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The Problem of Evil & the Problem of God

Reviewed by John Matthews.

While Phillips has written previously in this area, this is his most systematic attempt to discuss the problem of evil, which he says should be done with fear and trembling. He suggests that the problem is inextricably linked to our concept of God, and that the majority of Anglo-American analytic philosophers of religion make a false distinction between the logical problem and the practical (or pastoral) problem of evil. He is not attempting to establish the proper response to the problem of evil, but to point out the confusions that are created by reflecting on the logical problem in isolation. He believes that there will always be more than one response, but sees it as the task of philosophers to point out where conceptual confusion arises.

Phillips argues that it is unintelligible to attribute ‘all power’ to God. Indeed, God is not power, but love, and the only power God has is the power of love. God cannot know the future because it is incoherent to see the future as an existing something to be known (p.102). The central issue is how belief in God as Creator informs living human life in God-given freedom, and he recognizes that “creation, understood as involving the gift of freedom, is a creation that involves risk” (p.177).

This tightly reasoned volume is difficult to summarize, but while it demands concentration, it is not opaque, and those who make the effort will reap the reward in careful analysis and stimulus to thought. This is an excellent book for ministers (and others) who wish to engage seriously with this issue in an open way and to test a variety of arguments. There are indices of names and subjects and while there is no bibliography, the references in the footnotes (unfortunately placed at the end of each chapter) provide plenty of material for further reading.