In Saint Augustine’s Confessions,
I found his struggle with the concept of evil to be intriguing. In the beginning of Book VII Augustine has a
difficult time understanding evil and its relation to God. After all, why would an all-powerful God
create evil by choice? Augustine
disregards the idea that evil is merely a byproduct of human choice by the same
logic. Since God is completely good, God
would not create evil. Augustine solves
his struggles by coming up with the idea that evil is “not a substance but
perversion of the will when it turns aside from you (150).” Essentially, evil is not actually existent
but is solely the absence of that which is good or Godly. Therefore, evil is a characteristic of
creatures that move away from God, “the wicked themselves are suited to this
order in as much as they are unlike you, whereas they are suited to the to the
higher order in so far they become more like you (150).” Furthermore, Augustine creates the idea of a
spectrum of goodness, where the beings closest to God are good and the
creatures farthest away are evil. This
idea also goes along with the idea in the previous Books that one is either
moving closer or moving farther from God.
I agree with Augustine’s assessment of evil. I think it is an important idea that no
creature is created evil because it does not contradict the idea that God is
wholly good. It also answers the
question of why God does not make everything good. Good is something that is purely relative and
therefore must have creations that are less good than others are. What we see as evil is still good just not as
good as other beings. Therefore,
Augustine provides a fantastic explanation to the existence of evil and why a
good God would create evil.
If Augustine considers sin to be evil, then what does this quote mean?: "We are bowed down by your chastisement. In justice we have been delivered to the author of sin"(155). So if evil is the absence of god and sin is evil, sinning is also the absence of god within one's lower self? Why then would that make god the author of sin if its the absence of god? Am I speaking too much like Augustine? Or is sinning not in fact evil?
ReplyDeleteLike Eric, I am still struggling to understand the origin of sin. You say that goodness is determined by one's proximity to God, but then you also say that "God does not make everything good." Does that mean that God controls people's proximity to himself? Are some people allowed to get to know him better, while others aren't? And if sin is the absence of God, then is God responsible for it if he doesn't let certain people draw nearer to him?
ReplyDeleteIn the context of Evan's post i think that it is important not to ignore where Augustine has derived this answer from; scripture and experience. I would agree that augustine provides a compelling argument which allows for a wholly good god but also explains evil. In the quote provided by Eric there is a reference to the "author of sin", in my mind this is clearly a reference to Satan. This is a character defined clearly within the scripture (for example in the story of Job) as evil, not necessarily the root of evil but just the existing presence of it in questioning God. In this context I believe the concept of sin is easier to understand, at the most basic level it is the movement away from God. moving towards God or away from him is an individual's choice rooted in the concept of free will which is the reason why there are heretics and believers, the good and evil-doers.
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