Online Encyclopedia
Eutheism, dystheism, and maltheism
Eutheism and dystheism are dialectic opposites within the spectrum of theistic religious beliefs.
- Eutheism is the belief that God exists and is good.
- Dystheism is the belief that God exists but is not good.
Both dystheism and eutheism are forms of theism, in that they are belief systems that assert the existence of God in some form. (The opposing viewpoint to theism, of course, is atheism, which asserts that there is no God.) Most theistic belief systems are eutheistic, but by no means all of them. Gnosticism, Satanism, and Maltheism are examples of belief systems with dystheistic tenets. Many polytheistic belief systems assert the existence of a variety of both 'good' and 'bad' deities, but the strict dichotomy of eutheism vs. dystheism is usually (though not always) framed in monotheistic terms.
An elaboration of the formal dichotomy of eutheism vs. dystheism was first proposed in an academic setting by Robert Koons , a professor of philosophy at the University of Texas. [1] http://www.la.utexas.edu/phl356/lec19.html
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Foundations of eutheistic and dystheistic belief
Eutheism arises from a belief that the universe is inherently good, and that its creator (assuming there is one) is inherently good. Dystheism arises from a contrary belief, that neither the universe nor its creator is necessarily good.
Dystheists assert that eutheistic belief is predicated on assumption, and that the preponderance of evil present in the world makes any belief that the universe and its creator are inherently good presumptuous and contrary to the way things are. They say that an omnipotent creator whose creation includes things that are evil is responsible for the existence of that evil, and is thus evil himself, since an omnipotent could have chosen otherwise. The assumption is that omnipotence would allow this creator to create a world without evil, thus it must have been a free choice the creator made to include evil in the creation. In other words, the presence of evil in the world indicates to dystheists that inherent goodness is not an innate quality of the universe or its creator, and in fact it indicts the creator as having made a deliberately evil choice.
Relationship to the Problem of Evil
Eutheists counter that God had his reasons for including the possibility of evil in his creation, which absolve him of accusations that he is evil in nature.
The theological question of why an omnipotent benevolent God would include evil in his creation is called the problem of evil. It raises questions about God's nature, asking why a benevolent omnipotent God would create a world with evil in it when he could have chosen not to do so. Responses to the problem of evil are known as theodicies. Dystheists (and atheists) do not find any known theodicies especially convincing. Many of them consider the whole discipline of theodicy problematic, since it involves working backwards from a desired conclusion (that God is good) in order to prove that this is the case.
Atheists cite the problem of evil as a disproof of the existence of God and of theism in general, but in reality it only serves as a disproof of eutheism: the problem of evil does not eliminate the possibility of the existence of a malevolent God as postulated by dystheism.
Some eutheists respond to the problem of evil by denying God's omnipotence: if God cannot be both omnipotent and benevolent, then we must concede that either God is not benevolent (as claimed by advocates of dystheism), or God is not omnipotent (as claimed by advocates of process theology and Open Theism). This may be perceived as the "better" alternative, in that contradictions are eliminated and we still get a God that is benevolent, but to some eutheists this radically changes what we believe to be the nature of God, to the point that we aren't really talking about God as God anymore. (Dystheists also say that a God who claims to be omnipotent but isn't is a liar, which also makes him evil.)
Corresponding "Problem of Good" for Dystheists
Eutheists suggest that there must be a corresponding "problem of good" associated with dystheism: "If God is evil, why is there good in the world?" Dystheists say this isn't really a problem (see The Myth of "Necessary" Evil http://maltheism.blogspot.com/2004_12_01_maltheism_archive.html#1102458933158277
47 ) for the following reasons:
- While it is often said that good cannot exist without evil (frequently as an explanation for the existence of evil), there doesn't seem to be any logical basis for saying this. Things we think of as good could exist in a world without evil, but they would not "stand out" as things that ought to be given a special label such as "good". There is no logical reason to assert that a world that is totally good without any evil could not possibly exist—in fact (dystheists ask), isn't Heaven supposed to be that very world?
- But the converse is not true: while good can exist without evil, evil cannot exist without good. According to dystheists, a world that is totally evil, without any good in it, could not sustain itself for any extended period of time; it would wither and die. It is part of the very definition of evil, that evil feeds off of good and takes advantage of it in order to thrive. It is in fact what defines it as being evil.
- Therefore, they conclude, it is not a "problem" for an evil deity to have created a world that has good in it. He would in fact need to do so.
Definition of "good"
One of the fundamental elements of any eutheistic belief system is how its adherents define what "good" means and how God manifests himself as good.
- Some eutheists would define good in and of itself, in a hopefully objective sense independent of God, asserting that God is good because he fits this definition in his nature and behavior. Such people use a descriptive definition of good.
- Other eutheists would say that good is defined as whatever God says is good. Such people are using a proscriptive definition of good.
These two viewpoints come into conflict when examining some of God's characteristics. God is often described as exhibiting many characteristics we normally consider negative, including jealousy, cruelty, vindictiveness, and destructiveness.
The former group of eutheists defines good in a descriptive way that excludes such behaviors, yet most of them still believe God is good, and try to find a way (often through faith) to resolve that apparent contradiction.
The latter group, which uses a proscriptive definition of good, sees no problem with this. In their view, God has the authority to say what is good and what is not—even to make such definitions in a seemingly unbalanced way so that what is wrong for us is acceptable for him. They see no contradiction in this, this is simply the way it is—God gets to define good, we don't. Our human perspective that might find this contradictory or hypocritical does not matter. This approach to defining good is known as the divine command theory.
The Euthyphro Dilemma is a rebuttal to the divine command theory. Originally offered by Plato, it showcases the dichotomy between descriptive and proscriptive definitions of "good". Essentially, it poses the question "Is an action good because God approves of it, or does God approve of it because it is good?"
Eutheists who employ a proscriptive definition of "good" would concur with the first part of the question, saying that things are good (or not) because God says they are (or aren't), period.
- Those who pose this dilemma consider this an arbitrary, circular definition, and in fact an example of moral relativism, since good is whatever one particular entity—in this case, God—says it is. The rebuttal to this is that God is the summum bonum—the center and source of all good—by definition, and thus has the right to do this. They say that God since goodness is defined by God and not by us, God cannot be judged, we are in no position to even attempt to judge him. Obviously this argument is not convincing to dystheists, or even to many "descriptive eutheists." (It's not clear whether all those who believe God to be the summum bonum are using a descriptive or proscriptive definition of good in asserting their claim, e.g., eutheists who believe God is the greatest possible example of goodness but not necessarily its source.)
On the other hand, eutheists who use a descriptive definition of good would concur with the second part of the question. They agree that goodness is a independent quantifiable concept that can be measured without reference to God, but they also believe that does God fulfill that definition of goodness.
- Those posing this dilemma note that if goodness can be defined and measured independent of God, it becomes reasonable to judge God (and his actions) as good or evil, based on the degree to which they comply with the definition. Naturally, dystheists also concur with the second part of the question, but they would say that God fails to meet the test of objective goodness based on his exhibiting of negative characteristics.
Conversely, these same issues arise with respect to dystheistic belief systems and how their adherents define what "evil" means. Eutheists arguing against dystheism often claim that the dystheist's definition of evil is flawed, because it is based on a limited human perspective instead of God's omniscient perspective. Dystheists respond by noting this is an example of the logical fallacy known as "argument from authority." They also note that any harm God causes us, individually or collectively, even if in the service of some greater good, is still an act of evil that a truly omnipotent benevolent God could and would not have to perform. If God were truly benevolent and omnipotent, they say, he could and would reach his goal of greater good without having to go through evil to get to it. To the dystheist, eutheistic explanations for the presence of evil in the world (theodicies) are just rationalizations.
History of eutheistic and dystheistic thought
Since the majority of theistic religious beliefs tend to be eutheistic, the history of eutheism is pretty well covered within the study of the history of religion. Dystheism, on the other hand, is another story: its history tends to be obscured by the overwhelming predominance of eutheism in religious thought. Still, there are significant examples of historical dystheism:
- The early Gnostics believed that the God worshipped by Jews and Christians was really a demiurge that stood between us and some greater, more truly benevolent real God. The Gnostic Gospels were suppressed for many years by the established church.
- John Milton's Paradise Lost is often cited as an apology of Satan's rebellion against a despotic God.
- The trickster gods that play a part in many polytheistic belief systems certainly have a dystheistic nature. One example is Eshu, a trickster God from Yoruba mythology who deliberately fostered violence between groups of people for his own amusement, saying that "causing strife is my greatest joy."
- In Jewish author Elie Wiesel's play, The Trial of God, the survivors of a pogrom in which most of the inhabitants of a 17th-century Jewish village were massacred, put God on trial for his cruelty and indifference to their misery. The play is based on an actual trial Wiesel participated in that was conducted by inmates of the Auschwitz concentration camp during the Nazi holocaust, but it also references a number of other incidents in Jewish history including a similar trial conducted by the Hasidic Rabbi Levi Yitzhak of Berdichev.
Support for dystheism from the Bible
Those holding dystheistic beliefs cite the Bible (and similar religious texts) as evidence of God's duplicitous nature, noting that God tells people that it's wrong to kill, but then exhorts them to do so in his name at his behest (e.g., the slaughter of the native inhabitants of Canaan by the returning Hebrews, the Christian Crusades, the Spanish Inquisition, the missionary practices of colonial Europeans, the Nazi Holocaust, and today's Islamic Jihad). They also note that God says we have free will, but punishes us when we exercise it. They also note that God says we were created in his image, but at the same time he tells us we are low and vile creatures based on the original sin of Adam and Eve.
What follows are explicit examples from the Bible that dystheists see as supporting their belief that God is evil:
The Garden of Eden and The Tree of Knowledge
In Genesis, we read that God told Adam and Eve, the first humans, not to eat from the Tree of Knowledge, warning them that on the day they eat from this tree they will surely die. A serpent (often associated with Satan) convinced Eve to partake of the tree's fruit, and she in turn convinced Adam to do so. God punished them for doing this, banishing them from the paradise known as the Garden of Eden.
While this story is often seen as metaphorical in nature, it raises questions about God's nature. Why would a God who created humans to be curious and knowledge-seeking punish them for being curious and seeking knowledge? What is the "lesson" to be learned from this parable?—that seeking knowledge is wrong? Dystheists note that God lied when he said that Adam and Eve eating this fruit would cause them to die—the story indicates that not only did they not die from eating the fruit, but that God took explicit action to cause them suffering, not because eating from the tree was bad or wrong, but merely because it displeased him.
Additionally, we see Satan again used as God's agent, unfairly blamed for things God himself does not want to be associated with, as in the Book of Job. In this case, according to the Maltheist perspective, God sets things up to entrap Adam and Eve, using Satan as a patsy. Maltheists believe that Satan is just an alias God uses to point fingers at when he (God) does evil things.
The Tower of Babel
Another well-known example of this is the story of the Tower of Babel. In this tale, the people in the city of Babel work together to build a tower that "will reach the heavens". God remarks that "the people are one, and they have all one language, and now nothing will be restrained from them, which they have imagined to do." Apparently seeing this as a threat to his authority, he goes down to "confound their language, that they may not understand one another's speech," so that these people would not be able to work together on this or any other common goal.
While this story is often interpreted as an admonition about rebelling against God, it's not clear to dystheists that these people were doing anything wrong. According to the dystheistic perspective,the message of the story is that God's glory and ego are more important than humanity working together. Is it any wonder, it is noted, that religion since this time has been plagued with division and fractionalism? Dystheists see God talking about how following his way will lead to peace, but each group is told a slightly different "way", with the end result being interreligious hatred and violence. The interpretation here is that God wants us divided from each other, fighting each other, each group being told to worship God in a different way that leads them to ostracize and quarrel with others who believe differently.
The Hardening of Pharaoh's Heart
In the book of Exodus, when Moses was instructed by God to lead the effort to seek his people's freedom from slavery in Egypt, God deliberately "hardened Pharaoh's heart", making him even more unwilling to free the Hebrew slaves, making it less likely (not more likely) that they would be released from bondage.
Is this the act of a benevolent God, a dystheist would ask? Was his goal to free his chosen people from slavery, or to show them (and everyone else) how powerful he was? By deliberately making Pharaoh more obstinate about not releasing the Hebrew slaves, he got the opportunity to demonstrate to everyone how powerful he was through the series of plagues he beleaguered the Egyptians with. This interpretation of the story reinforces the notion that God performs "miracles" not as an act of benevolence, but as an act of showing off to gain praise and worship. A benevolent God would not save people from disaster after the fact, he would prevent the disaster from occurring in the first place.
Furthermore, this story would seem to invalidate the common theodicy that God allows evil in the world because he cannot or will not interfere with human free will. Aside from the other known flaws in this explanation for the presence of evil in the world, in this story God does indeed "tamper" with human free will.
The Book of Job
The Book of Job has probably sparked more controversy and debate than any other story in the Bible. In it, God makes a bet with Satan that his loyal servant Job would continue to worship him even after he is plagued with devastating tragedies. The Book of Job contains accusations against God, suggesting that he cannot be criticized because he is all-powerful, and not because he is all-benevolent. The accusations are retracted once Job is reinstalled into his former state, but the controversy regarding the text still exists in modern times.
Dystheists think that a deity who makes bets with his "friends" that he could deliberately hurt someone and that this person would remain faithful and devoted despite this does not qualify by any objective standards as good. Even many Judeo-Christian eutheists see the Book of Job as bringing into question the fundamental assumption of God's goodness, since God is shown not to have our interests and well-being at heart, and we learn that neither we nor any idea we have about what is good really matter to him.
Those who agree with this conclusion seem to approach it with resignation, saying that it doesn't matter how we might define good, God has the power to do whatever he wants, so we'd best just give in to his will. Dystheists see this as an accession to a "might makes right" moral code, and as a fundamental reason not to worship God.
Some believe that the authors of the Bible knew God's nature all along and sought to placate him through their praises, but that the Book of Job has a not-so-hidden subtextual message for those who read it carefully—that the God whose praises were being sung throughout the Bible isn't really as good as he is made out to be.
Belief systems with dystheistic aspects
Satanism
Satanists advocate rebellion against God because they also consider him evil, and (depending on the particular flavor of Satanism) may or may not believe in the existence of an actual Satan as a real entity, as described in various parts of the Bible and in Milton's Paradise Lost. Some dystheists (specifically the Maltheists) believe that Satan is just an alias God uses to veil his evil aspects, much like Big Brother in George Orwell's 1984 would blame all the evil in the world on imaginary insurgent Emmanuel Goldstein, who was really just a fiction invented by the Party as a scapegoat. Another interpretation, which is more in line with actual Satanism, is that since God is at least partly evil, his supremacy is only justified by force, and Satan was justified in rebelling against God's tyranny.
Gnosticism
The Gnostics believed that the God many worship is not the "real" God but a demiurge standing between humanity and the true benevolent God. Dystheists would ask why, if this true God is really more powerful than the demiurge and is benevolent, he doesn't step in and crush the demiurge.
Atheism
Atheism obviously cannot be labeled either eutheistic or dystheistic since it is the belief that God does not exist. Atheists cite Occam's Razor as a reason for reaching this conclusion, but like dystheists they also see eutheists' theodicies (intended to serve as responses to the problem of evil) as unconvincing, and consider the contradictions and hypocrisies they see in religious texts like the Bible to be evidence that the problem of evil is unresolved. But while some atheists cite this lack of resolution as proof that God does not exist, dystheists say that it only proves that God might still exist, but if does he's a liar and a bully. Dystheism has been described as the position an atheist would hold if it were proven to him logically that the God of the Bible really did exist.
Maltheism
Maltheism is a modern manifestation of dystheistic belief. While not an organized religious movement, it has a small number of adherents throughout the world. Though Maltheism has no formal doctrine, there are a number of beliefs that most Maltheists share:
- Maltheists note the presence of evil in a world created by an omnipotent God and conclude that this God must be evil—since, being omnipotent, he could have chosen not to create evil, but willfully chose to do so anyway.
- They see his demands for worship as bullying and coercion. A truly benevolent God, they say, would neither need nor want his creations to worship him. They also see his promise of "salvation" from eternal torture as blackmail—what is God saving us from, they ask, if not his own willful wrath? Isn't this like (for example) calling a school bully a "savior" for not beating you up when you give him your lunch money?
- Noting how much divisive fighting there is between world religions, they say that a God with all the characteristics his followers attribute to him couldn't possibly fail so miserably in conveying a benevolent message of peace and love to all people. The utter failure of this message (in its variegated forms across belief systems) to accomplish its goal, bringing about peace and love in the world, can only be accounted for by either total incompetence—which contradicts the notion of God's omniscience and omnipotence—or malicious intent. Either God is not what he says he is, marking him as a liar, or he is overtly malevolent.
- They believe that the problem of evil is not really a problem at all, because an omnipotent benevolent God creating a world with evil in it when he could have chosen (and did choose) otherwise is a logical contradiction. They contend this is only a "problem" if you are working backwards from a conclusion that God must be benevolent. They claim this is what those attempting to produce theodicy are actually doing.
- Some say God is the summum bonum, the center and source of all that is good, and that this means he is good by definition and that he alone gets to define what good is. Maltheists see this as circular reasoning—"God is good because he gets to define what good is because he's God"—and as the ultimate example of moral relativism. The claim that God uses the existence of evil to work towards some greater good is also unconvincing to Maltheists: a God who is benevolent and omnipotent, they say, would not need to "go through" evil to get to some ultimate good.
- Maltheists dismiss "miracles" performed by God as self-aggrandizing boastfulness. They say that "miracles" in which a mere handful are cured of a fatal disease or saved from a natural disaster do not demonstrate that God is benevolent. Instead of saving only a few who would testify to his greatness after the fact, a truly benevolent God would have prevented the disease and disaster in the first place.
- They believe God is dependent on the worship and adoration of human beings for his existence, and hope that if he is deprived of that worship, he will wither up and die. This is akin to the common belief that what we worship is given spiritual substance through the act of worship. According to this belief, those who believe in the God of the Bible, whose behavior Maltheists find deplorable, give him life and form through their worship, and create a world where such a God influences life on earth negatively. In contrast, those who withhold worship of that God help to solve the problem of evil in this world, by focusing on being good, instead of on worshipping God.
Many Maltheists also believe that Satan is not a real entity, but merely a pseudonym used by God when overtly engaging in evil acts. According to this belief, God uses the name "Satan" as an imaginary scapegoat for the evil he engages in, just like Big Brother (in George Orwell's 1984) blames everything that went wrong on imaginary insurgent Emmanuel Goldstein, who was really just a fiction invented by the Party.
This is a sharp contrast to dualistic beliefs such as Gnosticism, which asserts that the God of "this world"—the physical realm—is evil (a demiurge), while a true benevolent God lies beyond the physical realm. Ironically, many varieties of Christianity have a similar dualistic belief, asserting that the ruler of "this world" is Satan, while God lies beyond this world. According to such belief, Satan is a great deceiver who misleads mankind about good and evil. Maltheism stands in contrast to both of these beliefs by denying this duality, claiming that the entity labeled as evil and the one claiming to be good are really one and the same. In essence, according to Maltheism, the great deceiver simply wears multiple masks.
Maltheists refer to people who worship God and believe him to be good as Censored page. They believe that most of human society has accepted theophilia (also referred to as eutheism) as the norm, because of centuries of cultural indoctrination, to the point where the majority of people do not even think to question the idea that God exists, is good, and should be worshipped.
They liken this to a cult, noting that many eutheistic religions exhibit virtually all the symptoms found on classic cult checklists. They note a correlation between the behavior of theophiles and the Stockholm syndrome, wherein victims of kidnapping or long-term abuse come over time to think of their captor/torturer in a positive way.
To Maltheists, all this explains what they see as the irrational behavior of theophiles, which they consider similar to that of abused children who still love their abusive parents. Such parents frequently hurt their children, belittle them, take credit for good things the children accomplish, and blame them for acts they themselves are responsible for, while trying to convince those children that they should think of this abuse as love.
Maltheists contend that this is exactly what God tries to do to: he blames us for the existence of evil in a world he created, he tells us that we are inherently sinful and evil, he tries to teach us that we need salvation from him because of our supposed unworthiness, and he threatens us with eternal torture if we do not comply with his demands—at the same time telling us that he is a benevolent loving God who cares about us. (Note the similarity between this sentiment and George Carlin's rant on the subject of religion http://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/George_Carlin#religion .)
Maltheists would encourage people of all religious persuasions to think for themselves and try to see God objectively, as opposed to how we might wish him to be or how we have been taught to believe him to be. They would see it as a good thing if theophiles were to stop worshipping God. If God is indeed evil, and if his goal is not the benefit of mankind but rather his own glory, worshipping an evil God is a treasonous act against oneself and against the entire human race, even if it causes the worshippers to gain some short-term benefit for themselves (e.g., Heaven in the afterlife).
But Maltheists do not actively proselytize their beliefs. This would, in their eyes, make them no better the evangelistic theophiles who implement God's will in promoting divisive hostility and violence between those with different beliefs. They say their audience when vocalizing their beliefs is not the theophiles, but rather those other people who have at some point considered the notion that God is not what common beliefs assert him to be. Theophiles, they say, are not likely to change their beliefs, given how entrenched those beliefs are. They think that other people who may have considered Dystheistic or Maltheistic notions have a right to know that they are not the only ones who have considered such notions, that belief along those lines is not unreasonable, that they are not "crazy" for thinking along those lines, and that they are not alone in their beliefs.
External links
- Introduction to Maltheism http://belief.net/boards/message_list.asp?boardID=42416&discussionID=164781 (belief.net)
- Maltheism Blog http://maltheism.blogspot.com/
- Lecture on Eutheism, dystheism and atheism by Robert Koons http://www.la.utexas.edu/phl356/lec19.html (utexas.edu)
- Atrocities committed or commanded by God http://web2.airmail.net/capella/aguide/attroc.htm
- The moral imperative to rebel against God http://www.philosophers.co.uk/portal_article.php?id=23
- God on Trial: A Critical Analysis of the Book of Job http://www.bloodclub.com/web_pages/AK47/articleseven.htm
- Even If I Did Believe http://tim.maroney.org/Essays/Even_If_I_Did_Believe.html
- George Carlin on God http://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/George_Carlin#Religion
- Lecture by Robert Koons http://www.la.utexas.edu/phl356/lec19.html (utexas.edu)
- Atrocities committed or commanded by God http://web2.airmail.net/capella/aguide/attroc.htm
- The moral imperative to rebel against God http://www.philosophers.co.uk/portal_article.php?id=23
- God on Trial: A Critical Analysis of the Book of Job http://www.bloodclub.com/web_pages/AK47/articleseven.htm
- Even If I Did Believe http://tim.maroney.org/Essays/Even_If_I_Did_Believe.html
- George Carlin on God http://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/George_Carlin#religion