What Is Theodicy? Christianity's Answer to the Problem of Evil

Gottfried Leibniz coined the word theodicy in 1710 — from the Greek theos (God) and dikē (justice). A theodicy is a defense of God's justice and goodness in the face of the existence of evil and suffering. It attempts to answer: if God is all-good, all-knowing, and all-powerful, why does evil exist?

This is philosophy's most persistently challenging question. Atheist philosophers treat it as a decisive argument against theism. Christian theologians have grappled with it for millennia — from Augustine and Aquinas to C.S. Lewis and Alvin Plantinga. No single answer satisfies every dimension of the problem, but Christianity offers responses that are more coherent, more honest, and ultimately more hopeful than the alternatives.

The Problem Stated Precisely

The "logical problem of evil" (David Hume's version):

1. God is omnipotent (all-powerful)
2. God is omniscient (all-knowing)
3. God is omnibenevolent (all-good)
4. Evil exists
5. If (1), (2), and (3), then God would prevent evil
6. But evil exists
7. Therefore, God does not exist (or lacks one of the three attributes)

The "evidential problem of evil" (more modest): Even if evil doesn't disprove God's existence logically, the amount and distribution of evil in the world is strong evidence against a good, powerful God.

The Free Will Defense

The most influential Christian theodicy is Alvin Plantinga's free will defense:

God is omnipotent — but "omnipotent" means God can do anything that is logically possible. Creating creatures with genuine free will who always freely choose good is logically impossible — by definition, genuinely free creatures can choose evil. If God wants genuinely free moral agents (rather than morally deterministic robots), he must permit the possibility of evil choices.

This explains moral evil (evil caused by human choices): cruelty, war, abuse, murder. God permits these not because he approves but because he values genuine human freedom, including the capacity to make genuinely wrong choices.

Strengths: Logically compelling; explains why God doesn't simply prevent all evil without eliminating freedom; respected even by atheist philosopher J.L. Mackie (who said Plantinga successfully rebutted the logical problem of evil).

Limitations: Doesn't fully explain natural evil — suffering caused not by human choice but by disease, earthquakes, tsunamis. (Plantinga suggests fallen angelic beings may be responsible for natural disasters — an interesting but debated move.)

The Soul-Making Theodicy

John Hick, drawing on Irenaeus, proposed that the world is designed not as a paradise of comfort but as a "vale of soul-making" — an environment where human beings develop character, virtue, and the kind of relationship with God that only emerges through genuine challenge and suffering.

If God had created human beings perfect and complete, with no need of growth or struggle, they would not be the mature, character-formed beings who can bear the weight of eternal fellowship with God. The difficulties of life are the gymnasium of the soul.

Biblical basis: Romans 5:3–4 (suffering → perseverance → character → hope); Hebrews 12:11 ("No discipline seems pleasant at the time, but painful. Later on, however, it produces a harvest of righteousness and peace for those who have been trained by it"); James 1:3–4.

Strengths: Takes the developmental and relational dimensions of suffering seriously; explains why a world without any challenge or suffering might actually be impoverished spiritually.

Limitations: Seems difficult to justify the amount of suffering that exists (especially extreme suffering like the Holocaust or the death of infants). The soul-making theodicy can seem to have an uncomfortably utilitarian edge.

The Greater Good Defense

God permits particular evils because they are necessary for greater goods that couldn't be achieved without them. The cross is the supreme example: the greatest evil in history (the murder of the innocent Son of God) was the necessary means to the greatest good in history (the salvation of humanity).

Joseph's enslavement and imprisonment — unjust suffering — led to the salvation of Egypt and Israel and the preservation of the Abrahamic family through whom the Messiah would come (Genesis 50:20).

Biblical basis: Romans 8:28 ("in all things God works for the good of those who love him"); Genesis 50:20; Romans 5:20 ("where sin increased, grace increased all the more").

Strengths: Grounded in the actual pattern of Scripture; takes seriously that God governs suffering toward redemptive purposes.

Limitations: Can sound callous if presented abstractly without acknowledging the genuine horror of specific suffering. Requires faith that God can and will bring good from evil that we cannot yet see.

The Eschatological Theodicy

Some evils cannot be explained or justified in terms of this present life. The ultimate justification of God in the face of evil requires an eschatological perspective — the final redemption and restoration of all things.

C.S. Lewis in The Great Divorce has the soul who arrives in heaven saying that the sufferings of this life, viewed from eternity, will feel like "a bad dream." Not minimized — but set in the context of an infinite good that more than compensates.

Revelation 21:4–5: God will "wipe every tear from their eyes. There will be no more death or mourning or crying or pain, for the old order of things has passed away. I am making everything new!"

This is not a denial of present suffering. It is the promise that present suffering is not the final chapter, and that the final chapter is so glorious that it will recontextualize the suffering of this age.

Biblical basis: Romans 8:18 ("present sufferings are not worth comparing with the glory that will be revealed in us"); 2 Corinthians 4:17 ("For our light and momentary troubles are achieving for us an eternal glory that far outweighs them all").

The Cross as the Central Theodicy

All Christian theodicy ultimately converges on the cross. At the cross:

• God does not remain untouched by evil — he enters it in the person of his Son
• The worst evil imaginable (the murder of God incarnate) is overcome by the greatest good (salvation for all who believe)
• God demonstrates that he can bring life from death, redemption from tragedy, victory from defeat

The cross does not explain every instance of suffering — but it reveals what God is like in the face of suffering: present, suffering with us, and ultimately triumphant.

Jürgen Moltmann's The Crucified God argues that on the cross, God himself experiences suffering and death — and therefore can say not just "I understand your pain from the outside" but "I have been there from the inside."

The Limit of Theodicy: Mystery

All theodicy eventually runs up against mystery. Paul, after his most sustained treatment of God's justice and sovereignty (Romans 9–11), breaks into doxology rather than further explanation: "Oh, the depth of the riches of the wisdom and knowledge of God! How unsearchable his judgments, and his paths beyond tracing out!" (Romans 11:33).

Job received not an explanation but an encounter — God revealing his vastness, wisdom, and creative power in a way that transformed Job's question. Not "here is why you suffered" but "here is who I am."

The honest Christian answer to theodicy includes: we have good reasons to trust God despite suffering; the cross is our central evidence; the resurrection is our central hope; and some questions will only be fully answered in eternity.

A Prayer

Lord, I acknowledge the weight of the question. The suffering in this world is real, and I do not understand all of it. But I also see the cross — and in it, your answer. You did not explain suffering from a distance; you entered it. You did not leave us alone in it; you are present. You did not leave it the last word; you raised your Son. I trust you. And I wait for the day when every question will be answered, every tear wiped away, and every wrong made right. Amen.

Frequently Asked Questions

Does the existence of evil disprove God? No — Alvin Plantinga has demonstrated that the "logical problem of evil" fails because God and evil are logically compatible (God might have morally sufficient reasons to permit evil). The "evidential problem" (evil makes God unlikely) is a more serious challenge but does not constitute proof of God's nonexistence.

What is the best Christian response to the Holocaust? One of the hardest applications of theodicy. Christian responses include: acknowledging the horror without minimization; recognizing that God wept at the cross and weeps at genocide; trusting God's final justice; supporting the ongoing dignity and flourishing of Jewish people; and holding the question in honest faith rather than forced resolution.

Does theodicy help people who are actually suffering? Theodicy is primarily an intellectual exercise; pastoral care is what actually helps suffering people. Sitting with someone, listening, lamenting alongside them — these help far more than theodicy arguments. The arguments are for later, when intellectual questions need intellectual engagement.

Why didn't God create a world without the possibility of evil? To create genuinely free beings capable of genuine love requires permitting the possibility of its opposite. A world without any possibility of evil is a world without genuine freedom, genuine love, genuine virtue, or genuine relationship. God chose genuine relationship over safe mechanism.