Theodicies as Failures of Recognition

Abstract

This paper examines the ethical failure of theodicies by integrating the perspectives of philosophical argumentation and literary reading and analysis. The paper consists of two main parts. In the first part, we propose an ethical critique of metaphysical realism by analyzing its inability to recognize the perspectival plurality and diversity of suffering. As theodicies seek to explain how an omnipotent, omniscient, and absolutely benevolent God could allow the world to contain evil and suffering, it can be argued that metaphysical realism-i.e., the thesis that the world possesses its own fundamental structure independently of human perspectives of conceptualization and inquiryis a problematic starting point of theodicism. We examine the failure of recognition of others' suffering inherent in theodicies as a failure based on the search for an overall reductive and objectifying picture (a "God's-Eye View") that is constitutive of metaphysical realism. The second part of the paper shows why we should include insights from imaginative literature in our attempts to understand the recognition failures of theodicies. Emphasizing the literary, philosophical, and theological relevance of various modern rewritings of the Book of Job, which has been a crucially important sub-text for many later literary works in which the protagonists render a particular kind of human experience-unmerited suffering-we turn more closely to some literary examples, such as Joseph Roth's novels Hiob and Die Rebellion. The tensions that are created around the moral controversy of the experiences of injustice and suffering and the human and religious reasoning and justification of violence are examined. The ambiguous ending of Hiob that adds an apparently hopeful and almost fairytale-like redemption to the story plays a crucial role in the interpretation provided in the paper. By analyzing some literary examples and their relation to the literary Job tradition, the recognition-failures of theodicist attempts to provide meaning into suffering-attempts based on metaphysical realism, as argued in the first part of the paper-are highlighted. Finally, we also critically consider the charge that theodicism could only be theoretically formulated and argue that a sharp distinction between theory and practice in this area is itself an act of non-recognition, or a failure to recognize suffering.

“I Will Show You My Faith by My Works”: Addressing the Nexus between Philosophical Theodicy and Human Suffering and Loss in Contexts of ‘Natural’ Disaster

“…Such was the depth of suffering conveyed to me by my survivors, I would not even dream of considering any philosophical theodicy as an appropriate therapeutic resource for their anguish. To have done so would risk causing more harm than good (Griffioen 2018;Kivistö and Pihlström 2017;Swinton 2007, pp. 3-4).…”

Anti-theodicies – An Adornian approach

“…An anti-theodicean account developed by Kivistö and Pihlström is, to a large extent, my starting point in the first section of the paper. Along the lines of Kivistö and Pihlström (2016;2017) and Pihlström (2020), I argue that theodicy as a viewpoint, independent of its intention, does injustice to the experience of the sufferer. It does so by "explaining away" the subjective and intimate experience of the sufferer, as it places that experience in the service of some greater good (e.g., to allow God to cultivate an individual or humankind) and wrongly places the sufferer in the background (see Kivistö & Pihlström, 2017).…”

“…Along the lines of Kivistö and Pihlström (2016;2017) and Pihlström (2020), I argue that theodicy as a viewpoint, independent of its intention, does injustice to the experience of the sufferer. It does so by "explaining away" the subjective and intimate experience of the sufferer, as it places that experience in the service of some greater good (e.g., to allow God to cultivate an individual or humankind) and wrongly places the sufferer in the background (see Kivistö & Pihlström, 2017). Moreover, I explore the possibility of deriving an anti-theodicean viewpoint from the philosophy of Theodor W. Adorno.…”

“…I first flesh out the notion of theodicy by treating John Hick's variant as a representative case for theodicies. I then discuss the critiques presented by Holocaust survivors Primo Levi (1959) and Emmanuel Levinas (1968Levinas ( /19941982/19851993, and more recently by philosophers Sari Kivistö and Sami Pihlström (2016;2017). In the final section of the article, I investigate Adorno's view on suffering and his notions of the priority of the object and nonidentity.…”

“…Some have drawn the conclusion that, all things considered, there can be no God. Thus, suffering is taken as an empirical refutation of God's existence-or as evidence that he is not almighty or thoroughly good or aware of all things (Kivistö & Pihlström, 2017). These attempts that seek to find meaning in suffering are called theodicies.…”