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| Mikhail (Michail) Bakunin and his wife Antonia Kwiatkowska (Photo credit: Wikipedia) |
Dystheism (Greek δύσ θεος "bad god"),
is the belief that a god or God
is not wholly good,
and is possibly evil. Trickster
gods found in polytheistic belief systems often have a dystheistic nature. One
example is Eshu, a trickster
god from Yoruba
mythology who deliberately fostered violence between groups of people for
his own amusement, saying that "causing strife is my greatest joy."
Dystheists may
themselves be theists or atheists, and in the case of either, concerning the
nature of the God of Abrahamic
faiths, will assert that God is not good, and is possibly, although not
necessarily, malevolent,
particularly to those who do not wish to follow that faith.
Such attitudes have
often stemmed from ideas similar to that of Mikhail Bakunin, who
stated that "if God really existed, it would be necessary to abolish
him" (an inversion of Voltaire's phrase "If God did not exist, it
would be necessary for man to invent Him") in response to [God's]
perceived antagonism to freedom.
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