Essays in Philosophy of Religion (Jostarhaye Falsafeh Din)

The Problem of Suffering, and Closeness to God Evaluation and Critique

Document Type : Original Article

Authors

sara baghdadi, 1
seyed amir akrami, 2

1 PhD candidate in philosophy of religion at the Institute for Humanities and Cultural Studies

2 Faculty member of the Institute for Humanities and Cultural Studies, Professor of Philosophy of Religion

http://dx.doi.org/10.22034/rs.2021.36459.1431
Abstract
Contemporary philosopher Eleanor Stump, as a theist, sets a defense against the problem of suffering. According to her defense, first, Suffering is a necessary condition for the realization of some good; second, that good violates the suffering. The scientific concern which is followed in this article is the assessment of stump’s defense. In this regard first of all, it is necessary to explain the defense and then the critique of the idea will be done from two general perspectives. First, expressing the characteristics of a successful defense and conditions for its realization shows that stump’s defense does not have the properties of such  defense. The second general critique of her theory is that according to the origins of a voluntary act, suffering cannot be the source of faith. Eventually, the fact that the concept of free will in its libertarian sense has been violated in Stump’s defense, is an issue that we will address as an appendix to the discussion.

Keywords

The Problem of Suffering
Defense
The Divine Plan
Free Will
Eleonore Stump
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Essays in Philosophy of Religion (Jostarhaye Falsafeh Din)
Volume 9, Issue 2 - Serial Number 20
January 2020
Pages 121-141

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