The Mystery of Evil in Thomas Aquinas

Abstract

The subject of evil demands a speculative analysis of great flights, in which not only metaphysical but also epistemological questions are involved. St. Thomas did what he could, in the three moments (all in the 1960s) in which he directly addressed the issue. His conclusion, turning the Boethian formulation on its head, was that, "if evil exists, then God exists." Such a way out postulates that good is a transcendental property, and that evil is nothing, it is only deprivation of a due good. As is known, the good, understood as transcendental, presupposes an intentional relation. When being offers itself to the gaze of the intellect, the intellect notices that it is true. When the will notices it, it discovers that it is palatable, because it is good. The problem continues, however, and leads to the existential paradox, which according to Carlos Cardona sounds like this: "evil is not, but it exists". Therefore, Cardona points out that evil is not knowable and that we only know what evil is, because God guarantees us access to its notion, if we can speak that way. This would be a radical way of reformulating the Thomistic solution: if evil exists, then God exists