The Cambridge Companion to the Problem of Evil

Description

For many centuries philosophers have been discussing the problem of evil - one of the greatest problems of intellectual history. There are many facets to the problem, and for students and scholars unfamiliar with the vast literature on the subject, grasping the main issues can be a daunting task. This Companion provides a stimulating introduction to the problem of evil. More than an introduction to the subject, it is a state-of-the-art contribution to the field which provides critical analyses of and creative insights on this longstanding problem. Fresh themes in the book include evil and the meaning of life, beauty and evil, evil and cosmic evolution, and anti-theodicy. Evil is discussed from the perspectives of the major monotheistic religions, agnosticism, and atheism. Written by leading scholars in clear and accessible prose, this book is an ideal companion for undergraduate and graduate students, teachers, and scholars across the disciplines.

Chad Meister is Professor of Philosophy and Theology at Bethel College, Indiana, where he received the Professor of the Year award for teaching excellence. He is the author of Evil: A Guide for the Perplexed, 2nd edition (forthcoming), and co-editor of Five Views on the Problem of Evil (forthcoming), The History of Evil (six volumes, forthcoming), and the award-winning God Is Great, God Is Good (2009). Paul Moser is Professor of Philosophy at Loyola University, Chicago. He is the author of The God Relationship (Cambridge, forthcoming) and the award-winning book The Elusive God: Reorienting Religious Epistemology (Cambridge, 2002). Other publications include The Evidence for God (Cambridge, 2009), The Severity of God (Cambridge, 2013), Knowledge and Evidence (Cambridge, 1991), Philosophy after Objectivity (1993), and Theory of Knowledge (1997). He is the editor and co-editor of Jesus and Philosophy (Cambridge, 2008), The Oxford Handbook of Epistemology (2005), and The Wisdom of the Christian Faith (Cambridge, 2012). He is the co-editor, with Chad Meister, of the Cambridge Studies in Religion, Philosophy, and Society series.

'To conclude, CCPE [The Cambridge Companion to the Problem of Evil] is a well-written book; the contributors did a good job in clearly presenting their ideas and convincingly arguing for their positions, as far as possible. An added value for the reader is the aesthetic pleasure that some of the essays offer (especially chapters 4, 9, and 12). Thus, the present volume is a valuable addition to the existing compendiums on evil, and a helpful guide for both students and scholars in the field of philosophy of religion. It successfully fulfils the main task set by the editors, which is not to solve PoE [The Problem of Evil], but to generate new insights by highlighting some of the key points of the continuous debate between atheologians and theologians.' Viktor Ilievski, Reading Religion