The morality of war has been debated from a variety of perspectives. However, it has rarely been intertwined with the topic of the existence of God. Sometimes anti-theists argue that the existence of ...a Western Judeo-Christian God who is omnipotent, omniscient and morally perfect is inconsistent with the existence of evils such as war. We will argue that there is no such logical inconsistency between the God of the African traditional religions and the evil of war. First, we contend that such a logical inconsistency does not exist because God in African traditional religions is not seen as omnipotent, omniscient or morally perfect, and therefore, it would not be logically inconsistent for such a God to co-exist with the evil of war. This is mainly because African moral realism entails that war is a legitimate means for an imperfect being in an imperfect world to pursue morally permissible goals. Second, even if God is omniscient, omnipotent and morally perfect, when considered from the African religious viewpoint, a God of harmony, like the one in African traditional religions, can permit some evils for a greater good such as "harmony".
The problem of evil, as raised by Mutahari and Swinburne, is one of the most important and complicated problems concerning belief in God and teleology of the world. Both of philosophers face the ...problem through the standpoint of “justice” as the most important divine attribute and, relying on divine grace and will, they seek to respond to it. The complexity of the problem of evil is mainly due to the logical method of putting forth the problem, which emphasizes incompatibility rather than mere contradiction. That is to say, supposing the existence of an omnipotent, omniscience, and wholly-good God, there is no justification of the existence of evil whatsoever. The present paper attempts to explore the problem of evil on the basis of two well-known philosophers’ views. These two thinkers seek to explain and justify evils on the basis of theodicy. This article discusses Mutahari’s views in two sections: discrimination and evils. His view about evils will be studied under three headlines: non-existence of evils, relativity of evil, and inseparability of good and evil. Besides, Swinburne’s views will be discussed in three sections: moral evil, natural evil, and animal suffering. Finally, two philosophers’ views will be compared in the headline of: the motivation for positing theodicy; the method adopted by two philosophers for positing the theodicy; the nature of evil; the classification of evils; the benefits of evils; the best created world and animal suffering. Then the article makes the conclusion that although both of philosophers agree upon emphasis on human will, existence of the best created world and the benefits of evils, they disagree about the nature of evil, the classification of evils, and about some justifications for the existence of evil. Therefore, the article attempts to explore the differences and similarities between the two philosophers.
