Page:Catholic Encyclopedia, volume 14.djvu/627

 THEODICY

569

THEODICY

i'heodard maintained with energy the rights of his see nd its suffragans, repaired the damages that these ioceses had suffered from the incursions of the Sar- cens, restored the oathcdral, and ga\e up his rev- nues and the treasures of his church for the release f captive Christians. At a later date he was able to eplace the treasures he had used. He died where he ad lived in the Benedictine Abbey of St. Martin and .'as buried there. The abbey bore his name from 45. It was later plundered by the Huguenots; since hen all the relics of St. Theodard, excepting a small emnant, have disappeared.

\cla SS.. Mav, I. U1-.56: Gallia Christiana, VI (Paris, 1739), 9-22; Bibliothcca hatjiogr. Lai. (Brussels, 1S98-19(X)), 1165; rOYARD, Vie de St. Theodard (Montauban, 1857; 2nded., Paris,

Klemens Loffler.

Theodicy. — Etymologically considered theodicy 8(6! SLkti) signifies the justification of God. The erm was introduced into philo.sophy by Leibniz q. v.), who, in 1710, published a work entitled: 'Essais de Th6odic6e sur la bont(5 de Dieu, la liberty le I'homme et I'origine du mal". The purpose of he essay was to show that the evil in the world does lot conflict with the goodness of God, that, indeed, lotwithstanding its many evils, the world is the best if all possible worlds (see Optimism). The problem if evil (see Evil) has from earhest times engrossed he attention of philosopher's. The well-known ceptic Pierre Bayle had denied in his "Dictionnaire listorique et critique" the goodness and omnipotence if God on account of the sufferings experienced in his earthly hfe. The "Th6odicce" of Leibniz was lirected mainly against Bayle. Imitating the exam- >le of Leibniz other philosophers now called their realises on the problem of evil "theodicies". As in I thorough treatment of the question the proofs both if the existence and of the attributes of God cannot )e disregarded, our entire knowledge of God was rhus theodicy came to be synonymous with natural heolog>' (theologia naturalis), that is, the depart- nent of metaphysics which presents the positive )roofs for the existence and attributes of God and olves the opposing difficulties. Theodicy, therefore, nay be defined as the science which treats of God hrough the exercise of reason alone. It is a science jecause it systematically arranges the content of our knowledge about God and demonstrates, in the strict lense of the word, each of its propositions. But it appeals to nature as its only source of proof, whereas heolog>' sets forth our knowledge of God as drawn rom the sources of supernatural revelation.
 * radually brought within the domain of theodicy,

The first and most important task of theodicy is to )rove the existence of God. It is of course presup- josed that the suprasensible can be known and that he limits of experience pui'e and immediate can be ranscended. The justification of this assumption nust be furnished by other branches of philosophy, '. g. cr)teriolog>' and general metaphysics. The nat- iral demons! rability «S < iod's existence was alw;iys ac- •eptedbythemajorityof theists. HimieandKant were he first to awaken in the minds of would-be f heists lerious doubt on this point. Not that these philoso- ihers presented any solid reason against the long- est ed arguments for the existence of God, but because n their .systems a scientific proof of the existence of I supernatural being is impossible. Xew ways of ■stablishing theism were now sought. The Scotch school led by Thomas Heid taught that the fact of he exi.stence of God is accepted by us without knowl- ■dge of rea.sons but simply by a natural impulse, rhat God exists, this school said, is one of the chief netaphy.sical principles that we accept not because hey are evident in themselves or because they can 3e proved, but because common sense obhges us to iccept them. In Germany the School of Jacobi

taught that our reason is able to perceive the supra- sensible. Jacobi distinguished three faculties: sense, reason, and understanding. Just as sense has im- mediate perception of the material so has reason immediate perce])tion of the immaterial, while the understanding brings these perceptions to our con- sciousness and unites them to one another (Stockl, "Geschichte der neueren Philosophic", II, 82 sqq.). God's existence, then, cannot be proved — Jacobi, hke Kant, rejected the absolute value of the principle of causality — it must be felt by the mind. In his "Emile", Jean-Jacques Rousseau asserted that when our understanding ponders over the existence of God it encounters nothing but contradictions; the impulses of our hearts, however, are of more value than the understanding, and these proclaim clearly to us the truths of natural religion, e. g., the existence of God, the immortality of the soul, etc. The same theory was advocated in Germany by Friedrich Schleier- macher (d. 1834), who assumed an inner religious sense by means of which we feel religious truths. According to Schleiermacher, rehgion consists solely in this inner perception, dogmatic doctrines are unessential (Stockl, loc. cit., 199 sqq.). Nearly all Protest:int tlicologians who have not yet sunken into atheism follow in Schleiermacher's footsteps. They generally teach that the existence of God can- not be demonstrated; certainty as to this truth is only furnished us by inner experience, feehng, and perception.

As is well known the Modernists also deny the demonstrabiUty of the existence of God. According to them we can only know something of God by means of the vital inunanence, that is, under favourable circumstances the need of the Divine dormant in our subconsciousness becomes conscious and arouses that religious feeling or experience in which God reveals himself to us (see Modernism). In condemnation of this view the oath against Modernism formulated by Pius X says: "Deum . . . natural! rationis lumine per ea qua; facta sunt, hoc est per visibilia creationis opera, tanquam causam per effectus certo cognosci adeoque demonstrari etiam posse, profiteor", i. e., I declare that by the natural light of reason, God can be certainly known and therefore His existence dem- onstrated through the things that are made, i. e., through the visible works of creation, as the cause is known through its effects.

There is, however, still another class of philosophers who assert that the proofs for the existence of God present indeed a fairly large probability but no absolute certainty. A number of obscure points, they say, always remain. In order to overcome these difficulties there is necessary either an act of the will, a religious experience, or the discernment of the misery of the world without God, so that finally the heart makes the decision. This view is main- tained, among others, by the noted Enghsh states- man Arthur Balfour in his widely read book "The Foundations of Belief" (189.5). The opinions set forth in this work were adopted in France by Brune- tiere, the editor of the ''Revue des deux Mondes". Many orthodox Protestants exTiress themselves in the same manner, as, for instance, Dr. E. Dennert, President of the Kepler Society, in his work "1st Gott tot?" (Stuttgart, 1908). It must imdoubtedly be conceded that for the perception of religious truths the mental attitude and temper are of great impor- tance. As the questions here under consideration are those that penetrate deeply into practical life and their solution is not directly evident, the will is thus able to hold fast to the opposing difficulties and to prevent the understanding from attaining to quiet, objective reflection. But it is false to s.ay that the understanding cannot eliminate every reasonable doubt as to the existence of God, or that a subjective inclination of the heart is a guarantee of the truth,