sin (posse non pecarre).  Adam, the first man, choose to use his freedom to disobey God when he was tempted to eat of the fruit of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, in which he believed would be a higher good for himself since he was tempted to believe that it would make him like God (Genesis 3:5).  Thus, Adam was corrupted.  But he did not act for himself alone.  Augustine states:

 

“Thence, after his sin, he was driven into exile, and by his sin the whole race of which he was the root was corrupted in him, and thereby subjected to the penalty of death.  And so it happens that all descended from him, and from the woman who had led him into sin , and was condemned at the same time with him, - being the offspring of carnal lust on which the same punishment of disobedience was visited, - were tainted with the original sin, and were by it drawn through diverse errors and sufferings into that last and endless punishment which they suffer in common with the fallen angels, their corrupters and masters, and the partakers of their doom.  And thus, ‘by one man sin entered the world, and death by sin; and so death passed upon all men, for that all have sinned.[Romans 5:12]’.”[15] 

 

            The entire human race, now corrupted, was now only able to sin (non posse non pecarre).  Since man made an evil use of his free will, man had lost that will; “so when man, by his own free will sinned, then sin being victorious over him, the freedom of his will was lost.[16]”  The only freedom that man now possessed was freedom to sin and, because of the corrupted nature of man, that was the strongest desire in man.  Man’s nature was such that it was now sinful and contrary to God.  “For the carnal mind is enmity toward God, for it is neither subject to the law of God, nor indeed can it be” (Romans 8:6,7). 

 

The role of evil

 

            Because of the nature of man, who is in a state of constant rebellion against God, God is justly withholding good – causing “evil” – in the world.  But this display of evil is not something that is done arbitrarily or out of cruelty.  Instead, the role of “evil” is an instrument of the Justice of God.  Augustine says:

 

“Nor can we doubt that God does well even in the permission of what is evil.  For He permits it only in the justice of His judgment.  And surely all that is just is good.[17]”

 

            Augustine continues,

 

“Although, therefore, evil, in so far as it is evil, is not a good; yet the fact that evil as well as good exists, its existence would not be permitted by the omnipotent Good, who without doubt can as easily refuse to permit what He does not wish, as bring about what He does wish.  And if we do not believe this, the very first sentence of our creed[18] is endangered, wherein we profess to believe in God the Father Almighty.  For He is not truly called Almighty if He cannot do whatsoever He pleases, or if the power of His almighty will is hindered by the will of any creature whatsoever.[19]”

 

            It seems as though Augustine is being contradictory by saying that all that is allowed by God is good, and evil is allowed by God, therefore, evil must be good.  I don’t believe Augustine is trying to affirm that “evil is good”, for he says that “evil, in so far as it is evil is not a good.”  But there is a sense in which we must acknowledge the permission of evil to be a good thing in the world for it is clearly part of the sovereign permission of God, who only wills good because He is Good.  If we deny the existence of evil as being in the sovereign will of God, then he believes that Christians must abandon the basic Theistic premise that God is the creator and is able to do whatsoever pleases him.

            There is a tendency among Christians – particularly those of the Arminian  persuasion - when answering the problem of evil to appeal to the Libertarian Free Will of man as obstructing the plan of God and, thereby, causing God to go into some kind of “contingency mode” in order to provide a way to redeem humanity from their fall.  However, if Augustine is right so far, then this cannot be the case for we have the absurdity of the creature bringing frustration to the will of the Creator.  Instead, what I think St. Augustine is proposing, especially when he expounds the doctrine of the predestination of the saints[20], is that it was always the plan of God for evil to exist in the world, yet it was not to exist unto evil ends, but, rather unto ends that are according to the good will and pleasure of God.  This doctrine of predestination finds its fullest expression in the Calvinistic camps of the Reformation and in Luther’s famous work, “The Bondage of the Will”.  Not surprisingly, both Luther and Calvin were well acquainted with the works of Augustine, Luther himself being a monk of the Augustinian order.

            It should even be noted that the Scriptures, in several places portray God as ordering the wicked deeds of men so as to bring about His sovereign purposes.  For instance, in Genesis 50, Joseph has become re-acquainted with his brothers who sold him into slavery and he tells them, “But as for you, you meant evil; but God meant it for good in order to bring it about as it is this day, to save many people alive(v19).”  God used the wicked events of his brothers in order to place Joseph in a position of authority so that, through him, he could save many people in Egypt from the famine that was sweeping through the land at the time.  And who could forget that most wicked act in Christian history:  the murder of the Son of God.  The Bible itself tells us that Christ was “delivered by the determined purpose and foreknowledge of God” (Acts 2:23, Italics mine) to be “crucified and put to death”.  God clearly intended the greatest of evils to be permitted to His own Son, but it was to the greatest end: redemption. 

            From what has been said, I would like to assert, in regards to the “problem” of evil, that the existence of evil in the world is NOT a problem.  For evil is not a thing that has ontological status so as to be struggling against God for order in His creation.  Neither is it something that is unjust, but rather is a form of good that is sought by all who live in the world, namely Justice.  It is also a way that God has sovereignly chosen to use to cause his creatures to appreciate the good[21].  Neither does evil effect the plans of God nor does it effect his Being, for He is unchangeable good.  Also, for Christians, evil was also a means by which God performed his greatest act of redemption through the death of Jesus Christ, which then led to the resurrection.  In light of these many reasons, evil is not a problem.

            It might be contended then that this makes God evil because He wills evil.  But this does not necessarily follow.  As has been noted earlier, God is the Highest Good and only Good proceeds from Him.  Whatever He does, therefore, is right and good.  Allowing evil to take place is not the same thing as committing evil.  In terms of responsibility, God is not responsible for sin because He is obligated to no one.  Certainly, it should be boldly admitted that God is the ultimate cause of evil but not the efficient cause of it. 

           

 

            So did Augustine solve the problem of evil in regards to skeptical arguments against Christianity?  Perhaps not, for there are still many questions that are left unanswered.  But I believe that he has offered the Christian community some very valuable tools to work with and develop.  Most important, I believe, is that evil is not an ontological thing.  I think he has also led us in a step to not regard the “problem of evil” as not a problem at all since it is God, who is the Highest Good, who permits it and, therefore, must have a good reason for doing so and a good will behind it.  Because it is God who is the Sovereign ruler of His creation, I think Augustine would admonish Christians to abandon the foolish appeals to Libertarian Free Will as the cause of evil in the world.  Calvinist theologians have taken this step, yet many Christians are left behind and are susceptible to the arguments against Christianity and Theism because of their appeals to Libertarian Free Will. 

            Augustine certainly has much to offer in the discussion of God and evil.  No doubt, he had his thoughts well organized about it, for it was in seeking an answer to this very issue that brought Augustine to the Christian faith and it was this issue that he spent most of his Christian life passionately engaged in.  Christian philosophers, especially, would do well to pay attention to Augustine’s thoughts on evil.