Concept

Free Will Defense

Intro

In the 1950s the philosopher J. L. Mackie thought he had the knockout argument against God. The shape of it: if God is all-powerful, all-knowing, and all-good, then evil should not exist. Evil exists. So there is no God like that. Mackie said this was a logical contradiction, like a square circle. Christianity, he thought, was simply impossible.

Then in 1974 Alvin Plantinga published a short book called God, Freedom, and Evil and ended the conversation. Even atheist philosophers admit it. The logical problem of evil is closed.

The argument is simple to state, hard to refute. Plantinga said: God could have made a world without free creatures, but then no real love, no real obedience, no real virtue could exist in it, because love by definition is not coerced. If God wants free creatures capable of genuine goodness, then by the very nature of freedom, those creatures could also choose evil. God cannot make a being that is both free to do otherwise and unable to do otherwise. That is a square circle. God's omnipotence does not extend to logical contradictions, and never claimed to.

Once you put free agents in the picture, evil becomes a possibility tied to the same setup that makes love a possibility. The atheist objection assumed God could create freely-loving beings while ensuring they always loved. Plantinga showed that "always-loving free beings" is logically possible as an outcome but not something God can guarantee from the start without overriding freedom and making the love fake.

This page is a defense, not a theodicy. A theodicy tries to give the actual reason God allows evil. A defense only needs to show one possible reason, to defeat the claim of contradiction. Defense is weaker in ambition, stronger in result. It survives.

Quick reply line: "Plantinga 1974. Real love requires real freedom. Real freedom carries the possibility of real evil. God cannot create a being that is both free and forced. The logical problem of evil is closed, atheist philosophers agree."

In full

The principal Christian response to the logical Problem of Evil, that the existence of moral evil in the world is logically compatible with the existence of an omnipotent, omniscient, omnibenevolent God, because God's creation of free moral agents capable of genuine goodness logically entails the possibility (not the necessity, but the possibility) of those agents choosing evil. Originating in nascent form with Augustine and developed in its decisive contemporary shape by Alvin Plantinga (God, Freedom, and Evil, Eerdmans, 1974), the Free Will Defense is generally credited with having closed the logical Problem of Evil, even hostile philosophers (William Rowe, J. L. Mackie's later concessions) acknowledge that the logical-incompatibility version of the atheist objection has been defeated.

The Free Will Defense is a defense, not a theodicy, a crucial distinction. A theodicy attempts to give the actual reason God permits evil. A defense merely shows that some possible reason could exist consistent with God's nature, defeating the claim that evil and God are logically inconsistent. The defense is weaker in ambition but stronger in result: it survives objections that defeat individual theodicies.

Companion defense to Soul-Making Theodicy; the two work together to handle both moral evil (the Free Will Defense's primary target) and natural evil (the soul-making theodicy's primary target). The Free Will Defense also offers a contributing account of natural evil through the Augustinian-Plantingian fallen-angels extension.

The logical Problem of Evil that the Free Will Defense answers

J. L. Mackie, "Evil and Omnipotence" (Mind, 1955), formulated the strongest version of the logical Problem of Evil:

If God exists, He is omnipotent (can do anything logically possible).

If God exists, He is omniscient (knows everything that can be known).

If God exists, He is omnibenevolent (wants the good of His creatures).

Evil exists.

An omnipotent, omniscient, omnibenevolent God would prevent all evil.

Therefore: God's existence and the existence of evil are logically inconsistent.

The claim is strong: not merely that evil makes God's existence improbable, but that evil makes God's existence logically impossible. Mackie held that any reasoned theist must accept that "the theologian … must be prepared to believe, not merely what cannot be proved, but what can be disproved from other beliefs that he also holds."

This is the version Plantinga's Free Will Defense defeats. The evidential Problem of Evil (which holds that evil makes God's existence improbable rather than impossible) is a separate and weaker argument, addressed by Soul-Making Theodicy and other resources.

Plantinga's Free Will Defense (the core argument)

Plantinga's argument in God, Freedom, and Evil runs:

Step 1, The value of free will

A world containing free moral agents who freely choose the good is more valuable than a world containing only agents who are programmed or causally determined to do the good. The genuine goodness of free creatures requires the genuine possibility of their choosing evil; if they could not have chosen otherwise, their good actions would not be morally significant in the way free actions are.

This is a substantive metaphysical claim about the value of libertarian free will (see Libertarian Free Will). The Free Will Defense assumes this libertarian conception of freedom; if Compatibilism is true (free will compatible with determinism), the defense needs reformulation, though some versions can work compatibilistically with adjustments.

Step 2, The transworld depravity possibility

Plantinga's key innovation, drawing on the Molinist tradition of counterfactuals of freedom (see Counterfactuals of Freedom and Molinism): for any free creature S, there are counterfactuals of freedom, truths about what S would freely do in every possible circumstance. S's essence determines, prior to creation, what S would freely do in any situation God could place S in.

Plantinga defines transworld depravity: an essence E suffers from transworld depravity if, for every possible world W in which the creature instantiating E exists and is significantly free, E would freely choose to do at least one wrong action in W. If a creature's essence is transworldly depraved, then no possible world in which that creature exists and is significantly free is a world in which the creature is morally perfect.

It is possible (Plantinga's key claim, not actual, just possible) that every creaturely essence God could have created suffers from transworld depravity. If this is possible, then it is possible that God could not have created a world containing free creatures who always freely do the good, every world God could create with free creatures would contain some moral evil.

Step 3, Defeating the logical inconsistency

If it is possible that every creaturely essence God could create suffers from transworld depravity, then it is possible that:

God exists
God is omnipotent
God could create free creatures or not
If God creates free creatures, the world will contain moral evil
A world with free creatures and some moral evil is better than a world with no free creatures
Therefore God permits moral evil in order to have free creatures

The atheist needs to show that no such possibility exists, that necessarily, God could create a world of free creatures who never choose evil. But the atheist has no way to show this; the modal claim is too strong. Mackie's logical inconsistency claim is therefore defeated: God's existence and the existence of moral evil are not logically inconsistent.

Step 4, Natural evil and the fallen-angels extension

Plantinga extends the defense to natural evil (earthquakes, disease, predation): it is possible that natural evil is caused by the free choices of non-human spiritual agents (fallen angels, demons). If natural evil is reducible to moral evil-by-spiritual-agents, then the Free Will Defense covers it.

The fallen-angels extension is the philosophically weakest part of the argument because it requires premises most atheists reject. But as a defense (showing logical consistency), it does not need to be actually true; it only needs to be possible. The atheist must show it is necessarily false that fallen angels could cause natural evil, which is a much stronger claim than they typically want to defend.

What the Free Will Defense does and does not do

Does

Defeats the logical Problem of Evil. Even Mackie himself, in later work, conceded that Plantinga had shown the logical inconsistency claim could not be sustained as stated.
Provides a coherent possible account of why God permits evil, integrating with classical Christian doctrines of free will, fall, and redemption.
Reframes the apologetic conversation from "the existence of evil disproves God" (logical) to "the amount and distribution of evil makes God improbable" (evidential), the evidential version is dealt with by Soul-Making Theodicy and other resources.

Does not

Provide a theodicy, the defense is not the actual reason God permits evil, just a possible one. The actual reason might be something else (some combination of free will + soul-making + the cross + eschatological completion + reasons God has not revealed).
Handle specific cases of horrendous evil, the defense answers the logical question; it does not pastorally console the parent of a murdered child. See Soul-Making Theodicy for the longer treatment.
Settle the broader Problem of Evil, the evidential version remains a live discussion. The Free Will Defense + Soul-Making Theodicy + the cross + eschatology together constitute the Christian cumulative response.

Apologetic deployment

30-second response to "the existence of evil disproves God":

"Alvin Plantinga answered the logical version of that argument in 1974. The core move: a world with free creatures who can choose evil is more valuable than a world of programmed agents who can't, even though it carries the risk of evil being chosen. God's permission of evil is the condition of the free will whose existence is part of the goodness of creation. The atheist would have to show it's logically impossible for God to create free creatures who might evil, but no atheist can show that. The logical version of the problem of evil is closed. The harder version is the evidential version, why so much evil, why these specific evils, and the Christian response to that is the cross plus the eschatological completion plus soul-making. Want to talk about that?"

Live-cite kit:

Alvin Plantinga, God, Freedom, and Evil (Eerdmans, 1974), the canonical statement
Augustine, On Free Choice of the Will I-III (c. AD 388-395), the patristic origin
C. S. Lewis, The Problem of Pain (Macmillan, 1940), ch. 2, "divine omnipotence" clarifies that "omnipotence" does not extend to logical contradictions
William Lane Craig, On Guard (David C. Cook, 2010), ch. 6, accessible deployment of the Free Will Defense

Pair with: Soul-Making Theodicy (for the evidential version), Listening Tools #5 (Honoring the Objection, most Problem-of-Evil questions are wound-anchored, not philosophical).

Common objections and responses

Objection 1, Why not create free creatures with character that always freely chooses good?

The atheist response: surely God, being omnipotent, could create free creatures whose freely-chosen actions are always good, like the redeemed in heaven, who are still free but no longer sin.

Response. This is the transworld-depravity response from Plantinga. It is possible (not necessary, just possible) that no creature God could create has the kind of essence such that, given libertarian freedom, it would always freely choose the good. The atheist needs to show this is necessarily false; they cannot. The defense survives. The heaven case is sometimes handled by saying the redeemed have become non posse peccare (Augustine's "not able to sin") through union with Christ and the beatific vision, a gained condition that does not bear on the pre-redemption state.

Objection 2, Doesn't this make God less powerful?

The atheist: doesn't the defense limit God's omnipotence by saying He couldn't create free creatures without risk of evil?

Response. Classical omnipotence has always excluded logical contradictions: God cannot make a square circle, cannot make 2+2=5, cannot make Himself not God. Aquinas (Summa I.25.3): "Whatever implies contradiction does not come within the scope of divine omnipotence, because it cannot have the aspect of possibility." The Free Will Defense argues that "create free creatures who necessarily and always freely choose the good" is in the same category as "square circle", a logical contradiction not within omnipotence's scope. This is not a limitation on God; it is a clarification of what omnipotence has always meant.

Objection 3, Compatibilism makes this defense unnecessary

The compatibilist (see Compatibilism) responds: if free will is compatible with determinism, God could have determined creatures to always freely choose the good (in the compatibilist sense), and the Free Will Defense fails.

Response. This is a genuine in-house dispute. Plantinga's defense assumes libertarian free will. Compatibilist Christians (some Reformed thinkers, e.g.) need a different theodicy, typically a sovereignty-and-best-possible-world account or a soul-making-without-libertarian-freedom variant. The defense's force depends on which conception of free will is correct, an unresolved question. Most evangelical apologetics assumes libertarianism and uses the Plantinga defense.

Objection 4, Heaven contradicts the defense

If heaven is a world of free creatures who never choose evil, then God can create such a world, contradicting the transworld-depravity premise.

Response. Heaven is post-redemption. The creatures in heaven have been transformed through the work of Christ and the beatific vision into a non posse peccare state. This is not the same as God creating, ex nihilo, free creatures who from creation never sin, it is the eschatological completion of the soul-making process for redeemed creatures. The defense applies to the creative situation, not to the eschatological completion. Augustine handled this distinction (City of God XXII.30).