Knowing that Augustine attributes moral evil to the free choice of the will, it now becomes a question of why God created us with a free will in the first place. Did God drop the ball on this one? Does it even make sense to say that God dropped the ball? If not, why did he make us free if he knew what would result? Speaking of which, if he does know how all things ultimately result, are we really free to begin with? So many questions, so little time!
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In Book I of On Free Choice of the Will, Augustine attributes moral evil to the free choice of every human being. He then uncovers a problem with this perception of evil in the eyes of Christianity. On page 3, he states: “we believe that everything that exists comes from the one God, and yet we believe that God is not the cause of sins.” He then continues by saying “For there is no single cause of evil; rather everyone who does evil is the cause of his own evildoing (Book I, 1).”This becomes an issue for Augustine and furthermore, Christianity. One could counter this idea stating that because we are accepting the idea that God is the creator of all souls, and all souls have free will, and that free will can cause evildoing; we are ultimately blaming God for evil. Augustine then holds “inordinate desires” as responsible for a person’s evildoing. We could argue again that if God is omnipotent, all-powerful, all-knowing, etc. why would he create such attributes such as free will in all living souls? Why would he create these “inordinate desires” with which people commit evil? Personally, if God creates all, he creates all, including free will and desire, and in turn, evil.
Augustine discusses many things in this first book of his On Free Choice of the Will. He explores such questions as: Is God the cause of all evil. We find that Augustine believes the answer is no; God does no evil but he does punish the wicked and thus causes the evil of punishment. When people engage in evil acts, they are the causes of their own evil doings. We also learn what “evil doing” is. We learn that it is inordinate desire and inordinate desire is “the love of those things which one can lose against one’s will.” Augustine also discusses when killing is allowed and establishes that it is the law which must decide. There are two laws: the temporal law and the eternal law. Both are said to be good; “an unjust law is no law at all,” and both ensure good order. Augustine says that a person lives well when any impulses of the soul are guided by men’s reason. If reason rules, then the man is said to be wise and if it does not, then he is said to be foolish. Human wisdom lies in the rule of the mind.
God created us with a free will so that we, as good creatures could have a good will to do right from. This free will allows us to sin but it was not given to us to be able to sin but so we could do what is right. This was a good enough reason to have it, to live rightly (Book 2, 1 p.30). God did not "drop the ball". His deeds are above reproach, perfect, He is perfect so all things about him are perfect, therefore His decisions and gifts given to us are divinely perfect. There is a reason for all things that He does and has done. We may not understand but will one day see the big picture. He made us free regardless of the sins that would be committed because it is only through this free will that good would be accomplished. Therefore we are free because we are willing it ourselves. He is not willing it for us , He made the initial will for us to choose and our corresponding actions to come forth, hence why He foreknows everything.
Augustine shows that God gave us free will. He makes the argument that how is God suppose to punish those who are destined to do evil. On the opposite side, how is someone good, when they are destined to help others. He gave us free will to be good or evil on our own accord. This is why he gave us free will, in the hope that people will do what is right. It’s not God who dropped the ball but people. If there is bad in the world it’s our fault. Free will comes with great responsibility and not everyone uses this gift for good. Also it sounds terrible but you need some bad in the world. Good needs to be compared to something so that it is good. If evil did not exist, there would be no good either because it would no longer be good but nothing. People need to better and kinder but there will always be some aspect of evil. Free will allows us to decide how much good and evil exist.
these are very perplexing and paradoxical ideas brought up by Saint Augustine. The idea that everything created by God is good, yet there is such thing as sin or evil simply doesn't make sense. It's not only a religious issue either. Rousseau states that everything born from nature is good. yet evil is born of man, who is (originally) born of nature. That statement goes for religion as well. one can make the argument that sin is born of God, and be completely right. I just can't wrap my head around how God can give us free will, but not also be charged with creating sin in the process.
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