Heavenly Head Trip: Is there sin or free will in Christian Heaven?

Ebon Musings demonstrates that God must have created evil intentionally.

While doing a little homework on the Pearly Gates (at the entrance to “the New Jerusalem”, Revelation 21, not “Heaven”, the abode of Yahweh), I ran across the Ebon Musings site. The author puts forth an interesting paradox for those who follow any one of the Abrahamic religions:

The theist might answer that the free will in Heaven is some different kind of free will, superior to the kind we have on Earth. Perhaps the people there are gifted with perfect knowledge, or perfect empathy, or something of the sort, or perhaps we are transformed by being in the presence of God, or perhaps we receive new bodies immune to the temptations of sin (some Christians believe exactly this and call it “glorification”) – so that people in Heaven are either no longer able to commit sins or are able to avoid doing so, yet retain their free will in other things. But of course, this begs the question: Why didn’t God create us with this kind of free will in the first place and thus not have to create a Hell at all?

No Christian or other theist has ever been able to resolve this paradox. Assuming Heaven exists, there are only four options to choose from:

1. There is both sin and free will in Heaven.
2. There is sin but no free will in Heaven.
3. There is free will but no sin in Heaven.
4. There is neither free will nor sin in Heaven.

Together, these four options exhaust all possibilities, and therefore one of them must be true. The only remaining question, then, is which of the four is the correct one.

I have argued on theological grounds that option (1) is unacceptable to Heaven-believing theists, and I know of no theist who disputes that conclusion. (Option (2) is simply absurd and will not be considered.) I have additionally argued that (4) is likewise unsatisfactory because it would make Heaven an undesirable goal for many, and because it contradicts the free will theodicy, a key teaching of most religions, which states that God wants beings who freely choose to love him and not “robots” programmed to do so. Again, I know of no member of these religions who is challenging that. Therefore, the only conclusion is that the correct solution is (3).

But theists who accept this solution have stepped into a trap. Now consider this argument:

By (3) above, it is possible for God to create free-willed beings without the possibility of evil.

According to the free will theodicy, evil arises from the actions of free-willed beings.

By (I) and (II), God deliberately chose to create free-willed beings who would commit evil acts, even though he had the option of doing otherwise.

Conclusion: God wanted evil to exist.

And a being that would want evil to exist is itself evil.

Very nice. Much, much more at the site . . . Enjoy!

Related articles:

1. God, evil, and free will
2. Take a Trip on the Freethought Trail
3. Islamists Want Head from Madonna!
4. The immorality of the Christian religion
5. Free Will: A Problem of Definition

Jenny Donati is webmistress and co-editor of Secular News Daily. Jenny is an outspoken secularist who believes firmly in the separation of church and state. She demands evidence to support arguments, and holds herself to the same standard. She doesn't write about herself in the third person . . . but there's a first time for everything.

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