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Jankélévitch argues that the notion of sin, understood as intentional wrongdoing, only makes sense in a world that is perceived as ontologically imperfect. The fault of the sinner thus consists in exacerbating the preexisting disorder of the world. This correspondence between sin and ontological imperfection is for Jankélévitch characteristic of Modern times and foreign to other worldviews, such as the ancient Greek one. This could explain why the Greeks did not have a word for 'sin" and evil did not pose a serious problem for them. Jankélévitch contrasts these two worldviews—the ancient Greek one and the Modern one—without explaining the transition from one to the other. The purpose of this chapter is to reconstruct this transition and to account for the emergence of the problem of evil in Modern thought. This reconstruction will allow us to explain the internal logic of Modern theodicies as well as their fall into obsolescence in the contemporary philosophical discourse.

DOI: 10.1007/978-3-319-57087-7_4

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