Moral Responsibility and Divine Freedom

Moral Responsibility and Divine Freedom Classical theism contains a conception of one single God, a being of great power, wisdom, and goodness. This God is not just a great being or even the greatest being of all beings that have existed or will exist, but the greatest possible being. This means that God is a being which no greater being can exist or even be conceived to exist. Naturally then, God is taken to be a being whose goodness, power, and knowledge are such that it is logically impossible for any being, including God, to have a greater degree of these attributes. However, some thinkers object to this conception of God. One of these objections has to do with God’s essential goodness and praiseworthiness in relation to His freedom to choose otherwise. This objection consists of two claims: God’s essential goodness entails that He lacks freedom and God’s lack of freedom entails that He is not worthy of praise for His actions. First we will define the conflict between God’s essential goodness and praiseworthiness. Next we will consider the first claim and inquire whether or not it is coherent. Finally, I will attack the second claim of the objection and argue that lack of divine freedom does not entail that God is not worthy of praise.
The Problem of Essential Goodness and Praiseworthiness To say that God is essentially good is to say that he is perfect in every possible world. In other words, God, in every conceivable world, both exists and is perfectly, morally good. In the early 18th century, Gottfried Leibniz argued that this essential goodness, entailed by the fact that He is the greatest conceivable being, requires God to create the best of all possible worlds. Leibniz imagines God as considering a variety worlds that He might create. God might create a world in which there is only dead matter and no conscience creatures. Or He might create a world that consists of many conscience creatures whose lives are meaningful, morally good,