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Must G-d Create Only Good People?
Mack says to the Christian:
You say that free will is the origin of evil. But it is possible for a person to freely choose to do no evil. Your G-d, if he exists, would be able to create such people. He would know how to create such people. And he would definitely do so because he is good. But no such thing happened, and therefore your G-d does not exist.
Does anyone else see the problem I see with Mack’s way of thinking? I’d been wanting to properly deal with this problem since 2005, but I finally found a little mental space to put some real work into it last year. Now it’s a published article: “Must G-d Create the Best Available Creatures?” in the journal Philosophia Christi, the journal of the Evangelical Philosophical Society.
Mack’s remarks above (written by me) are drawn from J. L. Mackie, who distinguished himself in 1900s philosophy by presenting an important objection to the traditional free will explanation for why G-d could allow evil: If evil is due to the free choice of creatures, why wouldn’t an omnipotent G-d simply create free creatures who would choose better?
Alvin Plantinga, in turn, distinguished himself with his critique of Mackie. Plantinga’s main point is that Mackie made a mistake in assuming that it is within the power of omnipotence fully to create just any possible world.
So far, so good.
But I think Mackie made another mistake. He had another highly questionable assumption that Plantinga does not critique.
Mackie assumes that a G-d, as construed by classical theistic belief, who could create either of two people—one of whom would freely choose right and the other of whom would freely choose wrong—must create the one who would freely choose right.
But if that’s true, then, just as long as there is any possible person whom G-d could have created and placed in the Garden of Eden and who would not have sinned, G-d won’t allow anyone else the chance to sin!
So, in Mackie’s view, no one else sinning is even possible! And even that one possible, not-sinning person doesn’t have any possibility of sinning as long as there’s someone else who wouldn’t have sinned given the chance.
In short, for nearly every conceivable arrangement of the facts about what possible people would do, . . . every possible person, or all but one of them, is completely unable to ever sin! And where does that leave free will?????
Now you might be thinking it’s just not reasonable to even talk about the so-called facts about what not-real-but-possible people might do. You might be right. I think that’s a very respectable position.
And there are some other options. But I think the best option is to . . . Just. Drop. Mackie’s. Assumption.
This also means we don’t need Alvin Plantinga’s idea, which is this: Maybe all possible created people have what he calls trans-world depravity, meaning that maybe all of them would have sinned given the chance.
I love Plantinga’s Christian philosophy, but I don’t think that particular position is likely. Still, if I’m criticizing Plantinga, it’s a friendly, and a pretty mild, criticism. It’s less that Plantinga is wrong and more that . . . we can agree with Plantinga’s criticism of J. L. Mackie, and go just one step further.
Two more notes. First, the title of my article is inspired by Robert Adams’ famous article, “Must G-d Create the Best?”
Second, this is the best I’ve been able to do so far. Maybe I’ll do more later. All this time I’m working with the idea of free will as the ability to do otherwise, which is a prominent theory on what free will is, and is Plantinga’s theory. But there are other views on what free will is.
If we’re going to stick with this definition, we may have to consider the possibility that free will is not good only as a means to the end of freely chosen moral good, but also for other reasons, or even just good in itself. This is an idea I might explore in the future.
And I think I’ve stumbled on a promising insight: If human beings are made in the image of G-d and if part of that involves the responsibility to creatively develop creation in G-d’s name, then maybe that creativity requires some ability to do otherwise. This might be at least part of the explanation for why FW—as the ability to do otherwise—is important.
In any case, frankly, I’m happy enough if we just question Mackie’s assumption. It should never have been allowed to pass unquestioned.
Published in General
Yes, absolutely. I’ll find it in the Catechism of the Catholic Church. Let me look.
Well, that will definitely be worth me remembering!
I’m not finding it here. Just the stuff about original sin.
The Catechism of the Catholic Church states:
“Mary benefited first of all and uniquely from Christ’s victory over sin: she was preserved from all stain of original sin and by a special grace of God committed no sin of any kind during her whole earthly life” (CCC 411). Mary had free will but, by that special grace, never rejected God.
“The fathers of the Eastern tradition call the mother of God ‘the All-Holy’ (Panagia) and celebrate her as ‘free from any stain of sin, as though fashioned by the Holy Spirit and formed as a new creature.’ By the grace of God Mary remained free of every personal sin her whole life long” (CCC 493).
“Mary goes before us all in the holiness that is the church’s mystery as the ‘bride without spot or wrinkle’ ” (CCC773). “Spot or wrinkle” refers to sin.
“Spotless” is an analogy, a symbol of without sin. Sin is crucial to the whole process. It started the process of the fall and redemption requires the reversal of the process. If Adam and Eve didn’t sin, none of Christ’s atonement would have been necessary. God in His infinite wisdom chose a process that we limited human beings could understand through analogy and typology. Salvation history is God shaped so man can understand it. It was not by random events but clearly events God shaped for revelations. Why is Mary a virgin in the first place? God could have done anything. He did it for clarity in His revelation.
Does it say that? In context:
Yeah, it probably does say that. That next sentence reads like its own statement on the importance of the former statement, not just a paraphrase.
Looks like the same situation.
Golly. I need to remember this.
And thank you.
Yes, and you can also tell me any number of other things I also already know. But I still can’t read your mind.
One thing that should be kept in mind in all this is that Mary’s “Yes” is in a direct opposition to Eve’s “no.” There is a clear parallel. Same reason why in Gospel of John Christ refers to her twice as “woman.” In Chapter 2 (wedding feast of Cana) and at the foot of the cross. “Woman behold your son.”
The parts in quotes are from the catechism. Yes it says that. Those are the paragraph numbers.
I know what the quotes are. You missed the point of my query. But I already answered the query in your favor, so whatever.
All fine and dandy. Milton says good stuff in Paradise Lost about the seed of the woman and the virgin birth too.
Yes, Milton didn’t think it originally. That’s right out of church fathers. Irenaeus I think but probably several as well.
Yes, I believe as the Church teaches that Mary was sinless. The Biblical example of a venial fault (a term I also had not heard) would be when she and Joseph left Jesus in the Temple at twelve years old. Obviously it wasn’t a rejection of God (Jesus). It was a mistake**. So Mary made mistakes, but her will was completely aligned (full of grace*, as the Angel says) with God’s will for her life.
*I’ve heard one of our apologists (could have been Tim Staples) expand on the meaning of the text there. I think our translations into English often don’t do scripture justice. To be “full of grace” suggests a completeness — Mary has already been redeemed by Christ from the moment of her conception. It is another of those seeming theological paradoxes that she had free will, but was preserved from sin from the get-go and throughout her (eternal) life. But, it’s just as true as Jesus being both God and man (Man).
**It was a revelatory mistake, wasn’t it? I mean that Jesus’ parents searched for him and found him on the third day. . . Maybe I’m slow, but I only recently came to realize this is foreshadowing of the Passion and Resurrection from Mary’s perspective.
Thank you WC. Yes, it took me some time to realize those three days too. (I don’t mean at this moment, but from the time I first read that until it finally dawned on me.) As I states above, God coordinates those kind of “coincidences” for revelatory purposes. It becomes a light bulb moment for humanity to see the symphony that is His creation and His existence. The typology of salvation history is of the highest of such priorities when it comes to His revelation.