Abstract
In his posthumously published essay, “Divine Evil,” David Lewis presents an argument from evil against theism that focuses on the problem of hell. In our paper, we use Lewis’s challenge to the theist to help motivate our escapist alternative to the traditional doctrine of hell that we have developed and defended elsewhere. Specifically, we argue that the problem as presented by Lewis dissipates once we shift to an issuant view of hell on which hell is not a place where retributive punishment is exacted against the unrepentant but is rather a place God has provided, being motivated by love, for those who wish to be separated from God. On an issuant view, hell issues from God’s loving character. Further, we argue that an issuant view of hell is more compatible with traditional views of God’s desires and motivational states than is a retributive view of hell. Finally we argue that, while any version of issuantism fares better than retributivism, not all versions of issuantism are equal. Focusing on Jonathan Kvanvig’s version of issuantism, we argue that the escapist version of issuantism we have defended better provides theists with the resources needed to respond to objections to theism such as Lewis’s.
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Notes
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See Buckareff and Plug 2010 for discussion of why those in hell may experience positive utility (even infinite utility if they remain there). However, the quality of their experiences is vastly inferior to that of those in heaven.
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What follows is a brief summary of our theory of hell as outlined in Buckareff and Plug 2005, 42–45.
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In the interest of rendering his version of issuantism compatible with the finality of the final judgment, Kvanvig (1993, 156) argues for the view that those in hell have a finite period to accept God’s grace and enter into communion with God. We argue (Buckareff and Plug 2005) for the view that those in hell always have the ability to accept God’s grace.
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The value in question is assumed to be intrinsically valuable and not merely instrumentally valuable, more on this below.
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See Mele 2008 for a taxonomy of types of manipulation arguments. One of the most discussed manipulation arguments is Derk Pereboom’s four-case argument that was first presented in Pereboom 2001. Alfred Mele (2005) presents a compatibilist response according to which manipulation deprives agents of free will. Michael McKenna (2008) offers a “hard-line” response on which the sort of case presented by Pereboom does not threaten free will. See Pereboom 2008 for a reply to McKenna. While the focus in the moral responsibility literature is on blameworthy actions, some compatibilists have argued that praiseworthy actions do not require leeway and can be the result of manipulation. But the same philosophers maintain that leeway is necessary for blameworthiness and, hence, manipulation is not compatible with holding agents morally blameworthy. See Wolf 1980 and Nelkin 2011.
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Most famously, many strict Calvinists take theological determinism to be compatible with responsible agency.
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We have explicitly stated in our own defense of escapism that we are open to the possibility of universalism being true (Buckareff and Plug 2005, 49–50). Escapism is an account of hell developed as the result of philosophical reflection. But there are compelling reasons from biblical theology for Christians to accept a version of universalism.
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Thanks to Ben Matheson for helpful comments on an earlier draft of this essay.
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Buckareff, A.A., Plug, A. (2017). Divine Love and Hell. In: Nagasawa, Y., Matheson, B. (eds) The Palgrave Handbook of the Afterlife. Palgrave Frontiers in Philosophy of Religion. Palgrave Macmillan, London. https://doi.org/10.1057/978-1-137-48609-7_10
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