 What is described above is the problem of evil. Because evil poses the most difficult problems for traditional views of divine providence, this discussion will be organized around the theme of evil. In its classical formulation, the problem of evil is a problem of logical consistency. The opponent of theism alleges that a triad of properties traditionally held to belong to God’s nature — omniscience, omnipotence and omnibenevolence — are not jointly consistent with the existence of evil in the world. An omniscient God, we must assume, would have knowledge of the evil in the world. An omnibenevolent God would desire to halt or prevent it, and an omnipotent God should be able to do so. Yet evil is rife. It must be, then, that God lacks at least one of the triad of attributes, and perhaps all of them. Perhaps as creator he is somewhat in the dark as to what evils may occur, and once they appear it is too late to forestall them. On the other hand, it may be that evil is endemic — built into the structure of any world, so that even God is powerless to prevent it. Or, maybe he just doesn’t care, and has long since turned his attention to projects more interesting than nurturing our feeble destinies. Whatever the reason, the argument runs, he is not the God of Abraham, of Jesus, and of Mohammed. Their God simply would not permit wanton wrongdoing, nor would he allow the suffering and duress under which all creation labors. So while the presence of evil in the world does not serve to prove there is no God at all, it does show there is no God of the kind adumbrated in religious tradition.