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Augustine, on Free Choice of the Will, 2.16-3.1 (Or, How God Is Not Responsible for Evil)

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Augustine, on Free Choice of the Will, 2.16-3.1 (Or, How God Is Not Responsible for Evil) Augustine, On Free Choice of the Will, 2.16-3.1 (or, How God is not responsible for evil) Introduction: Recall that Augustine and Evodius asked three questions: (1) How is it manifest that God exists? (2) Do all things, insofar as they are good, come from God? (3) Should free will be counted as one of those good things? Last time, they answered (1). Truth and Wisdom are the highest goods. We know now that we ought to give up our “ephemeral”, fleeting “private goods” and instead seek the perfect eternal goods—Augustine even says that Wisdom CALLS to us (pg. 60). But, we are not there yet. We are not wise yet, but we are “on our way”. Furthermore, since we are not yet wise, we are fools. He writes, “Wouldn’t you agree that someone who is not just is unjust, and someone who is not prudent is imprudent, and someone who is not temperate is intemperate” … So, when someone is not wise, isn’t he a fool?” (2.15, pg. 59) Augustine is making reference here to the four cardinal virtues of early Christianity, which he had laid out earlier in Book I, section 13 (pgs. 20-21): Fortitude = Courage, strength. Confronting fear and hardship bravely. Temperance = Restraint. Controlling one’s desires. Prudence = Wisdom. Conducting one’s self with caution, reason, good judgment. Justice = Fairness. Living (morally) rightly, or righteously. [But, does it follow that if you are not just that you are UN-just? Or, if you are not wise, that you are UN-wise (i.e., foolish)? Consider: 1. You are not happy. 2. Therefore, you are UN-happy. That doesn’t seem to follow. For, ‘unhappy’ seems to mean something like ‘sad’. But, I can be ‘non-happy’ without being ‘un-happy’. Similarly, ‘unjust’ seems to mean something like ‘unfair’ or even ‘cruel’. But, can’t I be ‘non-just’ without being ‘un-just’? Furthermore, can’t I be non-wise without being a fool? In short, Augustine seems to confuse ‘contraries’ (statements which cannot both be true, but CAN both be false) with ‘contradictories’ here (cannot both be true OR both false).] 1 Participation in the Highest Goods: Time to tackle question (2). Augustine now argues that ALL things that exist are in some way good. Now, recall that the highest good was Truth, and this included eternal truths about Number. That being the case, it is evident that ALL things that exist participate in the highest good—even if this is only insofar as all things that exist have number. “Consider the heavens and the earth and the sea and everything in them that shines from on high or crawls here below, everything that flies or swims. They have forms because they have numbers; take away their form and number and they will be nothing. So they derive their being from the same source as number, for they have being only insofar as they have number.” (2.16, pgs. 60-61) In some sense, ALL things that exist participate in the supremely good Truth, merely by existing. For, merely by existing, they have something of the eternal in them—e.g., form, number, or beauty. If a thing did not have number, it would not exist at all. This explains why he says that even the depraved enjoy some goods: “Woe to those who turn away from your light and gladly embrace a darkness of their own. They turn their backs on you and are bewitched by the works of the flesh, which are like their own shadows; [Sounds very Platonist doesn’t it?] and yet even then, the things that delight them have something of the radiance of your light.” (2.16, pg. 62) Consider also what he says of beauty: “You could neither approve nor disapprove of anything you perceive through the bodily senses unless you had within yourself certain laws of beauty to which you refer every beautiful thing that you see outside yourself.” (2.16, pg. 60) Here, he seems to be saying that, we could only judge something to be more or less beautiful if there were some fixed STANDARD of Beauty against which we could compare the things that we are judging. He seems to suggest also that we could not even take PLEASURE in worldly things if there were no such eternal standard. So, things are also good insofar as they participate in, or are like, Beauty. So, the answer to question (2) is ‘Yes’: Yes, all things are good. They can have more or less good, but AT MINIMUM, they participate in number merely by existing. 2 A brief digression into the Confessions and the Enchiridion. Evil is the Privation of Good: Still, doesn’t it seem like lots of things are NOT good? The Problem of Evil: Disease, pain, sin… All of these seem to be EVIL things. If God made everything, then it seems like, even if He made lots of good things, He made lots of terrible things too. But, God is supposed to be the supreme Good—perfect in every way. So, the question arises: How could perfect Goodness create so much evil? Answer: Evil is not a thing at all. Consider: What we call 'evil' is just corruption. But, in order for something to be corrupted, it must have had some good in it—because corruption harms (i.e., makes worse). But something cannot be made worse if it did not have some good in it to begin with. And a thing cannot be TOTALLY corrupted because then it would cease to exist! (since, to exist, it must at least participate in, e.g., number) In sum: Evil is the privation of good. It is not a thing. Rather, it is the ABSENCE of a thing. For instance, what is darkness? Darkness is not a thing. It is just the ABSENCE of light. If your sock gets a hole in it, what is the hole? It is nothing at all. It is the absence of fabric. It is a DEFECT in the (otherwise good) sock. Similarly, if you get sick, the sickness is not a thing at all. Rather, sickness is merely the privation of health. The wickedness of a man is not a thing either. It is just the absence of a good will. The man, insofar as he exists, is good. But, he is evil insofar as his will is defective, which causes his good to be diminished. The result is that all things are good. Nothing can be WHOLLY evil. For, if a thing is deprived of ALL good, it would just cease to exist at all. So, all evil things are still good. For, since they exist at all, there is still some good left in them. He writes, “And it was made clear to me that all things are good even if they are corrupted. … If … they are deprived of all good, they will cease to exist. So long as they are, therefore, they are good. Therefore, whatsoever is, is good. Evil, then, … has not substance at all.” (Confessions, 7.12) And elsewhere, “What, after all, is anything we call evil except the privation of good?” (Enchridion, 3) How can something be both good AND evil? Good and evil seem to be contrary to one another—they’re opposites. But typically, nothing can have two properties that oppose one another. For instance, a room cannot be both dark and light. A shirt cannot be both black and white. And so on. So, how can something be both good AND evil at the same time? 3 Answer: Augustine admits that good and evil are contrary to one another. Something TOTALLY good cannot have any evil, and something TOTALLY evil cannot have anything good (or, rather, such a thing wouldn’t exist at all!). But, keep in mind that evil isn’t really a THING; evil is parasitic upon goodness. That is, there cannot be evil without good (though there CAN be good without evil). Consider: Perhaps a room cannot both be TOTALLY bright and TOTALLY dark—but can’t a room be LESS bright, or MORE bright? In a sense, we might say that a dimly lit room is both light AND dark—even though these are contrary properties. But, darkness is PARASITIC on light. It isn’t a THING at all. What we really mean is that the dimly lit room has LESS light in it than a well-lit room. Similarly for something with both good and evil in it. What we really mean is that it has LESS good in it (and evil isn’t a “thing” at all). [Augustine says that this defies logic: “The rule of the logicians fails to apply,” (Enchiridion 4). Is he confused? Does this defy logic?] Solution to the Problem of Evil: Back to the problem: God created all things. Yet, He is not responsible for creating evil because there is no such thing as evil! Problem solved. Objection: It is still bad for God to allow “privations of goodness” to occur. Does this really solve the problem? Might we still ask, But, even if sickness isn’t a THING, why would a good God allow the privation of health? It still seem bad to allow it. [Also, IS sickness just the privation of health? What do you think?] Augustine gives two answers: (a) Evil is instrumentally good because it makes good things seem even better in comparison: “what is called evil … commends the good more eminently, since good things yield greater pleasure and praise when compared to the bad things.” (Enchiridion, 3) (b) God allows evil because it leads to much greater goods: “the Omnipotent God … would not allow any evil in his works, unless in his omnipotence and goodness, as the Supreme Good, he is able to bring forth good out of evil.” (ibid.) [Are (a) and (b) true? Does Augustine’s answer get God off the hook?] End digression.
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