We saw in the last article of the same title that man is often considered to be « mostly » good. Generally speaking, we tend to assert that man does not have a bad background, except for a few people who are abnormal. This way of thinking has led to genocide and racism. It seems obvious then that this is not the solution we should be looking for. As we have already pointed out, the Bible does not start from this premise. It affirms that man is perverted and that his whole being naturally turns away from God. We’ll come back to this point in a later article. Instead, I’d like to talk about another solution that our society has put forward to deal with the problem of evil, namely to assert that evil does not exist.

Philosophical Darwinism

To say that evil doesn’t exist and is merely an illusion (or maya) has a rather Buddhist and Eastern connotation. Yet it’s a way of thinking that’s very much alive and well in Western society. After two world wars, the West had to abandon its assumption that man was naturally good – how can we even say that after so many atrocities in its midst? What solution was to be sought? The West increasingly turned to Darwinism, which taught that everything was the fruit of evolution, and that man was an animal in every way like any other, except for his intelligence. By removing God from the equation, Darwinism also removed moral absolutes. Instead of saying that there is a God who directs his Creation and asks it to live in a certain way, Darwinism preferred to make the world « neutral » and assert that everything that is, is neither good nor bad, but simply the product of evolution. To quote the Marquis de Sade: « What is, is right »¹. Let’s face it, there’s a certain logic to this thinking: if all that exists is the fruit of blind evolution, then morality makes no sense. We would then have to live only by the survival of the fittest, proclaiming a consequent ego-centrism since Darwinism teaches that we live only for ourselves and that the only reason to do good to others is our own well-being.

Of course, the Bible is completely at the opposite end of the spectrum, affirming that we should do good to others, even if it costs us. Our experience shows us that our goal is not domination of others, but love (of God and of others). We are truly fulfilled, not when we are superior to others, but when we are at the service of others, in relationships marked by love and sacrifice. Instead of pointing to an impersonal, unforgiving world, this « relationality » and need for love points us to a personal beginning of the universe.

Turning to Darwinism to explain the problem of evil solves nothing, since it completely denies the suffering and evil around us. This philosophy turns us towards despair, since it is impossible to fight against a non-existent evil, and towards an answer that is denied by our society itself, which seeks to exercise justice and condemn delinquents.

Western Buddhism

Interestingly, Darwinism combines very well with a certain form of Buddhism². In both cases, the world has an impersonal dimension where evil does not exist. In Buddhism, the problem of evil is merely an illusion arising from our misperception of our individuality. In meditation, the aim is to remove our individuality and realize that it’s only our perception that’s wrong. Yet if someone were to come along with a thermos of boiling water, Buddhists would be forced to acknowledge that suffering really does exist, and that boiling water shouldn’t be thrown at their heads. Once again, denying suffering and evil does not correspond to reality. To find an answer to the problem, we need to go even further.

1. Quoted in SCHAEFFER Francis, Dieu ni silencieux ni lointain, une philosophie chrétienne, éditions Cruciforme, Montréal, 1972, p. 46. ↩︎
2. Western Buddhism, New Age-style, is very different from Western Buddhism. Westerners have accepted some aspects of Eastern Buddhism without accepting the consequences. In this day and age, Buddhism, political and moral commitment, love and sacrifice for others are constantly being mixed up, even though they can’t be derived from a Buddhist way of thinking that asserts that the individual doesn’t exist (see one of my articles here). ↩︎