This is a modified form of the conversation on the ontology of evil that I’ve partaken in. It centers on the denial of the privation theory of evil. Which is:

According to the Neoplatonists, evil does not exist as a substance or property but instead as a privation of substance, form, and goodness (Plotinus, Enneads, I, 8; See also O’Brien 1996). For instance, the evil of disease consists in a privation of health, and the evil of sin consist in a privation of virtue. The Neoplatonist theory of evil provides a solution to the problem of evil because if evil is a privation of substance, form, and goodness, then God creates no evil. All of God’s creation is good, evil is a lack of being and goodness.

https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/concept-evil/

We’ve done an episode in response to this view of evil:

A dialogue about this topic occurred and this article was made about some of the issues:

https://watchmencouncil.com/2023/11/25/whats-evil/

In that conversation, the principle of proportionate cause was used to say God couldn’t create a reality in which evil is emergent because this would entail that somewhere God causes sin and has evil within him.

This is the thesis that whatever is in an effect must in some way preexist in the total cause of that effect.

https://aquinas101.thomisticinstitute.org/edward-feser-aristotles-revenge-3236#:~:text=A%20corollary%20of%20the%20principle,total%20cause%20of%20that%20effect.

The issue for Thomists is they will have to decide between the creator/creature distinction and some of their principles. Either the principle is created rule for the universe or it is a rule for everything. Which implies, that God must share something in common in the universe. The principle is simply that causes must share something in common with their effect, but this cannot be true of God and creation.

The other issue was how can God cause sin and not be responsible for it. This is as much an issue for Thomists as it is for Neo-Reformed folks.

One problem with the privation theory’s solution to the problem of evil is that it provides only a partial solution to the problem of evil since even if God creates no evil we must still explain why God allows privation evils to exist (See Calder 2007a; Kane 1980). 

https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/concept-evil/

The response I received was since man’s finite mind, sin is inevitable apart from special divine grace to not sin (similar to what is had in the eschaton). The issue with such is that the individual needs to still explain how God can intend evil without being evil because by withholding his grace, he must intend the consequences of such.

The issue of causation might be brought up as a relevant difference. Some Thomists do not claim that God causes every event, unlike Neo-Calvinists that is committed to determinism. This would not be sufficient to get them out of the prior objection, but it brings in the relevance of determinism and the ontology of evil.

I hold that divine causation is sui generis. It is unlike every form of causation that is known, thus it doesn’t follow from the fact that God divinely causes evil events and things to exist, that he must be responsible for those things. The burden is on the objector to give a reason why that is necessary. Dr. James Anderson gives this same model to those interested.

The individual that I was having a conversation with didn’t appeal to a libertarian reading of Scotus’ synchronic contingency. He rather appealed to the Boethian approach to necessity and contingency. I am not sure what that is about, but if it is what I think it is, then I don’t think it helps. Here are some resources on that:

https://triablogue.blogspot.com/2008/04/boethian-solution.html