The Problem Of Evil: An Historical Theological Approach

by Dale R. Stoffer

Dr. Stoffer is Assistant Professor of Historical Theology at ATS.

If there be any topic of human investigation which is difficult for our nature to grasp, certainly the origin of evils may be considered to be such. 

—Origen

Overview of the Study

The purpose of this paper is to survey the approaches taken to the problem of evil during the course of church history. I will divide the material into five chronological sections: the early church (through the fourth century), Augustine, the medieval and scholastic period, the Reformation, and the Enlightenment and modern period. I must necessarily be selective in what writers I consider for each period, though throughout I will seek to use the foremost theologians. Because other papers will consider the modern period, I will give less detailed consideration there.

As will become clear, the questions raised about the problem of evil vary from period to period, based on the current theological and philosophical climate. Therefore, some attention will need to be given to the cultural background for each period. In the conclusion I will attempt to make some observations about the issue of evil and how it has been perceived during the history of the church.

The Early Church (through the Fourth Century)

One looks in vain for a discussion of the problem of evil per se in the Apostolic Fathers. This should not come as a surprise, since the writers of the late first and early second centuries reflect the New Testament perspective. Thus, the existence of evil is assumed in both a physical (pain, suffering, disaster) and moral sense. Physical evil is seen as a part of the present order of things; in fact, suffering will be the lot of the follower of Christ. Moral evil derives from the sinful inclinations of the human heart. Jesus Christ has dealt decisively with evil in all its forms, including the evil one, Satan. While Christians can even now experience victory over evil and Satan through faith, one day God will judge all evil and cast it from His presence.[1]

The church begins to discuss the issue of evil explicitly in the latter second century in response to the threat posed by Marcion and Gnosticism. This point needs to be remembered because the early church will tend to formulate its doctrine of evil in reaction to the position held by various heretical groups. Interestingly, Tertullian, in responding to Marcion, observed that “the question of the origin of evil” was a favorite topic with the heretics.[2]

Marcion begged a response from the orthodox church by positing two gods: the Creator god of the Old Testament, who is just, fierce, and bellicose, and the “unknown god” of the Christian gospel, who is loving, peaceful, and infinitely good.[3] The issue of evil enters in at several points: the creator is the author of evil because he expressly states this in Isaiah 45:7 or because he is the one who made the devil, the instigator of sin; the Creator is responsible for humanity’s sin because humanity’s soul derives from the spiritual essence of its maker or because he hardens the hearts of those who oppose him.

Christian apologists began by insisting that the God of creation is the same as the God of redemption. They refused to allow a wedge to be driven between God’s actions in the Old and New Testaments. Irenaeus (d. ca. 200), for example, rejected Marcion’s claim that the Old Testament god was the author of sin because he hardened the heart of Pharaoh and his servants. Irenaeus noted such New Testament passages as Matthew 13:11–16; 2 Corinthians 4:4; Romans 1:28; 2 Thessalonians 2:11 to demonstrate that God’s acts in the New Testament are consistent with those in the Old. Significantly, he argues that because God foreknows all things, He left Pharaoh and his servants in the darkness which they chose for themselves. Irenaeus thus sees moral evil as a free choice made by individuals for which they, not God, are responsible.[4]

Tertullian (d. ca. 220) likewise rejects any Marcionite attempts to implicate the Creator as the source of evil because He made the devil or because He made man’s soul which has fallen into sin. Tertullian argues that God created both humanity and the devil with free will, and, therefore, they are responsible for their sin. “... the entire course of God’s action is purged from all imputation to evil. For the liberty of the will will not retort its own wrong on Him by whom it was bestowed, but on him by whom it was improperly used.”[5]

Tertullian makes an important distinction regarding evil when he responds to the claim that in Isaiah 45:7 God acknowledges that He is the creator of evil. Tertullian distinguishes two types of evil: evils of sin and penal evils. Each type of evil should be confined to its own author: the devil as the author of sinful evils and God as the creator of penal evils. This latter class is “the operations of justice passing penal sentences against the evils of sin.” Though these are evil to those who endure them, they are “still on their own account good, as being just and defensive of good and hostile to sin.”[6] Tertullian affirms that divine justice, expressed in the penalizing of sin, is not incompatible with His goodness.

Gnosticism likewise was attacked vigorously by the theologians of the second and third centuries. The issue of evil was part of the conflict both because of the determinism found in the Gnostic system and because of the Gnostic claim that evil inheres in matter. Origen (ca. 185-ca. 254), in the course of his lengthy response to Celsus, challenges the determinism found in Celsus’s claim that evil, by nature, is infinite. Origen felt that such a claim logically led to the conclusion that there has always been a fixed number of evils, neither more nor less. While agreeing with Celsus that evils did not proceed from God, he also rejected the notion that matter is the source of evils. Undergirding Origen’s response is the concept of human free will. “It is the mind of each individual which is the cause of the evil which arises in him.”[7] From this vantage point, Origen dismisses both the deterministic and materialistic nature of Celsus’s view.

Methodius (d. 311) reveals the logic that undergirded the Gnostic view. He observed that the Valentinian Gnostics, in order to avoid making God the author of sin, posited “the existence of substance as coeval with Him.”[8] Evil things have their source in this substance or matter. The Gnostics, as did Marcion, wanted to protect God from the charge of originating evil. Even though they resolved the problem in a different way, they ended up with a dualistic system.

Methodius resolves the dilemma by arguing that evil has no existence in the essence of things; rather it is in the doing of something evil that evil has its origin.

Because there is nothing evil by nature, but it is by use that evil things become such.. .. man was made with a free-will, not as if there were already evil in existence, which he had the power of choosing if he wished, but on account of his capacity of obeying or disobeying God. 

For this was the meaning of the gift of Free Will. And man after his creation receives a commandment from God; and from this at once rises evil, for he does not obey the divine command; and this alone is evil, namely, disobedience, which had a beginning.[9]

A writer who would have noticeable impact on discussions of evil in later centuries was Origen. Unfortunately, his consideration of the issue of evil is often intertwined with some of his most speculative theories, which bear a clear Greek philosophical stamp. Though Origen does wish to remain faithful to the teaching of the apostles, he points out that this teaching does not provide comprehensive knowledge, for example, in regard to “what existed before this world, or what will exist after it.”[10] Origen felt that he could offer “intelligent inference” on subjects that did not have “strict dogmatic definition. .. i.e., in agreement with the creed of the Church.”[11] Significantly, Origen’s importation of Greek philosophical concepts is most apparent when he is utilizing “intelligent inference” to fill in the gaps in apostolic teaching. Origen’s speculation in the two areas noted above — what existed before and what will exist after the world — introduced some most dubious tangents to the issue of evil.

Origen posited an eternal creation, not of corporeal beings or of the visible world, but of rational creatures or pure intellects.[12] God’s purpose for these intellects was that they should contemplate and, thereby, imitate Him. However, God created them with free will, which some of them abused by turning their gaze from Him to the multiplicity that characterizes evil. Origen indicates that no created being is good or evil in its essence, but becomes so by the use it makes of its own free will.[13]

Origen upheld the doctrine of a double creation with a prehistorical fall. Genesis 1 recounts God’s creation of the pure intellects who were made without sexual distinctions (they were made “male and female”). The Genesis 2 account describes how, following a heavenly fall when some intellects turned away from God, these intellects became “souls” with material bodies. God first made the body of a man and then that of woman, thereby establishing sexual distinctions. Origen held that God created the visible world as a field for the trial of these fallen intellects.[14]

Not only were these intellects the focus of God’s original creative activity, they also are the focus of God’s ultimate saving activity, according to Origen. It is from this perspective that he introduces his concept of the restoration of all things, for, as he argues, “the end is always like the beginning.”[15] God’s ultimate purpose is therefore to restore the unity found in the beginning by bringing all rational beings into subjection to Chirst. This subjection, which Origen equates with salvation, includes even the demons and the devil, who holds the world in his dominion.[16]

Origen’s speculative theology includes two points that are important for this study. Origen underscores the idea that God created all rational creatures with free will and that it is the misuse of free choice that is the occasion of sin.[17] Origen does observe that there are natual disasters and hardships that come our way. God does permit these; in fact “holy Scripture teaches us to receive all that happens as sent by God, knowing that without Him no event occurs.”[18] But, for the most part, Origen places the burden of responsibility for evil on the misuse of free will, whether Satan’s or humanity’s. A second point related to Origen’s speculation is the idea that the final restoration of all is an outworking of God’s goodness: he believed that “the goodness of God, through His Christ, may recall all His creatures to one end, even His enemies being conquered and subdued.”[19] Thus, Origen places special emphasis on God’s love and goodness in the outworking of eschatology. Though the church, during the sixth century, did reject Origen’s speculations about the preexistence of the intellects and their eventual salvation, these ideas continued to persist as, for example, in the medieval church through the mystical speculations of the pseudonymous Dionysius the Areopagite and in the Protestant tradition through the theosophical system of Jacob Boehme.

There are several other noteworthy points about the theme of evil that surface in the writings of church fathers through the mid fourth century. Theophilus of Antioch (late second century) underscored a point that later Christian writers frequently emphasized when facing the concept, which was thoroughly embedded in much Greek thought, that matter is inherently evil. He observed: “nothing was made evil by God, but all things good, yea, very good — but the sin in which humanity was concerned brought evil upon them.”[20] A number of writers indicated that the devil was the author of sin, even though he also was part of God’s good creation. Often they make the point that the devil became evil by his own free act.[21]

Several writers also wrestle with the question of why God delays in condemning evil. Tertullian, for example, argues that God’s wisdom is shown in allowing time for humanity to crush his enemy through the use of the same freedom of will that had caused humanity to succumb in the first place.[22] Lactantius (ca. 240-ca. 320) maintains that God “did not exclude evil, that the nature of virtue might be evident.”[23]

Athansius (ca. 296–373) reflects a conception of evil that becomes increasingly common from his time onward. He defines good as that which has its pattern in God Who is (that is, Who is self-existent). Whereas good is, because of its connection with God, “evil is not,” for evil consists in turning from the contemplation of what is good and wandering away towards its contraries. Because all that exists is good, made so by the Creator, evil cannot be said to exist. Evil did not exist in the beginning, nor did it belong to humanity’s nature, which was created good. Likewise evil cannot come from the good; it derives from the soul’s movement towards that which is not: lust expressed through various bodily senses. Evil, therefore, has no substantive or independent existence.[24]

The final church father that we need to consider from this period is one of the Cappadocian Fathers, Gregory of Nyssa (330-ca. 395). Gregory is significant both because he continues features of Origen’s thought and because he anticipates a number of points regarding evil that find their classic statement in Augustine.

Gregory’s conception of God possesses a definite Neoplatonic cast. God is depicted as ineffable and incomprehensible, unchangeable, unimpassioned, and simple, that is, uncompounded.[25] He is good and the Creator of a time and space universe (Gregory avoided the Greek notion of an eternal creation).[26]

Gregory’s view of God helps to understand his view of evil. Evil stands in contrast to God. While He is simple and without parts, evil is compound, multiform, many-colored (thus the bias against sexuality which derives from forming humanity male and female). While God is without change and passionless, His creatures are subject to change and passion, a door which God’s creatures can open to evil if they choose. While God is good, evil is the deprivation or privation of the good (Origen had also seen evil as a privation of the good[27]). Gregory further argues that because evil is a privation of the good, it has no self-subsistence, “for no evil of any kind lies outside and independent of the will.”[28]

What is the origin of evil? Gregory lays the blame on the devil. The devil willingly turned away from the good and came to understand the opposite of goodness, that is, envy. This beginning is the cause of all that follows. For in this act, the devil received a bias toward evil. The devil, however, envied the special status of humanity, who still maintained communion with God. The devil therefore mixed the same wickedness into humanity’s will as he had in his own. By this means humanity is in its present evil condition. Gregory insists that this entire sad history is a result of the misuse of free will. It is “by a motion of our self-will” that “we contracted a fellowship with evil, and, owing to some sensual gratification, mixed up this evil with our nature ...“[29] Gregory indicates that God foreknew that all this would happen, yet He permitted it in order that “He might not destroy our freedom, the inalienable heritage of reason and therefore a portion of His image in us.”[30]

Gregory of Nyssa reveals the influence of Origen in a number of areas: his openness to Greek philosophy, the concept of a prehistorical fall of man, an acceptance of the restoration of all things. Though Gregory does part company with Origen in several areas, including the eternity of created beings, he does follow him, nonetheless, in his understanding of God’s grand design for the world.

Both regard the history of the world as a movement between a beginning and an end in which are united every single spiritual or truly human nature in the world, and the Divine nature. This interval of movement is caused by the falling away of [that is, through] the free will of the creature from the divine: but it will come to an end, in order that the former union may be restored. .. Both, too,. .. would regard “man” as the final cause, and the explanation, and the centre of God’s plan in creation.[31]

For this study, one of the significant points of agreement between Gregory and Origen is the conviction that evil has its source not in matter, but in the misuse of the free will of humanity. Though they lived over a century apart, they were reacting to a common threat: the fatalism and determinism of a prominent religious movement. In Origen’s case, it was Gnosticism; in Gregory’s case it was Manichaeism. Both movements viewed evil as an inevitable result of divine processes; it resided in matter and, therefore, human responsiblilty was nullified. In response, Origen and Gregory asserted that evil was due to an act of human will. Evil had no independent existence; “it was relative, being a ‘default, ‘ or ‘failure,’ or ‘turning away from the true good’ of the will, which, however, was always free to rectify this failure. It was a ... loss of the good; but it did not stand over against the good as an independent power.”[32]

Summary

Throughout the period of the early church, leading up to Augustine, there is a quite uniform approach to the problem of evil. Invariably, evil is seen as a product of the misuse of free will. It is important, though, to set this observation in a larger context. Pelikan notes that classical Greek, and later, Roman thought had wrestled with the opposing themes of responsibility and inevitability. By the time of the first century, determinism and inevitability had become predominate in the philosophical and religious mix of the Greco-Roman world. Gnosticism served only to heighten the sense that humanity was a “victim and slave of forces over which he had no control.”[33]

The early church fathers, as they sought to respond to the determinism that pervaded their cultural context, were sensitized in their study of Scripture to the concepts of choice, freedom, and option. Forster and Marston comment on this development:

The early church noted the Scriptures (such as Matthew 23:37) which indicated that man sometimes defied and disobeyed God’s will. .. They therefore coined the term “free-will” to describe the will of man. This was to emphasize the Bible’s teaching that Man’s will was free to choose not to do the will of God.[34]

They further stress the unanimity of the early church’s appeal to free will:

The doctrine of “free-will” seems to have been universally accepted in the early church. Not a single church figure in the first 300 years rejected it and most of them stated it clearly in works still extant. .. The only ones to reject it were heretics like the Gnostics, Marcion, Valentinus, Manes (and the Manichees), etc. ... Three recurrent ideas seem to be in their teaching:

1. The rejection of free-will is the view of heretics.
2. Free-will is a gift given to man by God — for nothing can ultimately be independent of God.
3. Man possesses free-will because he is made in God’s image, and God has free-will.[35]

The responsibility inherent in human free will becomes the dominant apologetic tool in the church’s response to heretical notions about the source of evil. The prominent heretical groups invariably traced the source of evil back to God either directly by positing two gods, one of whom created evil, (Marcion and the Manichees) or indirectly through divine prosesses which brought into existence a world and matter in which evil inheres (Gnosticism). The church responded by insisting that both God and His creation were good and that the devil and humanity are responsible for evil through the misuse of God’s good gift of free will. Evil is seen as having no self-existence but as being derivative in nature. Indeed, because only that which is good is existent, evil is not.

There are only limited discussions of incidental or natural evil in the writings of the early church fathers. The emphasis is clearly on those forms of evil for which humanity is responsible. When such evils as disease or natural disasters are discussed, they are viewed as God’s just judgment against sin (Tertullian’s “penal sin”), or as “ambassadors” which direct us toward God (as such, Basil the Great prefers not to call them evils), or as the result of the fallen world order.[36] The minimal consideration given to these evils certaily is an outgrowth of the church’s stress on human responsibility for evil, but there are also other factors. Suffering was an expected part of the life of the Christian throughout this period. In fact, the church probably experienced worse suffering directly from human hands than from natural sources of pain and hardship. Likewise, Christians of this period were other-worldly oriented; they believed that heaven was their true home, not this world. This outlook was strengthened by the Platonic world view which held that the true reality was heavenly, while the present life was but a mere shadow of the greater heavenly existence. Pain and suffering are therefore temporary aberrations found in an unstable world. God’s original endowment to humanity was passionlessness, existence beyond the touch of such temporal sensations.[37]

Augustine

Background to Augustine’s Thought

Perhaps no one has dominated the theological world, both in his own age as well as succeeding ones, as has Augustine. His impact has been due to the way that he marshalled his rare intellectual abilities to respond to a world that was undergoing unparalleled change. Not only did the Western church face numerous religious challenges from inside (Pelagianism, Donatism) and out (Manichaeism), but the very social and political order was in a state of disarray due to the conquest of Rome and the Western empire by a host of foreign invaders. In the course of responding to these and other issues, Augustine constructed a most impressive theological structure that would come to dominate the theological horizon of the Western church for over a millennium.

Knowing Augustine’s historical context allows us to gain a better grasp of his discussions about the problem of evil. Much of what Augustine writes about evil derives from his confrontation with two major challenges to orthodox thought: Manichaeism and Pelagianism. In addition, much of what Augustine has to say about evil has its roots in the thought of earlier theologians, but he does develop a new framework and provide new direction to the problem of evil. We will pursue Augustine’s thought on the topic of evil as he develops it in response to the movements of Manichaeism and Pelagianism. Some background on both movements and Augustine’s relation to them will help to set the stage.

Ever the seeker of truth, Augustine, in his younger years, had been drawn to Manichaeism because of its promise to offer a rational explanation for the universe. Augustine had had difficulties with the problem of how the goodness and love of God could be reconciled with the existence of evil. Manichaeism resolved this problem by positing two eternal principles, one good, the other evil, which are in perpetual conflict. Humanity’s plight derives from its present situation: the human spirit, which is part of the divine substance, is now in anguish because of its union, here on earth, with the principle of evil. Like Gnosticism, Manichaeism taught that through a revelation humanity can know its divine origin and escape the bonds of matter. In time, Augustine came to doubt this explanation for evil and eventually reject Manichaeism.[38]

As we noted in the previous section, the early church uniformly emphasized free will and human responsibility in response to a cultural milieu which stressed inevitability. The church in the Eastern, Greek-speaking portion of the Roman Empire especially upheld the doctrine of free will, a characteristic that continues to the present. In the West, however, there was a gradual movement toward a position of original sin, anticipating the doctrine of total depravity. J. N. D. Kelly notes, however, that even though fourth-century Christians had a firm grasp of “man’s fallen condition and and consequent need of divine help,” they also maintained “dogged belief in free will and responsibility.” He continues, “These two sets of ideas were not necessarily irreconcilable, but a conflict was unavoidable unless their relations were set down very subtly.”[39]

A conflict indeed was touched off when a well-educated Briton, Pelagius, appeared in Rome at the end of the fourth century. He brought with him a message that emphasized humanity’s innate goodness, free will, and perfectability. In addition, he challenged the growing tendencies in Western Christianity toward the inevitability of sin, original sin, and moral pessimism. All this put Pelagius on a collision course with a number of church leaders, including Augustine.[40]

Augustine and the Problem of Evil

Augustine shares the Neoplatonist view of God which was becoming the norm among theologians: God is incomprehensible, incorruptible, unchangeable, infinite, eternal. He is the sole source of light; only in Him is true enlightenment. He is the one sovereign Good; only in Him do we have wellbeing.[41]

Augustine affirms that God is the creator of all that exists. All the things which God created are individually “good, and altogether very good, because God made all things very good.”[42] It is from this standpoint that Augustine attacks Manichaeism. Creation is the work of the one absolute God. To posit two eternally antagonistic principles present in the universe is not only contrary to Christian monotheism but also leads to logical absurdity.[43]

Augustine’s discussion of evil reveals his indebtedness to the writings of earlier Christian theologians but especially to concepts derived from Neoplatonism.[44] Augustine rejected any notion that evil has its source in God. Therefore, he felt that the proper place to begin talking about evil was not “Whence is evil?,” as in the case of the Manichees, but “What is evil?” He rules out the Manichaen argument that evil was a nature or substance. Since God’s creation was very good, evil cannot be a substance, for if it were, it would be good. Evil, indeed, is what is against nature.[45]

Augustine’s classic definition of evil is that it is a privation (or depriving, or absence, or corruption) of the good. He is careful to observe that even though some things can be termed “better” than others in creation, it is not because they lack goodness. Rather, it is because they have differing degrees of measure, form, and order. Evil, on the other hand,

is nothing else than corruption, either of the measure, or the form, or the order, that belong to nature. Nature therefore which has been corrupted, is called evil, for assuredly when incorrupt it is good; but even when corrupt, so far as it is nature it is good, so far as it is corrupted it is evil.[46]

Augustine will make use of a related argument against the Manichaen concept of the existence of two principles, one good, one evil. Here, as in his above argument, he begins with one of the attributes which was essential to God’s nature, as he understood it. He observes that God is the supreme existence. A nature which moves away from Him and thereby becomes more corrupt moves toward non-existence, and “what is non-existent is nothing.”[47] True existence is to be found, therefore, only in the One who truly is. To be fully corrupt is to cease to exist.

Even though evil is not a nature, it is an undeniable reality. Though not existing as a substance, it does exist as a lack of goodness. Evil is thus an “ontological parasite” in Augustine’s thought.[48] “At this point, Augustine followed the lead of Neoplatonism, for which evil consisted not in another reality besides the One, but simply in withdrawing from the One.”[49]

What is the source of evil, according to Augustine? He observes that even though God is incorruptible, this is not true of those natures created by Him. Insofar as they are natures, they are good; but because they were made out of nothing, it is possible for them to be corrupted. Yet God cannot be held responsible for the corruption of natures that He created good, “for corruption cannot come from Him who alone is incorruptible.”[50] The only source of evil “is the falling away from the unchangeable good of a being made good but changeable, first in the case of an angel, and afterwards in the case of man.”[51] This falling away arises from the “perversion of the will, bent aside from. .. God, the Supreme Substance, toward. .. lower things.”[52] The abuse of free will by God’s creatures allows Augustine to claim that God is the creator of all things, but is not the author of evil.

Augustine maintained that free will is good, for its source is God. In the case of Adam, free will was capable of good, but only as it was aided by God’s grace. But it likewise was capable of evil.

God ... did not will even him [Adam] to be without His grace, which He left in his free will; because free will is sufficient for evil, but is too little for good, unless it is aided by Omnipotent Good. And if that man had not forsaken that assistance of his free will, he would always have been good; but he forsook it, and he was forsaken.[53]

Augustine insists that the will itself is the source of the move away from the good.

But what cause of willing can there be which is prior to willing? Either it is a will, in which case we have not got beyond the root of evil will. Or it is not a will, and in that case there is no sin in it. Either, then, will is itself the first cause of sin, or the first cause is without sin. Now sin is rightly imputed only to that which sins, nor is it rightly imputed unless it sins voluntarily.[54]

Augustine’s teaching about evil up to this point is consistent with what we have seen in the writings of earlier church fathers. Likewise, most of the above discussion derives from Augustine’s interaction with Manichaeism and generally with a deterministic philosophic outlook which the church had resolutely opposed from the second century on. It is in his response to Pelagianism, however, that Augustine introduces some significant new perspectives on the subject of evil.[55]

The preceding thought of Augustine on free will is true only of humanity before the fall. Augustine followed the Western tradition, beginning with Tertullian, that Adam’s sin radically affected all his descendants through their inheritance of original sin from the progenitor of the race. Though, as we have seen, Adam, prior to the fall, was able to sin, he also possessed the gift of being able to persevere in the good, i.e. the power not to sin. As a consequence of his sin, however, Adam lost the power not to sin. He was still free, but without the gift of grace that enabled him not to sin, he was free only to sin. All humanity since Adam is in this same condition because of the inheritance of original sin from Adam.[56]

Because our will is incapable of doing true good, we are dependent upon divine grace to act upon our will if we are to be led out of the “mass of perdition” to salvation. Augustine held that grace works irresistibly in the will, leading it to will the good. Though God initiates this working in the human will, once His grace is present, He cooperates with our initially weak will, strengthening it for good works. “He operates, therefore, without us, in order that we may will; but when we will, and so will that we may act, He co-operates with us.”[57] Faithfulness is expected of the Christian. But even this faithfulness derives from the gift of perseverance which is also a result of grace and not merit. Interestingly, Augustine holds that some who have received initial grace and the resultant truly free will may fall away because they do not receive the gift of perseverance.[58] In the future life, the saved will not have the power to will evil; they will not be able to sin. This state does not remove free will, however; rather, the elect will be much freer when it becomes impossible for them to be the slaves of sin.[59]

Augustine’s understanding of grace leads him to the issue of predestination. As Gonzalez observes:

If salvation is only possible through grace, and if that grace does not depend on any merit on the part of him who receives it, it follows that it is God himself, through his sovereign freedom and action, that decides who is to receive that unmerited gift.[60]

Augustine holds that the number of those predestinated is fixed. But he is insistent that God does not predestine humanity to sin or to damnation. Rather God saves the elect from the mass of perdition through His own sovereign and inscrutable will, while He leaves the rest in this mass to face the future condemnation which their sins deserve.[61] Augustine further observes that no one can be certain in this life whether “he is in the number of the predestinated.”[62] This serves to caution believers against any presumption or pride in their lives.

There is in Augustine’s writings a certain unresolved tension between his desire to deny that God is the source of evil, as he responds to Manichaeism, and his desire to uphold the absolute primacy of God in salvation through the doctrine of predestination, as he responds to Pelagianism. John Hick observes that this double emphasis on the “self-creation of evil ex nihilo” through the abuse of free will and on the doctrine of absolute divine predestination “in effect brings the origin of evil within the all-encompassing purpose of God, and lays upon Him who is alone able to bear it the ultimate responsibility for the existence of evil.”[63] Augustine, no doubt, would hold that such a charge is improper, both because we have no right to charge God with unrighteousness and because we are delving into issues which are part of God’s unsearchable and inscrutable will.[64] Nonetheless, this tension does exist as Augustine deals with the issues raised by Manichaeism and Pelagianism.

There are several other noteworthy points about evil in Augustine’s writings which relate to the purpose and place of evil. They fit evil within a larger philosophical world view which tends to minimize the notion that evil is an existential problem. A salient principle in Augustine’s thought is what Hick has referred to as Augustine’s “aesthetic theme.” This is his “affirmation of faith that, seen in its totality from the ultimate standpoint of the Creator, the universe is wholly good; for even the evil within it is made to contribute to the complex perfection of the whole.”[65] Following is one expression of this theme from Augustine’s Confessions:

And to Thee is there nothing at all evil, and not only to Thee, but to Thy whole creation; because there is nothing without which can break in, and mar that order which Thou has appointed it. But in the parts thereof, some things, because they harmonize not with others, are considered evil; whereas those very things harmonize with others, and are good, and in themselves are good.[66]

By fitting evil within the larger scope of God’s ultimate plans, Augustine sees evil fulfilling several purposes. It serves as a kind of counterpoint to good, enhancing our admiration for the good.[67] Further, God can bring good even out of that which is evil. An exceptional case of this truth is that when God

foresaw that man would make a bad use of his free-will, that is, would sin, God arranged His own designs rather with a view to do good to man even in his sinfulness, that thus the good will of the Omnipotent might not be made void by the evil will of man, but might be .fulfilled in spite of it.[68]

Augustine argues that even when God’s will inflicts evil, it is always just, “and what is just is certainly not evil.”[69] As we have seen in earlier writers, Augustine also distinguishes between two forms of evil in order to remove any suggestion that God creates sin.

He did not make sin, and our voluntary sin is the only thing that is called evil. There is another kind of evil, which is the penalty of sin. Since therefore there are two kinds of evil, sin and the penalty of sin, sin does not pertain to God; the penalty of sin pertains to the avenger. For as God is good who constituted all things, so He is just in taking vengeance on sin.[70]

Augustine follows up this discussion by tying it in with the aesthetic theme that we noted above: “therefore all things are ordered in the best way possible. .. “[71] Even those acts of God which are adjudged evil by humanity are part of the larger working of God’s justice.[72]

Observations Concerning Augustine’s Approach to Evil

The theme of evil serves as a microcosm of Augustine’s thought, for it cuts across some of his most distinctive beliefs: the doctrines of God, creation, humanity, sin, salvation, even consummation. His approach to evil reveals both his indebtdness to earlier theologians, but also the new directions which he pioneered.

Of special importance is that, in his discussion of evil, Augustine shifted the balance which had existed in the church from the second century to his time away from an emphasis on free will and in the direction of determinism. It is true that Augustine sought to retain the traditional argument that misuse of free will is the source of sin and evil. But his doctrine of predestination, that God has from all eternity determined which shall receive saving grace and which shall not, introduces an irreconcilable tension into the mix. As John Sanders has observed concerning Augustine and Calvin,

both attempted to argue for a form of soft-determinism or compatibilism (human freedom and divine determinism are not contradictory), by making a distinction between remote and proximate causes. They thought that if God was only the remote cause, then humans are still free and responsible as the proximate causes. The problem is that the proximate cause only does what the remote cause determines it should do. Soft-determinism is actually a determinism in freewill clothing.[73]

There is no doubt that Augustine’s doctrine of predestination derives in part from his reaction to Pelagianism and his desire to guard against the introduction of human works into God’s work of salvation. But even more determinative was his conception of God. Sanders observes that Augustine logically applied his Platinic concept of God as perfect, static, and unchangeable to the issue of the divine-human relationship.

Because God is totally unconditioned, he cannot “respond” to a person’s faith ... God has always known who would be saved and who would be damned. Furthermore, God does not decide who will be saved based on foreknowledge of future human decisions because God is immutable. Basing election on any sort of human activity would imply conditionality and mutability in God. God is therefore the sole cause of salvation and damnation. God is, in fact, the sole cause of everything. . .[74]

Clark Pinnock has noted that Augustine’s view of God bears directly upon the issue of evil. His commitment to this “type of theism threatened his defense of the divine justice” in attributing evil to the misuse of freedom. “However, if history is infallibly known and certain from all eternity, then freedom is an illusion.”[75] And if freedom is an illusion, in what sense can humanity be held responsible for evil and sin? Likewise, does not the ultimate responsibility for evil come to rest at heaven’s gate? Though these questions tended to be muted during the medieval period due to the dominance of a semi-Pelagian (or semi-Augustinian) approach to grace and free will, they would again surface during the Reformation when a purer form of Augustinian doctrine was recovered.

Notes

1. Note these points in the following passages: “The Letter of the Romans to the Corinthians” 4:2, 22:6, 28:1, 45:1–8 in The Apostolic Fathers (hereafter AF), trans. J. B. Lightfoot and J. R. Harmer, 2nd ed. (Grand Rapids, MI: Baker Book House, 1989), pp. 30, 41, 44, 53–54; “An Ancient Christian Sermon (2 Clement)” 8:2, 10:1 AF, pp. 71-73; “The Letters of Ignatius, Bishop of Antioch: To the Ephesians” 13:1, 19:3 in AF, pp. 90, 92; “The Martyrdom of Polycarp” 2:1–4 in AF, pp. 135-136 (interestingly, the letter affirms that the martyrdoms of God’s people “have taken place in accordance with the will of God” since He has “the power over all things”); “The Epistle of Barnabas” 4:12, 20:1–2 in AF, pp. 166, 186-187; “The Shepherd of Hermas” 53:4 in AF, p. 240; “The Fragments of Papias” 24 in AF, p. 326.
2. Alexander Roberts and James Donaldson, eds. The Ante-Nicene Fathers (hereafter ANF), Vol. III: Latin Christianity: Its Founder, Tertullian. The Five Books against Marcion, by Tertullian (Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdmans Publishing Company, reprint ed, 1980), 1, 2, p. 272.
3. Justo L. Gonzalez, A History of Christian Thought, Vol. I: From the Beginnings to the Council of Chalcedon (Nashville, TN: Abingdon Press, 1970), p. 141.
4. ANF, Vol. I: The Apostolic Fathers with Justin Martyr and Irenaeus. Against Heresies, by Irenaeus, 29, 1–2, p. 502.
5. Tertullian, Against Marcion, 2, 9, p. 305.
6. Ibid., 2, 14, p. 308. See a similar approach to Isaiah 45:7 in Orgen’s response to Celsus. ANF, Vol. IV: Fathers of the Third Century. Against Celsus, by Origen, 6, 60, pp. 598-599.
7. Origen, Against Celsus, 4, 62–66, pp. 525-527.
8. ANF, Vol. VI: Fathers of the Third Century. “Concerning Free-Will,” by Methodius, p. 358.
9. Ibid., p. 362.
10. ANF, Vol. IV, De Principiis, by Origen, Preface 7, pp. 240-241.
11. Ibid., 1,7, 1, p. 262. Such speculative inference is consistent with Origen’s view that there is, beyond the literal sense of Scripture, a spiritual, or secret, or hidden sense which the Holy Spirit reveals to some. Ibid., 2, 3, 2, pp. 270-271.
12. Ibid., 2, 2, 1, p. 270; 3, 5, 4, p. 342. Gonzalez, Christian Thought, Vol. I, p. 226, refers to these creatures as “pure intellects.” When writers refer to Origen’s belief in the pre-existence of souls, they have this concept in mind.
13. Gonzalez, Christian Thought, Vol. I, pp. 226-227.
14. Ibid., p. 227.
15. Origen, De Principiis, 1, 6, 2, p. 260.
16. Ibid., 1,6, 1, p. 260. Origen’s equation of subjection to Christ with salvation comes from joining the concept of subjection found in I Corinthians 15:25 with the parallelism between “subject unto God” and “salvation” found in Psalm 62:1 — “Shall not my soul be subject unto God? From Him cometh my salvation.” Origen’s idea that God’s enemies will be brought to salvation through their subjection is intriguing. He is such a proponent of free will in dealing with the issue of evil (vs. the determinism and fatalism of the Gnostics) that it seems quite out of character to suggest that some beings will be subjected to Christ.
17. Ibid., 2, 10, 6, p. 292.
18. Ibid., 3, 2, 7, p. 334.
19. Ibid., 1, 6, 1, p. 260.
20. ANF, Vol. II: Fathers of the Second Century. “To Autolycus,” by Theophilus, 2, 17, p. 101.
21. Tertullian, Against Marcion, 2, 10, p. 306; Origen, Against Celsus, 4, 65, pp. 526-527. Note also ANF, Vol. VII: Fathers of the Third and Fourth Centuries. The Divine Institutes, by Lactantius, 2, 9, p. 52.
22. Tertullian, Against Marcion, 2, 10, p. 306.
23. Lactantius, Divine Institutes, 5, 7, p. 142.
24. The Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers (hereafter NPNF) Second Series, Vol. IV: Anthanasius. “Against the Heathens” by Athanasius (Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdmans Publishing Company, reprint ed., 1978), 2–6, pp. 4-7.
25. NPNF, Second Series, Vol. V, Against Eunomius by Gregory of Nyssa, 1, 26, p. 69 and “The Great Catechism,” 20, p. 491.
26. Footnote missing in print version.
27. Origen, De Principiis, 2, 9, 2, p. 290.
28. Gregory of Nyssa, “The Great Catechism, “ 7, p. 482. For other discussions of the nature of evil, see “On the Making of Man,” 20, 3, p. 410; “On the Soul and the Resurrecion.” p. 433; and “The Great Catechism.” 6, p. 481.
29. Idem, “The Great Catechism,” 8, p. 482; see also 6, p. 481.
30. NPNF, Second Series, Vol. V, “Prolegomena” by William Moore, p. 10.
31. Ibid., p. 21.
32. Ibid., p. 15.
33. Jeroslav Pelikan, The Emergence of the Catholic Tradition (100–600) (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1972), p. 283. I am indebted to the article by Owen H. Alderfer, “An Inquiry into Divine Sovereignty and Human Will,” Ashland Theological Bulletin 11 (Spring 1978): 14-39 for pulling together much material pertinent to this discussion.
34. Roger T. Forster and V. Paul Marston, God’s Strategy in Human History (Wheaton, IL: Tyndale House Publishers, Inc., 1973), p. 244.
35. Ibid.
36. See, for example, NPNF, Second Series, Vol. VIII: St. Basil. The Hexaemeron by Basil the Great, 2, 5, p. 62 and Gregory of Myssa, “The Great Catechism,” 8, p. 484.
37. Gregory of Nyssa, “The Great Confession,” 8, p. 484.
38. Gonzalez, Christian History, Vol. II, pp. 15-18.
39. J. N. D. Kelly, Early Christian Doctrines (New York: Harper & Row, Publishers, revised ed., 1960), p. 357.
40. Alderfer, “Inquiry,” p. 18.
41. NPNF, First Series, Vol. I: St. Augustine. The Confessions of St. Augustine by Augustine, 7, 1, 1–3, pp. 102-103; 7, 10, 16, p. 109; 8, 1, 1–4, pp. 190-191.
42. Ibid., 7, 12, 18, p. 110.
43. Gonzalez, Christian Thought, Vol. II, p. 40.
44. See the discussion of Augustine’s reliance on Platonism in John Hick, Evil and the God of Love (Great Britain: Macmillan and Co., Ltd., 1966), pp. 46-49.
45. NPNF, First Series, Vol. IV: St. Augustine. “On the Morals of the Manichaens” by Augustine, 1, 2–6, 2–8, pp. 69-71; Confessions, 7, 12, 18, p. 110.
46. NPNF, First Series, Vol. IV, “Concerning the Nature of Good, against the Manichaens” by Augustine, 4, p. 352.
47. NPNF, First Series, Vol. IV, “Against the Epistle of Manichaeus Called Fundamental,” by Augustine, 40, 46, pp. 149-150. See also Hick, Evil, p. 55.
48. Norman L. Geisler, The Roots of Evil (Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan Publishing Company, 1978), p. 47.
49. Gonzalez, Christian Theology, Vol. II, pp. 40-41.
50. Augustine, Epistle of Manichaeus, 38, 44, p. 149.
51. Idem, NPNF, First Series, Vol. III: St. Augustine. “The Enchiridion,” 23, p. 245.
52. Idem, Confessions, 7, 16, 22, p. 111.
53. Idem, NPNF, First Series, Vol. V: St. Augustine. “On Rebuke and Grace,” 31, p. 484.
54. The Library of Christain Classics (hereafter LCC), Vol. VI: Augustine: Earlier Writings (Philadelphia: The Westminster Press, 1953). On Free Will by Augustine, 17, 49, p. 200.
55. Augustine himself recognized that he was charting a new course with regard to the issues of free will, original sin, and irresistible grace. See Alderfer, “Inquiry,” pp. 18-19.
56. Augustine, “On Rebuke and Grace,” 12, p. 476; 31–33, pp. 484-485.
57. Idem, NPNF, First Series, Vol. V, “On Grace and Free Will,” 33, p. 458.
58. Idem, “On Rebuke and Grace, “ 42, p. 489.
59. Idem, “Enchiridion,” 105, p. 271.
60. Gonzalez, Christian Theology, Vol. II, p. 46.
61. Augustine, “On Rebuke and Grace,’ 11–19, pp. 476-479.
62. Ibid., 40, p. 488.
63. Hick, Evil, p. 69.
64. Augustine will frequently cite Romans 9:14 and 11:33 to deflect any suggestion that God’s dealing with humanity is unjust.
65. Hick, Evil, p. 88.
66. Augustine, Confessions, 7, 13, 19, p. 110.
67. Idem, “Enchiridion,” 11, p. 240.
68. Ibid., 104, p. 271; see also 101, p. 269.
69. Ibid., 102, p. 270.
70. Idem, NPNF, First Series, Vol. IV, “Acts or Disputation against Fotunatus,” 15, p. 116.
71. Ibid.
72. Augustine interprets the statement in Isaiah 45:7 that God creates evil along these lines. See Epistle of Manichaeus, 39, 45, p. 149.
73. John E. Sanders, “God as Personal,” in A Case for Arminianism: The Grace of God, The Will of Man, ed. Clark H. Pinnock (Grand Rapids, MI: Academie Books, 1989), p. 172.
74. Ibid., p. 171.
75. Clark Pinnock, “God Limits His Knowledge,” in Predestination and Free Will, eds. David Basinger and Randall Basinger (Downers Grove, IL: Inter-Varsity Press, 1986), p. 150.