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Study of evil in relation to God
In theology, ponerology (from Greek πονηρός ponērós, "evil") is the study of evil. Major subdivisions of the study are the nature of evil, the origin of evil, and evil in relation to the Divine Government.[1]
Karl Immanuel Nitzsch outlined his System der christlichen Lehre (System of Christian Doctrine) into three major rubrics:
- Agathology, or the Doctrine of the Good
- Ponerology, or the Doctrine of the Bad
- Soteriology, or the Doctrine of Salvation
He further subdivided ponerology into the topics of Sin and of Death.[2][3]
The concept of political ponerology was popularized by Polish psychiatrist Andrzej Łobaczewski, who advocated using the fields of psychology, sociology, philosophy, and history to account for such phenomena as aggressive war, ethnic cleansing, genocide, and despotism.[4]
- Theodicy, a theological argument about the problem of evil
Look up ponerology in Wiktionary, the free dictionary.
- ^ The Presbyterian Review. 1881. p. 423. Retrieved 2014-10-18.
- ^ The Methodist Review. Vol. 77. 1895. p. 203. Retrieved 2014-10-18.
- ^ Nitzsch, C.I. (1849). System of Christian doctrine. T. & T. Clark. p. 130. ISBN 978-0-7905-7603-9. Retrieved 2014-10-18.
- ^ Łobaczewski, Andrzej, Political Ponerology: A Science on the Nature of Evil Adjusted for Political Purposes (Grande Prairie: Red Pill Press, 2006, ISBN 978-1-897244-25-8), p. 22.