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Evaluation of Alvin Plantinga’s Free Will Defense: Whether Our Power to Do Bad is Something Good

Author: 
Year:
Pages:132
ISBN:0-7734-5129-3
978-0-7734-5129-2
Price:$139.95
This work is an attempt to solve incompatibility between horrendous evil and the God of love. The case study which is criticized and analyzed is Alvin Plantinga’s free will defense. Putting too much value on freedom, Plantinga obviously did not recognize the importance of the extreme phenomenon of individual horrendous sufferings and possibility of God’s love for this particular person.

Reviews

“Santra?’s daring, yet cautious, approach to the difficult problem of horrendous evil is an important contribution to the study of suffering, one that merits careful reading for anyone interested in theodicy and philosophical explanations of the problem of horrendous evil.” - Kenneth Atkinson, Associate Professor of Religion, University of Northern Iowa

“[The author] seeks to blend philosophical, theological and ethical facets of the problem of evil, but in close connection with the biblical data and the biblical world view.” . . . he claims that in the biblical world view humans are not completely defenseless. While not privy to all the “intelligence” (see the last chapters of Job) behind the scenes of the attacks, God is involved and very active in the Great Conflict with the powers of evil.” - Miroslav M. Kis, Professor of Ethics, Chair of Theology and Christian Philosophy, SDA Theological Seminary, Andrews University

Table of Contents

Preface by Kenneth Atkinson
Dedication
Acknowledgements
Introduction
Exposition and Meta-Ethical Questions of Free Will Defense Theory
1 Basic Exposition of Free Will Defense
2 Limitations of Free Will Defense
3 Meta-ethical Issues of Free Will Defense
Meta-ethical Necessity and the Problem of Evil
1 Necessity of the meta-ethical approach
2 Definition of Meta-ethical Terms
3 Context of meta-ethical theories
Meta-ethical Uncertainty and the Problem of Evil
1 Precondition of the Failure of Defense
2 Need for Morally Sufficient Reason
Great Conflict Theory as an Alternative Solution to the Problem of Evil
1 Eternal Wisdom
2 Great Conflict
Instead of a Conclusion
Selected Bibliography
Index