Philosophy of Religion - Augustinian Theodicy

Evaluation

The Augustinian Theodicy seems to answer the Problem of Evil legitimately, it exonerates God, allowing Him to exist in spite of evil, and offers an answer to the presence of natural evil in the world. However, it seems this theodicy would only be valid for pre-existing believers, rather than non-theists, as we must already have a solid belief in the concept of the Fall, without faith this concept seems ridiculous as it seems scientifically impossible that it occurred. There also exists a conflict between the Augustine's response to natural evil and the scientific proof that natural evil actually existed before moral evil, i.e. before our existence in the world. How can moral evil have provoked natural evil if natural evil came into existence before it? This seems an unanswerable question, and therefore we must either reject Augustine's response to natural evil or reject this scientific evidence. Augustine relies on the belief that God created a perfect universe, and we are the ones that unbalanced this perfect harmony, but if it was truly a perfect universe, how could it have gone wrong? Surely, if it was perfect in the beginning there would have been no possibility for evil. However, this could be answered through the free will defence, i.e. it is more 'perfect' to have free will than not.