Infinite Paths to Infinite Reality

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Ayon Maharaj
Keyword(s):  
Mystical Experience ◽  
Problem Of Evil ◽  
Cross Cultural ◽  
Careful Study ◽  
Cultural Perspective ◽  
New Paradigm ◽  
Knowledge Of God ◽  
The Problem Of Evil ◽  
Intimate Knowledge ◽  
The Universe

Sri Ramakrishna is widely known as a nineteenth-century Indian mystic who affirmed the harmony of all religions on the basis of his richly varied spiritual experiences and eclectic religious practices, both Hindu and non-Hindu. In Infinite Paths to Infinite Reality, Ayon Maharaj argues that Sri Ramakrishna was also a sophisticated philosopher of great contemporary relevance. Through a careful study of Sri Ramakrishna’s recorded oral teachings in the original Bengali, Maharaj reconstructs his philosophical positions and analyzes them from a cross-cultural perspective. Sri Ramakrishna’s mystical journey culminated in the exalted state of “vijñāna,” his term for the “intimate knowledge” of God as the Infinite Reality that is both personal and impersonal, with and without form, immanent in the universe and beyond it. This spiritual standpoint of vijñāna, Maharaj contends, opens up a new paradigm for addressing central issues in cross-cultural philosophy of religion, including the infinitude of God, religious diversity, mystical experience, and the problem of evil. Sri Ramakrishna’s vijñāna-based religious pluralism—when grasped in all its subtlety—proves to have major philosophical advantages over dominant Western models. Moreover, his mystical testimony and teachings not only cut across long-standing debates about the nature of mystical experience but also bolster recent defenses of its epistemic value. Maharaj further demonstrates that Sri Ramakrishna’s unique response to the problem of evil resonates strongly with Western “soul-making” theodicies and contemporary theories of skeptical theism.

A Cross-Cultural Approach to the Problem of Evil

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Ayon Maharaj
Keyword(s):  
Mystical Experience ◽  
Problem Of Evil ◽  
Cross Cultural ◽  
The Other ◽  
Skeptical Theism ◽  
Cultural Approach ◽  
The Problem Of Evil ◽  
Argument From Evil ◽  
The One

This chapter adopts a cross-cultural approach to the problem of evil by bringing Sri Ramakrishna into conversation with recent analytic philosophers. Maharaj begins by exploring the philosophical resonances between Sri Ramakrishna’s skeptical theism and William Alston’s skeptical theist refutation of William Rowe’s argument from evil. On the one hand, Maharaj draws on Alston’s skeptical theist response to Rowe as a means of developing and defending Sri Ramakrishna’s own skeptical theist position. On the other, Maharaj argues that Alston’s failure to consider Indian karma-based theodicies significantly weakens his argument. Maharaj then brings Sri Ramakrishna’s saint-making theodicy into dialogue with Hick’s “soul-making” theodicy. Hick’s convincing arguments for the necessity of evil in a soul-making environment lend support to Sri Ramakrishna’s saint-making theodicy. However, Maharaj also identifies major weaknesses in Hick’s soul-making theodicy, which stem from Hick’s assumption of a one-life-only paradigm and his neglect of mystical experience. On this basis, Maharaj argues that Sri Ramakrishna’s mystically grounded saint-making theodicy, which presupposes the doctrines of karma and rebirth, has significant advantages over Hick’s theodicy.

scholarly journals The problem of evil and moral indifference

1999 ◽  
Vol 35 (3) ◽  
pp. 323-345
Author(s):  
TIM MAWSON
Keyword(s):  
Free Will ◽  
Problem Of Evil ◽  
General Nature ◽  
The Problem Of Evil ◽  
Moral Qualities ◽  
Moral Indifference ◽  
The Universe ◽  
Libertarian Free Will

In this paper, I argue that if the libertarian free will defence were seen to fail because determinism were seen to be true, then another solution to the problem of evil would present itself. I start by arguing that one cannot, by consideration of agents' choices between morally indifferent options, reach any conclusion as to these agents' moral qualities. If certain forms of consequentialism were false, determinism true, and if there were a God who chose to create this universe, then His choice would have been between such options. Consideration of the general nature of the universe God putatively chose to create would not then license any conclusion as His moral qualities.

Evil, Omniscience and Omnipotence

1979 ◽  
Vol 15 (1) ◽  
pp. 1-23 ◽  
Author(s):  
R. W. K. Paterson
Keyword(s):  
Problem Of Evil ◽  
Central Problem ◽  
Logical Inconsistency ◽  
The Problem Of Evil ◽  
Scaling Down ◽  
The Universe

There are numerous ‘solutions’ to the problem of evil, from which theists can and do freely take their pick. It is fairly clear that any attempt at a solution must involve a scaling-down of one or more of the assertions out of whose initial conflict the problem arises – either by a downward revision of what we mean by omnipotence, or omniscience, or benevolence, or by minimizing the amount or condensing the varieties of evil actually to be found in the universe. And indeed, in one or more of these different ways, the charge of logical inconsistency can no doubt always be vouchsafed at least a formal answer. Unfortunately, the mere ironing-out of formal inconsistencies does not of itself go very far towards providing a solution to this central problem of theism which will be morally, religiously, and intellectually convincing and acceptable as well as logically impeccable. Everything depends on how the inconsistencies are ironed out. For every attempt at a solution of the problem of evil has to be made at a price, in keeping with the scale and type of conceptual or ethical readjustments which it requires of us. And if the solutions which are generally offered seldom seem to carry much conviction, this is because the price they require us to pay nearly always seems far too high. A ‘solution’ to the problem of evil that is to count as a genuine solution must not require us to make any conceptual or ethical readjustments which it would not on independent grounds be entirely reasonable to make. A ‘solution’ that was finally to count as the solution of the problem of evil would presumably need to be that particular one which required us to make only those conceptual and ethical readjustments which (of all the readjustments that were open to us) were on independent grounds the ones that it was the most reasonable to make. What follows is offered as a solution, in the above sense, of the problem of evil. However, I shall not here attempt to argue that it is the solution.

Introduction

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
N. N. Trakakis
Keyword(s):  
Research Program ◽  
Philosophy Of Religion ◽  
Problem Of Evil ◽  
Imre Lakatos ◽  
Modern Times ◽  
Present Collection ◽  
Recent Philosophy ◽  
The Problem Of Evil ◽  
The Universe

The ‘problem of evil’—whether conceived broadly as the challenge of reconciling evil and imperfection with a commitment to ultimate justice, goodness, or harmony in the universe, or more narrowly in (say) theistic terms as the problem of reconciling the existence of an absolutely perfect being with the existence of sin and suffering—has a long and venerable history, exercising some of the finest minds from ancient to modern times. However, as will be discussed below, in recent philosophy of religion the debate seems to have reached a stalemate, where opposing camps rehearse tired and familiar lines of argument that remain singularly unconvincing to one another, giving the entire debate the character of what Imre Lakatos called a ‘degenerating research program’. In reaction to this, signs have begun to emerge that the problem of evil and the discipline at large are on the cusp of a breakthrough that promises to bring to the forefront a series of imaginative, suggestive, and innovative, though unfortunately neglected, approaches to the nature of divinity and its relationship to evil. The present collection of dialogical essays is put forward as a contribution to this renewal....

Sri Ramakrishna’s Multidimensional Response to the Problem of Evil

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Ayon Maharaj
Keyword(s):  
Problem Of Evil ◽  
Skeptical Theism ◽  
Positive Account ◽  
The Problem Of Evil ◽  
Human Intellect ◽  
The Universe

This chapter reconstructs Sri Ramakrishna’s response to the problem of evil. Several of Sri Ramakrishna’s visitors argued that instances of apparently pointless evil make it reasonable to believe that God does not exist. In response, Sri Ramakrishna would often observe that the ways of an omniscient and omnipotent God are inscrutable to the finite human intellect—a response, Maharaj argues, that is best understood as a skeptical theist position. Sri Ramakrishna’s skeptical theism dovetails with a full-blown theodicy—a positive account of why God permits evil and suffering. Maharaj reconstructs Sri Ramakrishna’s “saint-making” theodicy: since God has created this world as an environment for saint-making, evil is as necessary as good. Sri Ramakrishna’s theodicy culminates in an appeal to the panentheistic experience of vijñāna, which reveals to him that God has become everything in the universe. From this mystical standpoint, Sri Ramakrishna does not so much solve as dissolve the problem of evil.

Teachers' Self-Efficacy in Cross-Cultural Perspective

2008 ◽  
Author(s):  
Robert M. Klassen ◽  
Mimi Bong ◽  
Ellen L. Usher ◽  
Wan Har Chong ◽  
Vivien S. Huan ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Self Efficacy ◽  
Cross Cultural ◽  
Cultural Perspective
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