I'm not privileged enough to have seen an artist painting but there's always YouTube for people like me.

I like art and from what I've seen there are two requirements:

1. The object that he wishes to paint for which he chooses his colors

2. A contrasting color or background which frames and brings out the object the artist wants to paint.

Goodness is like the object the artist, God, wants to create and the contrast or background, evil, is the frame that reveals goodness.

The only worthwhile argument against this view i.e. evil is necessary is that the evil we see is just too excessive. We accuse the painter of overdoing his contrast/background- more than necessary to reveal the object of his painting.

A simple response to that could be "What about hell?" God could've done worse by putting us in hell. That wasn't done and so I'm satisfied (I may have to eat my words) that the problem of evil is now "solved".

I know what I'm saying is very disrespectful and callous to the millions who are in veritable hell, dying from disease, starvation, being raped and killed in cold blood. These can be "explained" with the necessity for freewill if we are to be truly responsible for our thoughts and actions. In other words these problems are our own creation and we can and should solve them ourselves instead of whining about God.

Here too we may effectively respond with "It could've been worse."

In conclusion, those who think evil in this world is a problem that disproves God should go for a bus tour to hell.

Comments