Thomas Aquinas on God and Evil

This monograph examines Thomas Aquinas's approach to reconciling God's existence with the reality of evil, offering a distinctive perspective within contemporary philosophical debates. Davies argues that Aquinas provides a coherent theistic response to the problem of evil that differs significantly from modern theodicies, particularly those attempting to justify God's permission of evil through greater good arguments.

The work demonstrates how Aquinas grounds his analysis in a particular understanding of divine nature. For Aquinas, God as pure actuality and being itself cannot be subjected to moral evaluation in the manner applicable to created beings. Davies explicates Aquinas's position that God, lacking potentiality, cannot be considered a moral agent in any conventional sense. This metaphysical framework fundamentally shapes how evil should be understood in relation to divine providence.

Central to Davies's interpretation is Aquinas's privation theory of evil. Evil represents an absence or deficiency rather than a positive reality requiring divine causation. Physical evils emerge as natural consequences of material existence and the interaction of created substances pursuing their proper ends. Moral evil arises from the defective choices of rational creatures endowed with genuine freedom. Davies emphasizes how this framework avoids making God the direct cause of evil while maintaining divine sovereignty over creation.

The monograph engages critically with contemporary analytic philosophy of religion, particularly evidential arguments from evil advanced by philosophers like William Rowe. Davies contends that such arguments often presuppose a univocal understanding of goodness between God and creatures that Aquinas explicitly rejects. The work also addresses how Aquinas's approach differs from skeptical theist responses, as Aquinas offers positive theological reasons for evil's possibility rather than merely appealing to human cognitive limitations.

Davies's contribution lies in demonstrating the continued philosophical viability of Aquinas's approach when properly understood within its metaphysical framework. By clarifying common misinterpretations of Thomistic positions in contemporary debates, the work shows how medieval insights can address modern formulations of the problem of evil. The monograph serves both as careful historical scholarship and constructive philosophical argument, illustrating how retrieval of classical theistic metaphysics offers resources for contemporary philosophy of religion beyond the typical parameters of post-Enlightenment theodicy.