Molinism and the Problem of Evil

Molinism is a view that attempts to resolve two doctrines that seem at odds with each other. First, that God predestines an elect people for salvation. Second, that we freely choose salvation. Both doctrines and the problem itself come from Christianity, though the tenets can be shared in other monotheistic religions. The Molinist solution is that God predestines us by creating the right circumstances that would lead to us freely choosing salvation. 

The Problem of Evil is the question of why God would allow evil. If we accept the Molinist solution to the first problem, we could possibly use it to answer the second: God allows evil because it is part of the circumstances that would lead a person to choose salvation.

Is Molinism tenable? Can it be combined in this way to solve the Problem of Evil?

• Problem of Evil
  • 1. If God exists, then He could prevent evil
    • S1: He is all-powerful and all-knowing
  • 2. If God exists, then He would prevent evil
    • S1: He is all-good
  • So, 3. If God exists, then evil doesn’t exist
  • 4. Evil exists
  • So, 5. God doesn’t exist
• Molinism
  • The following are three kinds of knowledge God has in the logical order He has them:
    • Natural knowledge = God's knowledge of all necessary truths (e.g., "2+2=4", "A squared circle is impossible")
    • Middle knowledge = knowledge of all CCFs
      • Counterfactuals of Creaturely Freedom (CCFs) = what a person would do in a possible circumstance that doesn't actually happen
    • Free knowledge = knowledge of what He decides to create
  • The Molinist picture of creation:
    • God begins with natural knowledge
    • He decides to create
    • He accesses middle knowledge to determine what each person would do in every possible circumstance (i.e., He looks at the CCFs)
    • He chooses to create a world with all the circumstances such that all the people He wants to predestine for salvation use their free will to choose salvation
    • God creates
    • God has free knowledge of what He chose
• Adapting Molinism for the Problem of Evil
  • Evil is a part of all the worlds where the elect choose salvation
    • Possible addition: God chooses the most people to get saved possible
  • God creates only as much evil as is necessary for the incomparable good of salvation
• Objections to Molinism
  • O1 (Open Theists): free will can't be known ahead of time because then it is determined
    • R1: it is determined by the agent, which is exactly what free will is
  • O2 (Grounding Objection): there is nothing outside of God to make these CCFs true
    • This is especially concerning since these are contingent truths
• Objections to Molinism used to explain the Problem of Evil
  • Before God created, all the people that currently exist were only possible people
  • It was possible for those people to choose other than they did at any point
  • So, there was also a possible person identical to each person that exists, only who chose only things that would avoid evil/lead to salvation
  • If God had only allowed evil as a necessary condition for good/salvation, then He would have just created these other possible people and avoided evil in the first place