The possibility of an evil God.

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Often times in theological discourse, it is assumed that god is good. However, what would we think if it turned out that god existed, but wasn't good?

Is this possible that god wouldn't be good?

Not only that, but what if god were evil and omnipotent? Would you obey god, torment the good, corrupt the innocent, and receive his dark rewards and go to an evil heaven? Or would you resist him, and suffer the consequences of eternal torment? Why would you make the choice you would make? Would your choice matter to anyone but you?

Given that some theologies claim that goodness only refers to whatever god wills, then how is this hypothetical different than some actual theologies? For if good lacks an ontology independent of god, then couldn't what god calls good be exactly what we call evil?

Some interesting links about the idea of an evil god:
http://www.jesusandmo.net/2008/10/08/world/
http://stephenlaw.blogspot.com/2007/03/god-of-eth.html
http://lawpapers.blogspot.com/2009/06/e ... ng-in.html
http://www.fredvanlente.com/cthulhutract/
http://rubbersuitstudios.com/ptcct.htm (contains the F-word)

If a being were truly omnipotent and/or omniscient, then that being by extension would have to exist as a totally amoral creature, being the sum of all good and bad in the universe. True Neutral, for you D&D folks. I wouldn't follow that god, or any, per se, but I think it'd be fascinating to see what happens.

Of course the role of Satan becomes something worth contemplating. Something on the order of Prometheus.

But even a glance at the history recanted about God reveals Him as neither good nor evil but merely inept.

No. Nor would it necessarily be the sum of all good and bad in the universe. At least more argumentation is needed to give credence to your point however, I would bet that you are using some assumptions that can be rejected. After all, who said that good and evil are equal in weight? Who said that evil (or good) even has independent existence, as Augustine (famous theologian) is noted for arguing that only good exists and evil is just the absence of a needed good but Stephen Law(one of the people linked to) also argues that this seems hypothetically reversible. http://stephenlaw.blogspot.com/2007/04/ ... art-2.html

And, of course, if God is omniscient and keeps screwing up as the Bible records, he is not merely clumsy, he is simply nuts.

Interesting, but flawed, hypothesis.

God is God alone. There is no other like or above God.

Hence, God defines what is "good." It is "good" because God says so. That which opposes God is "evil."

Many people reject God saying that God's way is wrong. God would consider such people "evil" but those same people think God is "evil" and their set of values as "good."

If God ordained that we should do what we currently see as "evil" is if it was "good" then it would become "good" by virtue that it is God's way to do things.

Good and Evil are more matters of alignment to God's way of doing things than they are matters of the concepts of "right" or "wrong." Right is what God says it is.

I think that's possibly the most dangerous idea in the history of religion. You could justify absolutely any atrocity that way. And in fact, that's how the idea has usually been used.

'Because I say so' isn't a good reason for any act even on the human level; it's the get-out clause of tyrants and abusive parents. It doesn't make God look any more impressive either, even if you dress it up in a pretty folktale and call it the Book of Job. Just being in charge doesn't make anyone the good guy; that's confusing morality with power. Also very dangerous.

If God is evil then "Heaven" would be a place that evil people would like. I would think that lying, stealing and cheating would be the norm and everyone would be infiicting pain on each other every chance they got.

I would rather go to Hell.

A god of evil topic

So why is God evil? Does this make for a more powerful deity? and how do we know? Perhaps we are born with such knowledge of God? And if 'God does bad things, always, how do we know to be good? And how could we know this anyway? Curiouser and curiouser.

I am glad I am a non-believer.

I address this somewhat already:
"Given that some theologies claim that goodness only refers to whatever god wills, then how is this hypothetical different than some actual theologies? For if good lacks an ontology independent of god, then couldn't what god calls good be exactly what we call evil? "

The reason I put forward this idea, is more in order to explore the notion of goodness.

Really though, if God defines what is good, then what non-arbitrary distinction separates your notion of God with an evil God, one who commands rape, murder, destruction, corruption, pain, misery, etc.


This bites a mighty nice bullet, however, there are a few issues with it:
1) Our intuitions tell us that that which is good is necessarily good. This is the problem pointed to by Plato's Euthyphro problem. (is what is good called so because it is loved by the gods, or is it loved by the gods because it is good?) The issue is that the divine command notion violates our understanding of things.
2) What makes God's commands moral? If God just proclaims his own morality to be moral, then why can't anyone else do exactly the same thing? Don't we need a more holistic account than the circularity that seems proposed? Anyone can create a circle, so don't we need to create an external argument to move upwards.
3) Additionally if God's power/ability is the source of moral rightness, then doesn't this actually undercut our own intuition that says "might does not make right"?
4) What do we even mean when we say "God is good"? Because if God is good by his own arbitrary declaration then what does "good" really mean? It seems to follow that good really would then have no meaning in relationship to God, and so saying "God is good" is then to say nothing.
5) How does this relate to our standard moral epistemology? We think things are moral and that morals exist based upon things that our perception, however, the source of morals seems to have no necessary connection to our moral knowledge. Additionally, there is an apparent ability for moral realities to be arbitrarily opposite of what we think they are, so how can we even approach moral knowledge in the first place?
6) If a theory completely undercuts our basic epistemology and disagrees with our every intuition, is it generally justifiable to accept this theory? Wouldn't this then put our moral intuitions against the existence of your conception of God? Is our evidence for God sufficient to overcome the theory that God exists but he has allowed us to have moral intuitions that are so thoroughly wrong?
7) Is this theory consistent with the Christian revelation, which I assume is partly what is referenced? After all, Romans 2:15 suggests that all men have access to moral intuitions that are correct to some extent. 1 John 4:8 & 16 tells us that God is love. Are the descriptions of love radically different from our basic understanding of what love means? Or rather are they in accordance with them as can be argued from Luke 11:11-13. Is there even a difference between the words used for love in reference to the Greek and the understandings of the Greek? As it can be seen in John 21, in the dialogue between Jesus and Peter that in the Greek, the words "phileio" and "agape" are used within the dialog, even being switched out, the problem is that the original dialog was in Aramaic. If John uses the two terms for love interchangeably in his text, then on a textual basis, can we distinguish between the forms of love found in the Bible just based upon the words used? When we are told that our two great commandments are to love God and to love our neighbor Matt 22:36-39 and to imitate God Eph 5:1, are the passages in disagreement? It seems to me that the Divine Command theory, to some extent, seems to have problems with the text of scripture, as the moral teachings of Christ and the importance of love in the NT do not represent themselves as contingent, as a divine command theorist would have to argue, but rather as theologically essential, which disagrees with the metaethical theory.

Well, if evil people like where they are, then there would be no inflicting pain on a person rewarded with heaven. I mean, even if a person is evil, that does not mean they like to be hurt or screwed over.

I only said "evil heaven" to make the evilness of what would have to be done to get there clear. However, the heaven is heaven, it is an enjoyable place. Any imaginings to the contrary are just self-serving, just like atheists make that joke "all of the cool people are in hell so therefore it is a party" you seem to be doing the same in this hypothetical situation, by saying "rotten people are in heaven so therefore it is just a crappy place to be".

Hypothetically, IF the God of Classical Theism, the Omnipotent and Omniscient God exists, I see a logic flaw.

God couldn't technically be God nor evil because I see the following issues:
1) God must have created EVERYTHING, THAT MEANS EVIL TOO!
This is due to the fact that otherwise something was there before God, thus meaning God was not the supreme being, because he very well might have been caused. I like the deist styled Alien God idea, its a nice and quite sensible idea as long as he isn't omnipotent and omniscient.

2) God can't have free will.
If God is omniscient, by the very meaning of the word 'all knowing' he thus knows your actions, both future and past, and his own. His omnipotence slightly damages this, because if he alters the future he knows, he isn't omniscient. But by the same thing if he can't alter it he isn't omnipotent so either way he loses one of his special 'omni' attributes. I call them super stats. But the main point is, if he knows what he'll do before he does, he's trapped by his own knowledge, and whereas if we lack free will we arn't knowledgeable enough to realise it, he must. Which makes me pitty God (if he exists).

3) For Kicks.
If I was God i'd be evil. End of. It would be fun to blow stuff up than to save stuff, just cause nuclear bombs make nice fireworks, and God would have supernovae at his disposal

No, but they like hurting other people and screwing other people over and if all the good people are going to be in Hell, they are going to have to do it to each other.

It comes down to separating the sheep from the goats. If God is good, Heaven will be a nice place to be because all the nice people are going to be there and Hell will be a lousy place to be because all the lousy people are going to be there. If God if evil, it works out the same; only the terminology is different.

NobelCynic, you are adding presuppositions about the nature of heaven and hell. A cruel person can watch cruel movies, read cruel literature, or even play The Sims. Given that this is heaven, each of these mediums could potentially be so good that they are equal to or surpass doing the real thing. Additionally, who said that people ever encountered other people in Heaven? Who said that Heaven was even an actual literal geographic location? Nobody. You added these assumptions in, even though my point was "they go to Heaven" which means they go to the good, happy land.

Is it about separating the sheep from the goats? No, hell is a lake of fire and heaven is that place where God makes all things right and wonderful. I mean, I don't see anything even in the Christian scripture saying that Heaven is good because it has cool people, and there is more reason to say that it is good because it ends sin and the alienation from God.

God must be evil, because I don't own a Mercedes Benz. If God were an all-good, all-just and all-loving God, then I would have a Mercedes Benz right now. I do not have one. Therefore, God is evil.

There's really no way to tell the difference between an omnipotent being, and a being which is merely powerful that is lying about being omnipotent in order to intimidate people into submission. If there were an evil omnipotent being, you'd be pretty screwed no matter what you do; what reason would you have to expect that such a being would reward you for obeying it, rather than double-cross you for its own sadistic amusement? Consequently, if confronted with an evil, powerful being claiming to be omnipotent, you might as well assume that said being is lying about its omnipotence, as if you're wrong, there's nothing you can do, whereas if you're right, it might be possible to find a way to thwart that being (also, a being falsely claiming to be omnipotent is much more likely to exist than a genuinely omnipotent being). Personally, the strategy I would adopt would be to pretend to be on the evil god's side, and use the time bought by doing so to find out as much about the god as possible, to try and discover any weaknesses and vulnerabilities, as well as trying to find out if there are any other gods out there who would be willing to oppose the evil god - as, let's face it, if you're coming up against a god, you're going to need all the allies you can get. So, I'd probably end up being a spy for the other gods; find the weaknesses of the evil god and pass that information onto them.