The Axiology of the African Limited-God

African Traditional Religion is a major world religion typically thought to be monotheistic with millions of adherents below the Sahara on the African continent. However, it has been sorely neglected by Anglo-American philosophers of religion, and thus far none of the axiological questions in what has come to be known as the axiology of theism literature have been applied to it. I will break new ground by applying axiological analysis to an important metaphysical position in African Traditional Religion known as the limited-God thesis. This conception of God denies that God is any of omniscient, omnipotent, and omnibenevolent. This has important implications when thinking about the axiological status of monotheism. While it might be thought obvious that it would be worse if the limited-God existed compared to the Anselmian God, I will argue that such a conclusion is not so straightforward for two reasons. First, many exponents of African Traditional Religion deny that the problem of evil applies to the limited-God. A world where the problem of evil does not arise may well be better than a world where it does. Second, and even if this first reason fails, I appeal to recent claims by Guy Kahane suggesting that a world without gratuitous evil is actually worse than a world with gratuitous evil. I conclude that not only does this imply the limited-God is axiologically superior to the Anselmian God, but it also avoids many of the pitfalls typically associated with anti-theism and therefore may also be better than metaphysical naturalism.