Does the problem of evil disprove the existence of God?

If “the problem of evil” is said to refer specifically to the logical problem of evil (or the notion that God’s existence is contradictory with the existence of evil in the world on an a priori level)–as opposed to the evidential problem of evil (which relies on inductive a posteriori reasoning and is thus easily refutable), and if “evil” refers to anything which causes excess suffering (suffering without a clear telos), then I strongly disagree with the idea that the problem of evil disproves the existence of God.

This is because humans can never fully understand God’s plan for the universe, as God is omnipotent and transcends the bounds of human logic (as demonstrated in Jesus’ performance of miracles in the Gospels, which are beyond science and reason). Jeremiah 29:11 states, “‘For I know the plans I have for you,’ declares the Lord, ‘plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you a hope and a future.’” This means that even though there may appear to be intense and unnecessary evil and suffering the world, this is only from a human standpoint, and the Bible shows that from God’s, every event will ultimately build to something positive (which can be said to have led to Leibniz’s claim that we live in “the best of all possible worlds”).  

This view is supported by Gary Rosenhield, who argued that the problem of evil can be solved if one appeals to the mystery of the divine. Gary Rosenhield wrote in Dostoevsky and The Book of Job that “the great miracle of the Bible... [that] Job was able to be happy with his new children, even when thinking about his old children... He could be happy because he was able to forgive God not only for himself but for the children that he lost.” If Job were strictly rational, it is obvious that he would not have forgiven God for the suffering God allowed to occur to him, However, Job’s faith was non-rational and he trusted in the mysterious character of God that everything was in God’s plan, leading him to continue proclaiming “Just and true art Thou, O Lord” in the Bible. Additionally, St. Augustine argued that the God is not responsible for the evil in the world, but that the evil in the world is a result of Adam and Eve’s original sin, which would then corrupt all future generations of humans. This is evidenced in how in the Book of Genesis, the line “And God saw that it was good” is repeated as the Book documents God’s creation of elements of the world, suggesting that God created the world without sin. 

However, some may disagree with these two theodicies (counterarguments to the problem of evil). Rosenhield’s theodicy suggests that belief in God must be non-rational, so some may contend that this means belief in God is illogical and thus, God should not be believed in. Kant thought that all perceived reality was based upon the “pure reason” of things-in-themselves (or objects prior to experience), meaning that all reality must be grounded in reason and anything which contradicts reason (in this case, God) must not be real. With regard to the Augustinian theodicy, some may argue that by providing Adam and Eve with the potential to commit the original sin in the first place, God is responsible for all subsequent evil in the world, and that given God’s omniscience, God could’ve prevented this.  

Nonetheless, these criticisms are flawed. The first criticism is invalid, as it is important to make a distinction between reality accessible to humans and reality inaccessible to humans. The criticism only disproves the possibility of a purely immanent God (or existing only in reality accessible to humans)–as Kantian theory only entails the basis of all perceived reality (or humanly-accessible reality) upon reason, yet God must exist beyond this, as Genesis 1 documents how God created such reality ex nihilo, meaning God must be outside of it. In addition, Kierkegaard famously argued that one should come to a belief in God through a “leap of faith” (or through the absence of reason), and a Latin phrase commonly attributed to Tertullian is “credo quia absurdum” (or “I believe, because it is absurd). The second criticism is invalid, because the “potential to commit the original sin” which God provided Adam and Eve can be defined as free will (which Alvin Plantinga argued was essential for God to preserve). Free will also brings about the potential for authentic faith in God (as a coerced faith in God would, by definition, not be meaningful), meaning that Adam and Eve’s choice to use their free will in a sinful manner was not an event set in stone, and therefore God should not be blamed for the original sin, and thus, evil in the world. Furthermore, it is only through God’s creation and preservation of free will that Christians can follow teachings on morality from the Bible at all, meaning that while free will can be used to cause evil, it also provides the solution to remove evil from the world, upholding God’s quality of omnibenevolence.  

In conclusion, the problem of evil is unsuccessful in falsifying the existence of God, as God has a plan for the betterment of the world (which is unknowable for humans, yet faith itself must be irrational), and because of the necessity for free will (which can create evil in the world but can also be the antidote to evil if used in the right way).