The Problem of Evil and the Chain — A Study Plan v0.1
The Problem of Evil and the Chain — A Study Plan v0.1
Theoretical foundations: Grant C. Sterling (Eastern Illinois University). Analysis and synthesis: Dave Kelly. Prose rendering: Claude (Anthropic). 2026.
The question. Does Stoicism face a problem of evil, and if it does, where does the problem bear on the chain? A post at Living Stoicism (October 2026) holds that it does not, on Julia Annas’s account of Plato’s craftsman god. The aim of this plan is mastery: the answer derived from the chain first, then the history tested against it.
The Beginning
Everyone wants happiness, and it would be irrational to accept incomplete happiness if complete happiness could be had (Th1, Th2, 2*). Complete happiness must lie wholly within control, and only belief and will are in our control (Th6). So the only thing actually good is virtue, and the only thing actually evil is vice (Th10). (Sterling, Core Stoicism, 2005.)
Premises
P1. Only virtue is actually good and only vice is actually evil; externals are never good or evil (Th10; line 12).
P2. Virtue consists of rational acts of will, vice of irrational acts of will (Th27).
P3. The universe is, or is governed by, Nature, Providence, God or the gods; what is so governed is exactly as it should be (Th20–21).
P4. Strict determinism would make even acts of vice “somehow correct,” and not in our control in any important sense; Sterling does not hold strict determinism about internal states to be a core belief of Stoicism (Th21, nota bene).
P5. Denying Th20 or Th21 undermines a great deal of the Stoic view of positive happiness, but does not seriously damage the views on virtue or on avoiding unhappiness (Core Stoicism, closing comment).
P6. The gods could control our wills, but choose not to (Sterling, ISF, 4 September 2019, as located in C2, Th6 and Th27 — What I Do Is My Own Doing v0.1).
P7. A man unhappy about what occurs accuses God by implication, insulting His Knowledge, His Goodness or His Power, or denying His existence (Sterling on Handbook 31, Stoic_Christian, June 2010; restated 16 August 2011).
P8. An omniscient being has no false beliefs; all wrongdoing comes from assent to false value beliefs; therefore an omniscient being can do no wrong (Sterling, Stoic_Christian, 14 June 2010).
P9. Evil has no bearer but a will (ruling, 15 October 2026).
Derived Claims
D1. The problem is a triad: God is good, God is able, evil exists. For earthquakes, disease and death the third premise fails. They are externals, not evils. (P1)
D2. Asked about externals, the problem of evil is itself the error P7 describes. Its three horns are Sterling’s three insults: knowledge, goodness and power. The question presupposes a false value judgment. (P1, P7, D1)
D3. Moral evil has a bearer, and the bearer is a will, not the arrangement. Under C2 the vice is the agent’s own doing, and God’s goodness is untouched. (P2, P6, P8, P9)
D4. Th21 does not declare vice “as it should be.” The will is not governed, and so is not among what Providence orders (ratified reading of the Th21 nota bene, 19 September 2026). (P3, P4)
D5. Strict determinism reopens the problem. If vice is arranged, either vice is correct or the arrangement fails. This is where Chrysippean fate breaks the chain. (P4, D3)
D6. The problem of evil bears on the chain only at Th21–23, the third source of positive happiness, the appreciation of the world as it is. The guarantee at line 14 and the account of virtue at Th27–29 stand without it. (P5)
Thesis. Stoicism faces the problem of evil. The chain answers it twice: by the value claim for externals (D1–D2) and by C2 for vice (D3–D4). Left unanswered, the problem would touch only the appreciation of the world (D6). The easy way the post describes is Plato’s, not the chain’s.
The Units
Unit 1 — The triad and the value claim. Read Core Stoicism, Sections One and Two.
- Test: which premise of the triad fails for externals, and by which line?
Unit 2 — Providence in the chain. Read Core Stoicism Th20–23 and the closing comment, then Handing Desire Over to God — Discourses 2.17.23–25 in Corpus Terms v1.1.
- Test: why does Sterling mark Th20–21 as deniable without serious damage to virtue? What exactly would be lost?
Unit 3 — Moral evil and the will. Read C2 — What the Commitment Carries: A Study Note v0.1, C1 and C2 Together — The Agent, the Chain and the Theorems: A Study Note v0.1, and Fate and Determinism: One Inheritance. A Study Note v0.1.
- Test: why does C2 answer moral evil where fate cannot? State D5 from memory.
Unit 4 — Piety. Read Religion — The Arrangement That States the Good Aloud v1.1 (Worship and the True View of Value; The Second Worked Case), then Enchiridion 31 and Discourses 1.6.
- Test: show that the problem of evil, asked about externals, is the impiety of Handbook 31.
Unit 5 — The ancient debate. History outside the corpus, not Sterling’s. Read in this order:
- Plato, Timaeus 29e–30a and 47e–48a; Republic 379b–c; Laws X.
- Gellius, Attic Nights 7.1–2 (Chrysippus: contraries, concomitance, fate and vice).
- Plutarch, On Stoic Self-Contradictions, the sections on providence and vice.
- Seneca, On Providence.
- Marcus Aurelius, Meditations 2.11.
- Test: why can the Stoic god not plead the craftsman’s excuse? Why does the concomitance answer concede Plutarch’s point?
Unit 6 — Classical theism. History outside the corpus. Read Plotinus, Enneads I.8; Augustine, Confessions VII.12–16 and Enchiridion 10–15.
- Test: is evil as privation Platonist or Stoic? Did classical theism fail, or did it borrow Plato’s answer?
Unit 7 — Capstone. Write a resolving of the Living Stoicism claim in traceable propositions, for ratification.
What This Plan Does Not Claim
- That Sterling wrote on the problem of evil by that name. The derivation is synthesis from his theorems and posts.
- That God exists. Th20–21 are carried as Sterling states them, and he marks them deniable without loss to virtue.
- Anything of Sterling’s in Units 5 and 6.
- That “free-will defense” is Sterling’s name for P6.
Sources
Sterling, Core Stoicism, International Stoic Forum, 19 September 2005.
Sterling, “Re: God, Christianity, the Bible, docetism,” Stoic_Christian group, 8 and 10 June 2010; “Theosis, Atonement, and (yes!) Stoicism,” 14 June 2010; “Re: Mea culpa,” stoic-christian group, 16 August 2011 — as given in Religion — The Arrangement That States the Good Aloud v1.1.
Sterling, International Stoic Forum, 4 September 2019, as located in C2, Th6 and Th27 — What I Do Is My Own Doing v0.1.
C2 — What the Commitment Carries: A Study Note v0.1.
Julia Annas, Plato: A Very Short Introduction (Oxford University Press).
Theoretical foundations: Grant C. Sterling (Eastern Illinois University). Analysis and synthesis: Dave Kelly. Prose rendering: Claude (Anthropic). 2026.
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