Al Maqsud Presents Does God Exist? & How Do You Square an Omnipotent and Benevolent God With Evil? What Maulana Abbas Sahib will hope to cover:- Existence of God: [a] Ontological Argument [b] Cosmological Argument [c] Teleological Argument Problem of Evil: [a] The concept of evil [b] How do you square the existence of an Omnipotent and Benevolent God with evil in the world? Finally Maulana Sahib will demonstrate the manner in which the problem of evil is construed in today's society with particular reference to Stephen Fry's recent rant about God.

2. Philosophy
of Religion
AN INTRODUCTORY
COURSE ON
PERSPECTIVES OF
WESTERN
AND ISLAMIC
PHILOSOPHY

3. AGENDA
•Initiate session10:20
•About the lectures10:20 – 10:30
•Existence of God10:30 – 11:45
•Break11:45 – 12:00
•Problem of Evil12:00 – 13:45
•Questions and answers13:45 – 14:00

4. LECTURE SERIES
A total of nine lectures are anticipated
to be delivered on a monthly basis over
a period of nine consecutive months
Each of the lectures shall provide a
rudimentary understanding of various
philosophical concepts
Please refer to the provided handbook
for further details and supplementary
readings

5. Sessions Date and Time Subject Matter
Western
Perspectives
Islamic
Perspectives
1 of 9
24th August 2014
10:15 – 13:.00
JKN
Introduction to philosophy
What is philosophy?
Why study philosophy?
Meaning and definition
2 of 9
21st September 2014
10:15 – 13:.00
JKN
What can we know? Knowledge
[Epistemology 1/2]
What is knowing?
What is knowledge?
Belief, truth and evidence
The sources and concepts of knowledge,
reason and experience
3 of 9
19th October 2014
10:15 – 13:.00
JKN
What is the world like?
Perceiving the World
[Epistemology 2/2]
Realism
Idealism
Our knowledge of the physical world
4 of 9
23rd November 2014
10:15 – 13:.00
JKN
The way the world works
Scientific Knowledge
[Philosophy of Science]
Laws of nature
Explanation
Theories
Possibility
The problem of induction
5 of 9
21st December 2014
10:15 – 13:.00
JKN
What is and what must be?
Freedom and Necessity
[Metaphysics]
Causality
Determinism and freedom
6 of 9
18th January 2015
10:15 – 13:.00
JKN
What am I?
Mind and Body
[Philosophy of Mind]
The physical and the mental,
The relationship between the physical and the mental,
Materialism
7 & 8 of 9
19th April 2015
10:15am – 14:00
JKN
The Existence of God?
[Philosophy of Religion 1/2]
Ontological, cosmological and teleological arguments for the existence of
God
The concept of God
The Problem of Evil
[Philosophy of Religion 2/2]
The concept of evil
How do we square an Omnipotent and Benevolent God with evil?
9 of 9
24th May 2015
10:15 – 13:.00
JKN
The is and the ought
[Problems in Ethics]
Meta-ethics
Theories of goodness
Theories of conduct

6. THE OBJECTIVE
The primary aim and overall
objective, among other subsidiary
benefits, is to assist in familiarising
and acquainting its recipients with
the conceptual [and intellectual]
perils, predominantly encountered
by religion in todays society, which
are propelled by [or in the name of]
philosophy.

8. A branch of philosophy
dealing with the
meaning, nature, and
philosophical
implications of
religious beliefs and
claims of religious
practices.
The attempts to
understand the
concepts involved in
religious belief:
existence, necessity,
fate, creation, sin,
justice, mercy,
redemption, God.
It is concerned to
analyse the special
roles played, and the
special problems
raised, by the
characteristic concepts
and doctrines of
religion within a whole
structure and economy
of human thought.
An examination of the meaning
and justification of religious
claims.
Explores philosophical issues
that arise from reflection on the
nature and truth of religious
belief and the meaning of
religious practices.
WHAT IS THE PHILOSOPHY OF
RELIGION?

9. Topics concerning
the Philosophy of
Religion have been
discussed by all the
major philosophers
up to the 19th
century.
They did not
recognise a field
called Philosophy of
Religion and did not
think of themselves
as writing in any
such field.
Plato did not think of
himself of doing
Philosophy of Religion
in the Phaedo.
Aristotle did not think
he was doing
Philosophy of Religion
in his argument for a
first mover.
Medieval
Philosophers did not
distinguish
Philosophy of
Religion from other
branches of
Philosophy either.
The distinction they
thought important
was the difference
between revealed
theology and natural
theology, which was
Philosophy.
The Emergence of
Philosophy of
Religion was in the
18th and 19th
century.
HISTORY OF THE PHILOSOPHY OF
RELIGION

10. Philosophical arguments
for and against belief in
a Creator of the cosmos.
Comparative treatments
of the Divine.
Accounts of the meaning
of religious language
and faith.
The ethical implications
od religious
commitments.
The relation between
faith, reason, experience
and tradition.
Concepts of the
miraculous, the afterlife,
the sacred revelation,
mysticism, prayer,
salvation, and other
religious concerns.
WHAT DOES THE PHILOSOPHY OF
RELIGION INCLUDE OR DEAL WITH?

11. TWO PROMINENT DISCUSSIONS IN
PHILOSOPHY OF RELIGION

12. CLASSICAL
ARGUMENTS
FOR THE
EXISTENCE
OF GOD

13. Theologians in
the Western
tradition have
characterised
“the concept of
God” in a variety
of different ways,
such as:
Just the concept of
ultimate reality
The source and
ground for all else
The concept of a
maximally perfect
being
The one and only
being worthy of
worship
Whatever being
happens to be
revealed in one’s
favoured sacred text
as the supreme
ruler of all
THE CONCEPT OF GOD

14. Ontological Argument
Cosmological Argument
Teleological Argument
THEISTIC ARGUMENTS
The question of
whether or not
there is good
evidence for the
existence of God,
and what that
evidence might
be can be
demonstrated in
the following
arguments.

15. In a nut shell, it claims that
if one truly understands the
concept of God and what it
is for God to be perfect, one
must acknowledge that He
exists, for a truly perfect
being could not lack
existence and still be
perfect.
The attempt to prove,
simply from an examination
of the concept of God, that
being to which that concept
would apply must in fact
exist.
These are a priori
arguments which aim to
demonstrate the existence
of God from the mere
concept of God or from the
mere fact that we can think
about God.
It is a bold attempt to deduce the
existence of God from the concept of
God: we understand God to be a
perfect being, something that which
nothing greater can be conceived.
A line of argument which appears to
appeal to no contingent fact at all,
but only to an analysis of the concept
of God. The argument is that this
concept is necessarily instantiated.
WHAT DO YOU MEAN BY
‘ONTOLOGICAL’ ARGUMENT?

16. [P1]
God is the greatest
possible being.
[P2]
The greatest possible
being possesses every
perfection that would
make a being great.
[P3]
Existence is a
perfection that would
make a being great.
[P4]
God possesses
existence.
[P5]
Anything that
possesses existence
exists.
[C]
Thus God exists.
WHAT IS THE ONTOLOGICAL
ARGUMENT?

17. [P1]
The Lost Island is the
greatest possible island.
[P2]
The greatest possible
island is an island which
possesses every
perfection that would
make an island great.
[P3]
Existence is a perfection
that would make an
island better.
[P4]
The Lost Island
possesses existence.
[P5]
Anything that possesses
existence exists.
[C]
The Lost Island exists.
GAUNILO’S OBJECTION

18. Kant’s objection is
aimed at two
premises:
[P3] in both
arguments
One, may
object to the
idea that
existence is a
great-making
property of
beings or
islands.
Second, may
object to the
idea that
existence is a
great-making
property of
beings or
islands.
On Kant’s view, when we attribute
or ascribe properties to a thing, we
presuppose the existence of that
thing.
Existence is not itself a
property; rather, it is a
precondition for having
properties – something that is
implicitly assumed when we
start ascribing properties.
Thus, the ontological argument
assumes something that is false.
KANT’S FIRST OBJECTION

19. The Modal Ontological
Argument
[1] If it is possible
for God to exist,
then necessarily,
God exists.
[2] It is possible for
God to exist.
[c] Therefore:
Necessarily, God
exists.
The Modal Atheistic
Argument
[1] If it is possible for
God to exist, then
necessarily, God exists.
[2a] It is possible that
God does not exist.
[C from 2a] Therefore: It
is not the case that
necessarily, God exists.
[C] Therefore: It is not
possible for God to exist.
KANT’S SECOND OBJECTION

20. These arguments are not
based on the analysis of
God’s essential nature,
but on the nature of the
cosmos or universe.
The key premises of
various cosmological
arguments are
statements of obvious
facts of a general sort
about the world.
A line of theistic
arguments appealing to
the very general
contingent facts, e.g. the
existence of caused
things. There must be
some sufficient
explanation for these
contingent facts.
Argument from some pervasive
feature of the world, for instance
the fact that there is motion or
change in the material universe,
to the existence of a first cause,
usually identified with God.
Its premises are that all the
natural things are dependent for
their existence on something else;
the totality of dependent beings
must then itself depend upon a
non-dependent, or necessary
existent, being, which is God.
WHAT DO YOU MEAN BY
‘COSMOLOGICAL’ ARGUMENT?

21. [P1]
Every being is
either
dependent or
self-explaining.
[P2]
Not every being
can be dependent.
[C] Therefore: at least
one self-explaining
being exists (a being
which in turn explains
the existence of
dependent beings).
A dependent being is one that
depends for existence on something
else – a being, in other words,
whose existence stands in need of
some explanation.
A self-explaining being, on the other
hand, is one that does not depend
for its existence on something else
– a being which somehow explains
its own existence and whose
existence therefore does not require
any (further) explanation.
WHAT IS THE COSMOLOGICAL
ARGUMENT? [VERSION 1]

22. [P1]
Whatever begins to
exist has a cause of
its coming to exist.
[P2]
The universe began to
exist.
[C]
Therefore: the
universe has a cause
of its coming to exist.
Another version of the
Cosmological Argument, which
finds its roots in medieval
Islamic Philosophy, has been
recently defended by William
Lane Craig.
Rather than arguing for the
existence of contingent or dependent
things to a cause, this argument
contends that everything that begins
to exist, including the universe, must
be caused to exist.
WHAT IS THE COSMOLOGICAL
ARGUMENT? [VERSION 2]

23. There are three particular difficulties
David Hume
suggests that what
we call ‘cause’ and
‘effect’ may simply
be our way of
reporting what is
just a statistical
correlation.
If God is a cause,
then He is a cause of
a very different kind
from anything in my
experience, and I
may properly be
asked on what
evidence can I posit
a cause of a type
outside my
experience, or,
indeed, any earthly
experience.
If He is a cause of no
known type – not
chemical, physical or
biological – then we
have no analogous
process for
understanding that
of which we speak.
ARGUMENTS AGAINST THE FIRST
CAUSE

24. Also called the argument
from design, an argument
seeking to derive the
existence of God from the
teleological order of the
word, resting on analogy
with the relation between
an intelligent craftsman
and human artefacts.
They start with
observations, especially of
regularities in the
operations of nature and
of the adaption of means
to ends; infer that this
order must be a product of
design; and take this to
establish the existence of
a supernatural intelligent
being, usually identified
with God.
The argument that the
world (meaning the
entire universe)
sufficiently resembles a
machine or a work of art
or architecture, for it to
be reasonable for us to
posit a designer whole
intellect is responsible
for its order and
complexity.
A world-based argument appealing to
special features, whose aspects of
the world which appear to be
designed and purposive, analogous
to human design.
The starting point of teleological
arguments is the phenomenon of goal-
directedness in nature.
WHAT DO YOU MEAN BY
‘TELEOLOGICAL’ ARGUMENT?

25. Analogy Argument
[P1]
The universe is like a
machine.
[P2]
Machines are typically
caused by designers.
[C]
Therefore: the universe
is likely caused by a
designer.
Fine-Tuning Argument
[P1]
The universe exhibits fine-tuning
of a sort that makes it suitable
for life.
[P2]
The existence of fine-tuning is
probable under theism.
[P3]
The existence of fine-tuning is
highly improbable under atheism.
[C] Therefore: fine-tuning provides
strong evidence in favour of theism
over atheism.
WHAT IS THE TELEOLOGICAL
ARGUMENT?

26. Hume’s three objections
Aptness of Analogy:
Our choice of analogy of
the world shapes the
outcomes of the
outcomes.
The Epicurean Thesis:
Any world is bound to fit
together up to a point in
order to continue – any
significant existence
requires a degree of
stability and mutual
adaptation. The
question arises whether
such a stable order
could randomly arise.
Hume suggests one way
by reference to the
ancient Epicurean
Thesis.
Argument from Effect to
Cause:
We cannot go from an
effect to a cause
greater than that
needed to produce the
cause.
HUME’S OBJECTIONS TO THE
DESIGN ARGUMENT

27. What is the
‘Moral’
Argument?
Many arguments
for God’s
existence invoke
morality.
The argument that our
capacity for moral thought
requires a divine explanation.
A transcendental
argument in the
sense that it
endeavours to
show the
existence of God
is a necessary
condition for
morality.
THE MORAL ARGUMENT

28. [P1] Rationally, perfect value ought to be
rewarded by perfect happiness;
[P2] The combination of perfect happiness
and perfect goodness is the highest good;
[P3] Clearly, this is not achieved in this life.
Good things happen to bad people and
catastrophes to the virtuous;
[C] Therefore, because the highest good
ought to be achieved, it can be achieved.
KANT’S MORAL ARGUMENT

29. If it is not achievable in this life, it must be achievable
in the next;
If the highest good exists in the next life, there must be
someone to provide it,
This someone is obviously God.
KANT’S MORAL ARGUMENT
CONTINUED

30. Three objections to Kant’s
argument
Much debate has been
concentrated on the
assumption that ought
implies can.
If the highest good
does indeed exist, why
should it need God to
provide it?
Behind Kant’s whole
approach seems to be
the assumption that
the universe is
somehow fair. But,
why should it be? Life
may just be unfair and
all we can do is to try
to make the best of
things.
AGAINST KANT’S MORAL
ARGUMENT

31. For every
argument you’ve
presented in
support of God’s
existence, you
have offered a
counter argument
. . .
This guy’s
off his
rails . . .
Where
does that
leave us?
WHAT ON EARTH ARE YOU
GETTING AT?

32. •Suffers from a lack of cogency
•No one is likely to accept its
most crucial premise who is
not already committed to its
conclusion
The Ontological
Argument:
•Suffer from the “gap problem”
•Both arguments rely, in some
sense, on the Ontological
Argument
The Cosmological
and The
Teleological
Argument:
LIMITATIONS OF THE ARGUMENTS
DISCUSSED SO FAR

33. “The arguments for the existence of God
have stood for hundreds of years with the
waves of unbelieving criticism breaking
against them, never totally discrediting
them in the ears of the faithful, but on the
whole slowly and surely washing out the
mortar from between their joints. If you
have a God already whom you believe in,
these arguments confirm you. If you are
atheistic, they fail to set you right.”
[William James, Lecture 18 of his Varieties of Religious Experience]
RELIGIOUS BELIEF WITHOUT
EVIDENCE

34. The Sin of Onto-Theology
[1] It treats God primarily as an
explanatory posit, so that God’s reason
for existence has become possible for
human reason to provide ultimate
explanations.
[2] Theorising about God in a way that
presupposes that reason is a reliable tool
for arriving at clear knowledge of God, so
that reasoning about God can ultimately
remove divine mystery.
It is why some have stated;
• “I have therefore
found it
necessary to
deny knowledge
in order to make
room for faith.”
Kant
• “I have found it
necessary to
deny theory in
order to make
room for
practice.”
Heidegger
BUT WHY . . . ?

35. We shall
reinitiate in
approximately
15 minutes
IT’S
BREAK
TIME

36. “Can one prove the non-existence
of something?”
You could show the
non-existence of
something by
showing that the
thing described is
impossible.
You could show the
non-existence of
something by
showing that
certain signs are
absent which would
be present if the
thing in question
actually did exist.
You could argue for
the non-existence of
something through
an appeal to the
lack of evidence for
the existence of the
thing in question.
ANTI-THEISTIC ARGUMENT

37. ONE OF THE
MOST
POPULAR
ANTI-
THEISTIC
ARGUMENTS

38. There is evil in the world: bad
things happen to people,
and people do bad things.
These two are usually called
physical (or natural) evil and
moral evil, respectively.
The problem of reconciling
the imperfect world with the
goodness of God.
The problem of evil is
commonly seen as a
problem of how the
existence of God can be
reconciled with the pain,
suffering, and moral evil
which we know to be.
The chief question regarding
the problem of evil is
whether or not the extent
and severity of the world’s
suffering undermines the
rational credibility of theism.
WHAT IS THE ARGUMENT FROM
EVIL?

39. A
PERSISTING
PROBLEM
FROM
ANTIQUITY!

40. The Logical Problem of Evil
If God were all-powerful, God
would be able to do something
about all of the evil and suffering.
Furthermore, if God were morally
perfect, then surely God would
want to do something about it.
And yet we find that our world is
filled with countless instances of
evil and suffering. These facts
about evil and suffering seem to
conflict with the orthodox theist
claim that there exists a perfectly
good God.
The Evidential Problem of
Evil
Evidential arguments from
evil attempt to show that,
once we put aside any
evidence there might be in
support of the existence of
God, it becomes unlikely, if
not highly unlikely, that
the world was created and
is governed by an
omnipotent, omniscient,
and wholly good being.
TYPES OF THE PROBLEM

41. STEPHEN FRY ON THE MATTER

42. [P1] If God were all-powerful, He
would be able to abolish evil.
[P2] If God were all-loving, then He
would wish to abolish evil.
[P3] But evil exists.
[C] Therefore, God is not all-
powerful, or not all-loving, or both.
THE ARGUMENT

43. What do you mean by ‘Theodicy’?
It is the part of theology
that focuses on the
reconciliation of the
existence of God, as an
Omnipotent, Omniscient,
perfectly good and loving
absolute being, with the
existence of evil in the
world.
Explanation of how God’s
perfect goodness, justice,
wisdom, power and other
perfections are
compatible with other
perfections are
compatible with the
existence of evil in this
world: that is, a theory
which purports to solve
the problem of evil.
A part of theology
concerned with
defending the goodness
and omnipotence of
Godin the face of the
suffering and evil of the
world.
DEALING WITH THE PROBLEM: A
THEODICY

44. The
Punishment
Theodicy
Natural
Consequence
Theodicy
The Free Will
Theodicy
The Natural
Law Theodicy
Soul-Making
Theodicies
VARIOUS THEODICIES

45. [1]
The principle behind
this doctrine is that
nothing is good in and
of itself, nor by virtue
of the class of things
to which it belongs,
not because of a
quality inherent in it.
the doctrine
concerning what is
bad is the same. [2]
Having established
that, for the orthodox,
goodness and
badness do not derive
from a genus or an
essential attribute, the
meaning of goodness
is that for the doing of
which the law confers
praise, and what is
meant by the bad is
that for the doing of
which the law confers
censure.
IMĀM AL-ḤARAMAYN AL-JUWAYNĪ
[RA] APPROACH TO THE MATTER

46. Pains and pleasures do not fall
within the power of any being
other than God, the Exalted.
Since they happen as an act of
God, the Exalted, they are good
in respect to Him, whether they
occur instantaneously or come
from Him in time, as what is
called reward.
In presupposing them to be
good, the orthodox have no
need to assume the prior
meriting of them, or to expect
them to fulfil a commitment for
compensation, or to begin to
procure benefit or repulse some
harm that is concomitant to
them.
Instead whatever of them should occur is good on part of God, the
Exalted, and cannot be held against Him in judging Him. Those who
do not accept the assignment of all matters to God, the Exalted,
have become disordered in their opinions.
IMĀM AL-ḤARAMAYN AL-JUWAYNĪ
[RA] ON SUFFERING

47. ward of f sickness or fault or defect or poverty
or injury from one so af flicted, and it would not
remove health or perfection or wealth or
advantage from one so favoured.
But if people directed their gaze and considered
steadfastly everything that God has created in
heaven and earth, they would see neither
discrepancy nor rif t.
Everything which God apportions to man, such
as sustenance, life-span, pleasure and pain,
capacity and incapacity, belief and disbelief,
obedience and sin, is all of it sheer justice, with
no in-justice in it; and pure right with no wrong
in it.
Indeed, it is according to the necessarily right
order, in accord with what must be and as it
must be and in the measure in which it must be;
and there is not in possibility anything whatever
more excellent, more perfect, and more
complete than it.
For if there were and He had withheld it, having
power to create it but not deigning to do so, this
would be miserliness contrary to the divine
generosity and injustice contrary to the divine
justice. But if He were not able, it would be
incapability contrary to divinity.
IMĀM AL-GHAZĀLĪ’S THEODICY
. . . [One must] believe with utter certainty in
which there is neither weakness nor doubt
that if God had created all creatures with the
intelligence of the most intelligent among
them and the knowledge of the most learned
among them; and if He had created for them
all the knowledge their souls could sustain
and had poured out upon them wisdom of
indescribable extent; then, He had given each
one of them the knowledge, wisdom, and
intelligence of them all, and revealed to them
the consequences of things and taught them
the mysteries of the transcendent world and
acquainted them with the subtleties of divine
favour and the mysteries of final
punishments, until they were made well
aware of good and evil, benefit and harm;
then, if He had ordered them to arrange this
world and the transcendent world in terms of
the knowledge and wisdom they had received,
(even then) the act of arrangement on the
part of all of them, helping each other and
working in concert, would not make it
necessary to add to the way in which God has
arranged creation in this world and the next
by (so much as) a gnat’s wing, nor to subtract
from it (by so much as) a gnat’s wing; nor
would it raise a speck of dust or lower a
speck of dust; (their arrangement) would not

48. Indeed, all poverty and loss in this world is a
diminution in this world but an increase in
the next. Every lack in the next world in
relation to one individual is a boon in relation
to someone else. For if it were not for night,
the value of day would be unknown. Were it
not for illness, the healthy would not enjoy
health. Were it not for hell, the blessed in
paradise would not know the extent of their
blessedness. In the same way, the lives of
animals serve as ransom for human souls;
and the power to kill them which is given to
humans is no injustice.
Indeed, giving precedence to the perfect over
the imperfect is justice itself. So too is
heaping favours on the inhabitants of
paradise by increasing the punishment of the
inhabitants of hell. The ransom of the faithful
by means of the unfaithful is justice itself.
As long as the imperfect is not created, the
perfect will remain unknown. If beasts had
not been created, the dignity of man would
not be manifest. The perfect and the
imperfect are correlated. Divine generosity
and wisdom require the simultaneous
creation of the perfect and the imperfect.
Just as the amputation of a gangrenous hand
in order to preserve life is justice, since it
involves ransoming
the perfect through the imperfect, so too the
matter of the discrepancy which exists among
people in their portion in this world and the
next. That is all justice, without any wrong;
and right in which there is no caprice.
Now this is a vast and deep sea with wide
shores and tossed by billows. In the extent it
is comparable to the sea of God’s unity.
Whole groups of the inept drown in it without
realizing that it is an arcane matter which
only the knowing comprehend. Behind this
sea is the mystery of predestination where
the many wander in perplexity and which
those who have been illuminated are
forbidden to divulge.
The gist is that good and evil are
foreordained. What is foreordained comes
necessarily to be after a prior act of divine
volition. No one can rebel against God’s
judgment; no one can appeal His decree and
command. Rather, everything small and large
is written and comes to be in a known and
expected measure.
“What strikes you was not there to miss you;
what misses you was not there to strike you.”
IMĀM AL-GHAZĀLĪ’S THEODICY

49. IMĀM AL-GHAZĀLĪ’S THEODICY
Characteristics of this Islamic
Theodicy
First, the actual world,
at each instance of its
continuance, is
unsurpassably right
and just; it has been
determined by divine
decree, specified by
divine will, and
effected by divine
power.
Second, the world is
radically contingent:
everything within it
could be otherwise. No
aspect of the world is
intrinsically necessary.
Third, the very
imperfections of the
world – disease,
deficiency, vice –
contribute to the
surpassing excellence
of the world. In the
grand scheme of
things, they, too, are
most wonderful.

50. “Reflect! The order of life, it is
a subtle, marvellous, unique
order, For nothing but death
endears life, And only the fear
of tombs adorns it; Were it
not for the misery of painful
life, People would not grasp
the meaning of happiness.
Whomever the scowling of
the dark does not terrify,
Does not feel the bliss of the
new morning.”
THE GREAT
TUNISIAN
POET ABŪ
AL-QĀSIM
AL-SHĀBBĪ
(1909-1934)

51. QUESTIONS
&
ANSWERS