This book introduces Aquinas's thinking on God and evil. It begins with a brief account of the so-called ‘problem of evil’ as constructed in modern philosophy of religion and shows that, although Aquinas would not have accepted that there is such a problem, his thought can be read in relation to the questions it raises. Aquinas has relevant things to say about these questions but his thinking is not confined by them, and any fair reader is obliged to consider the broader context of his thinking about evil. In a closing chapter Davies evaluates Aquinas's thought but his primary aim is simply to explain what Aquinas's thinking on God and evil amounts to when taken as a whole.
A couple of chapters in, one begins to wonder whether this is another general summary of Aquinas's thought. Davies has already provided us with two very successful works of that kind, The Thought of Thomas Aquinas (1992), and Aquinas (2002). Once again the basic concepts of Aquinas's thought are explained with characteristic clarity, precision, and humour: beings and being, causes, goodness and badness, the existence of God, essence and existence, what God is not, etc. Once again, it seems, the presentation follows the course of Summa theologiae.
But it is not just another such summary. If familiar ground is re-visited it is with a specific question in mind: a clear focus is strictly maintained on the question of God and evil. Davies shows that, in order to do justice to Aquinas's thinking on that topic, it is necessary to consider in cross-section his theological thinking as a whole. Nor does Davies restrict himself to Summa theologiae. De Malo is clearly key for his focus here, as are parts of Compendium Theologiae and Summa Contra Gentiles.
Another difference from earlier works is that his presentation of Aquinas as both philosopher and theologian seems more nuanced. Davies shows how Aquinas engages in properly philosophical thinking within broader theological argumentation. How Aquinas is both philosopher and theologian is explicitly considered in the second chapter and the rest of the book illustrates how he engages in both in thinking about God and evil. Aspects of his philosophy must be understood if this thinking is to be appreciated, hence chapters on ‘What There Is’ and ‘Goodness and Badness’. Aspects of ‘natural theology’ must also be understood, hence chapters on ‘God the Creator’, ‘God's Perfection and Goodness’, and ‘The Creator and Evil’. But a full presentation is not possible without doing theology properly so called, informing earlier levels of understanding with what biblical revelation teaches about God, and so we have chapters on ‘Providence and Grace’ and ‘The Trinity and Christ’.
The influence of Herbert McCabe remains strong although Davies carries the argument further than McCabe did in his God and Evil in the Theology of St Thomas Aquinas (2010). Like McCabe, Davies sees the question ‘why is there a universe at all rather than nothing?’ as the key to Aquinas's metaphysics of creation. An argument in favour of the existence of God based on this question is not an argument from contingency, since even necessary creatures (and eternal ones if they existed) would still be created, having their being from the source of being rather than themselves being their being. A metaphysical (and not moral) goodness accompanies any being and Aquinas assigns all creative causality to God who is thus the cause not only of the things there are but of all the actions of those things.
This heightens the difficulty of explaining the source of evil: Davies's chapter on ‘The Creator and Evil’ is thus the crucial one. He speaks there of what Aquinas says about divine omnipotence, about evil suffered (natural evil, malum poenae), and about evil done (human moral evil, malum culpae). God is the cause of all being, including the being that human choices and actions have, but God does not choose those actions for us and so is not responsible for the evil there might be in them. Nor is God himself a moral agent answerable to some criterion outside God. The free will defence – that God ‘steps back’ as Creator to allow space for human freedom – makes no sense on Aquinas's view of things.
Having contributed to discussion of the questions raised by the modern problem of evil, Aquinas still has a lot more to say about evil, God, and goodness. So Davies continues by considering the goodness God intends for at least some of the human creatures He has made. It is necessary to speak about providence, happiness, faith, grace, Christ, the Trinity itself: ‘(t)hese points need to be stressed if we are to appreciate all that Aquinas has to say about God, goodness, and evil – if we are accurately to understand his final approach to this topic… God can and does make people godlike (a thought that does not seem to enter the minds of many people writing on God and evil)’ (pp. 88–89).
The closing chapter provides a summary of Aquinas's ‘big picture’ on God and evil, a picture that depends on both philosophical and theological arguments. Not surprisingly, Davies agrees with Aquinas in his basic options and overall solutions: ‘(i)f Aquinas is right, then the problem of evil is not a serious problem at all but rather the result of a confused way of thinking about God’ (p. 128). And against Moltmann's theology of a ‘suffering God’ he shows how Aquinas's theology is more successful in guarding the intimate involvement of God in the suffering of the world.
This book will be of great interest not only to students approaching him for the first time but to seasoned readers of Aquinas. As it presents Aquinas's big picture on evil, goodness, and God, it also clarifies how a person can engage simultaneously in the related disciplines of philosophy and theology.
