Robert Merrihew Adams has been a leader in renewing philosophical respect for the idea that moral obligation may be founded on the commands of God. This collection of Adams’ essays, two of which are previously unpublished, draws from his extensive writings on philosophical theology that discuss metaphysical, epistemological, and ethical issues surrounding the concept of God — whether God exists or not, what God is or would be like, and how we ought to relate ourselves to such a being. Adams studies the relation between religion and ethics, delving into an analysis of moral arguments for theistic belief. In several essays, he applies contemporary studies in the metaphysics of individuality, possibility and necessity, and counterfactual conditionals to issues surrounding the existence of God and problems of evil. ~ Product Description

Table of Contents

• • Introduction    3
• Part 1    Faith
  • 1    The Virtue of Faith    9
  • 2    Kierkegaard’s Arguments Against Objective Reasoning in Religion    25
  • 3    The Leap of Faith    42
• Part 2    The Problem of Evil
  • 4    Must God Create the Best?    51
  • 5    Existence, Self-interest, and the Problem of Evil    65
  • 6    Middle Knowledge and the Problem of Evil    77
• Part 3    God and Ethics
  • 7    A Modified Divine Command Theory of Ethical Wrongness    97
  • 8    Autonomy and Theological Ethics    123
  • 9    Divine Command Metaethics Modified Again    128
  • 10    Moral Arguments for Theistic Belief    144
  • 11    Saints    164
  • 12    Pure Love    174
• Part 4    The Metaphysics of Theism
  • 13    Has It Been Proved That All Real Existence Is Contingent?    195
  • 14    Divine Necessity    209
  • 15    The Logical Structure of Anselm’s Arguments    221
  • 16    Flavors, Colors, and God    243
  • Index    263