Discussion Board Introduction With the coming of the Axial Age, new modes of thought tackled existing questions about the human condition and human actions. These new modes of thought were either...

Discussion Board Introduction

With the coming of the Axial Age, new modes of thought tackled existing questions about the human condition and human actions. These new modes of thought were either religiously or philosophically grounded. One problem that has perplexed humans over the course time, and certainly these two modes of thought have attempted to address it, is the question of evil. Those that have tackled this topic have categorized evil as either moral (willful acts of human beings) or natural (non intentional such as natural disasters). Paul W. Kahn in a fascinating contemporary study of evil in the Western tradition entitledOut of Eden: Adam and Eve and the Problem of Evil, explains the following:

"Evil makes us human. We learn this early in Genesis, when Adam and Eve are cast out of Eden because they chose to do wrong."

Kahn believes that the historical study of evil needs serious exploration if one is to ultimately understand what it means to be human. His own journey into this topic has produced an interesting hypothesis. Kahn' hypothesis proposes the following:

"My central argument is that evil does not appear in classical thought because the Greeks lacked a conception of the will. The Judeo-Christian tradition, on the other hand, puts the will at the center of its idea of the human. Where the Greeks saw the problem of man’s relationship to the world and to each other as one of meeting—or failing to meet—the demands of reason, once a conception of the will emerges, that relationship is re conceived as one of love. Evil, I argue, is the pathology of the will; it is love gone wrong. Contemporary theory fails to grasp evil, because it measures behavior against the standards of reason, not will. If our forms of explanation cannot acknowledge and understand evil, then we will remain opaque to ourselves morally and politically."

Kahn, obviously, is not the only scholar to tackle the question of evil and its challenges in the Western tradition. Take a moment to view David Alexander's approach tackling the question of evil.

It is clear that within Christianity evil, manifested in the form of the Devil, plays a very important role. In fact, one historian has concluded that the “Christian story cannot be told without the Devil.” The basic reason for examining the Devil in this tradition is that it has essentially created the most detailed concept of the fallen angel. With its emphasis upon monotheism, Christianity needed to cope with the responsibility of God for evil: How is the existence of evil reconcilable with that of a good and omnipotent God? What specific roles does the Devil play in Christianity? Below is a list of the Devil’s role within this monotheistic tradition.

• “He is the first to disobey God and, along with his fellow fallen angels, to be expelled from heaven.”


• “History is a record of the conflict between God and his angelic forces, and the Devil and his demonic army.”


• “It is the Devil who soon after his own fall, in the form of a serpent, brings about the fall of man.”


• “He it is who is ultimately responsible for God’s having to become man in Jesus Christ, and it is he whom Christ must overcome.”


• “It is the preliminary if not ultimate defeat of the Devil through Christ’s life, death and resurrection that is at the center of the resulting reconciliation between God and man.”


• “It is the Devil who, undaunted by his apparent defeat, remains the source of cosmic evil and human suffering.”

c 1300-c 1340, The Decretals of Gregory IX(Links to an external site.)

If God is all powerful, all loving and all good why then does evil exist? If evil exists, is it because it is a necessity? These are but a few of the questions that have plagued the Christian tradition as early apologists and church patriarchs had to come to terms with the reality that their world is not the necessarily the best of all possible worlds. Perhaps the historian Philip C. Almond can help us tackle these questions and others in your exploration of the historical devil in the paragraph below. How does he explain the existence of evil in the world? What is the relationship between evil and free will?

“The Christian tradition was committed to the doctrine of one God whose primary attribute was goodness. Thus, in its search for an explanation of evil, it had rejected the possibility that an opposing principle of evil had existed from eternity. Similarly, the goodness of God was endangered if it were the case that he himself had created a being who was, by nature, evil. The doctrine that Satan and his demons were originally angels with free will reinforced the goodness of God. The existence of evils in the world could then be claimed to be the misuse of free will by freely choosing beings (including both angels and humans).”

As you prepare to address the first two discussion board paragraphs remember that you are being asked to address them from an academic approach and not a personal testimonial approach. It is in the third paragraph that you will have the opportunity to share your personal thoughts.

• In yourfirst paragraphexplain from an academic position (as a historian) if you believe if the Devil is the personification of evil in the Christian tradition or are the Devil and evil completely separate and non-related.


• In yoursecond paragraphexplain whether or not you agree with Philip C. Almond's hypothesis of the existence of evil/Devil in the Christian tradition.


• In yourthirdparagraphexplain what do you believe is the cause(s) of evil.


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