Representing the Parent Analogy
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.24204/ejpr.2021.3363Keywords:
Problem of Evil, Evidential Argument, Skeptical Theism, Parent AnalogyAbstract
I argue that Stephen Wykstra’s much discussed Parent Analogy is helpful in responding to the evidential problem of evil when it is expanded upon from a positive skeptical theist framework. This framework, defended by John Depoe, says that although we often remain in the dark about the first-order reasons that God allows particular instances of suffering, we can have positive second-order reasons that God would create a world with seemingly gratuitous evils. I respond to recent challenges to the Parent Analogy by arguing that God, like a good parent, wants a rightly ordered relationship of mutual love with created beings.
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