Theoretical analysis reveals theodicy as a structural category error in philosophical ethics, suggesting that suffering requires relational care rather than conceptual justification.
We apply the Category Error Detector (CED) to theodicy — the at- tempt to justify suffering in a world governed by a good, omnipotent, or intelligible ground. We argue that theodicy is not a problem to be solved, but a category error: a collapse of the abstract and contingent axes, a clo- sure of the interface, and a misalignment of projection. Theodicy arises when the moral imagination is closed, and suffering is treated as a problem to be explained rather than a condition of relation. Once the geometry is restored, theodicy dissolves — not because suffering is justified, but because the question itself is misaligned. In its place, invariant worth compels stewardship: the ethical response to suffering is not explanation, but care
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Theriault et al. (2026) studied this question.
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