Why does God allow evil, pain, disaster, etc.

[JMan]

I found this series of videos interesting and insightful. See what you think.

YouTube - Greg Koukl - If God is all-powerful, why does evil exist?

[SonoranBob]

Originally Posted by JMan

I found this series of videos interesting and insightful. See what you think.

YouTube - Greg Koukl - If God is all-powerful, why does evil exist?

It's a pretty standard line of Christian rationalization: free will necessitates evil, and evil can't be removed from the world without removing free will and turning us into automatons.

I consider that a false dichotomy. I can't remove all the evil in the world either, and perhaps in a sense not any of it. But I have on many occasions protected my children from the consequences of specific evils, because I loved them and did not want them to suffer. I provided for their needs when they weren't able to do so for themselves, so that they did not starve or come to other kinds of harm because of their inability to take care of themselves.

God is presented as a "heavenly father" and part of the pitch is all that a loving father implies -- protection, guidance, patient mentoring, etc. He could very well be that to us if he chose to, without removing one iota of free will from the world. This is what might be called "grace" or "mercy". God is supposed, after all to be gracious and merciful.

He doesn't play the role of father, though, at least not in any systematic, reliable sense. For some people I have known, he doesn't seem to do it at all, and in fact seems to have abandoned them to some sort of doom.

You can have a couple of different basic reactions to that. One is to be angry that god can get away with action or inaction for which you and I would be rightly held accountable at law, were we to so treat our own children. The other is to change your understanding of god. I've chosen to do the latter. Indeed, I see no viable alternative.

If you choose to continue believing in anything resembling the god of Christianity, you could say that God is not at all interested in our happiness or security, but in the growth of our souls. This is the position of the more mystical thinkers in Christianity, and it is not very different from Buddhism. Or you can say, like Spinoza, that god neither loves nor hates us, but is indifferent, and chooses because of [fill in your favorite reason here] to just be indifferent and not engage us. The various "life is a schoolhouse" ideas fit in with this. Such a god has made no promises, declared no love, and staked no claim on us. The universe is an impersonal machine designed, perhaps, to gradually raise our awareness and teach us things that will eventually promote us to a higher level of existence. Or perhaps, it just "is" and there's no particular purpose to it other than some general evolutionary impulse.

Or you can, as I have, chose to just say you don't understand it, and aren't sure it's even important to. If it was important to god, he's perfectly capable of making what the heck he wants crystal clear. This view of life can take an absurdist turn, where you can't but laugh at life, or it can, as it does with me, take more of an approach that most of what passes for god in this world is my and other people's projections of him because we don't really have hard info, and quite possibly, don't have the intellectual or sensory equipment to begin to accurately perceive something as vast as god. For practical purposes, it doesn't matter if god exists or what he is like because he's going to do (or not) what he does (or not) regardless of what we think he should do (or not), and we are going to always be the blind men feeling the elephant's leg or trunk and coming up with our conflicting interpretations of what the elephant is really like.

That is my working theory. Partly it is borne out of mental and spiritual fatigue. I've considered these questions for three decades and basically gotten nowhere certain with it. I have to conclude that we aren't supposed or at least don't need to know much. What reinforces this for me is the observation that the more detailed and dogmatic a person's belief about god, the stranger both the belief and the person tend to become.

I can't tell you what a burden it has taken off me to just let it all go. And some would say that letting go of certitude and illusions and desires is exactly the point of life and the wellspring of meaningful growth.

--Bob

[Maguru]

Originally Posted by SonoranBob

It's a pretty standard line of Christian rationalization: free will necessitates evil, and evil can't be removed from the world without removing free will and turning us into automatons.

I consider that a false dichotomy. I can't remove all the evil in the world either, and perhaps in a sense not any of it. But I have on many occasions protected my children from the consequences of specific evils, because I loved them and did not want them to suffer. I provided for their needs when they weren't able to do so for themselves, so that they did not starve or come to other kinds of harm because of their inability to take care of themselves.

God is presented as a "heavenly father" and part of the pitch is all that a loving father implies -- protection, guidance, patient mentoring, etc. He could very well be that to us if he chose to, without removing one iota of free will from the world. This is what might be called "grace" or "mercy". God is supposed, after all to be gracious and merciful.

He doesn't play the role of father, though, at least not in any systematic, reliable sense. For some people I have known, he doesn't seem to do it at all, and in fact seems to have abandoned them to some sort of doom.

You can have a couple of different basic reactions to that. One is to be angry that god can get away with action or inaction for which you and I would be rightly held accountable at law, were we to so treat our own children. The other is to change your understanding of god. I've chosen to do the latter. Indeed, I see no viable alternative.

If you choose to continue believing in anything resembling the god of Christianity, you could say that God is not at all interested in our happiness or security, but in the growth of our souls. This is the position of the more mystical thinkers in Christianity, and it is not very different from Buddhism. Or you can say, like Spinoza, that god neither loves nor hates us, but is indifferent, and chooses because of [fill in your favorite reason here] to just be indifferent and not engage us. The various "life is a schoolhouse" ideas fit in with this. Such a god has made no promises, declared no love, and staked no claim on us. The universe is an impersonal machine designed, perhaps, to gradually raise our awareness and teach us things that will eventually promote us to a higher level of existence. Or perhaps, it just "is" and there's no particular purpose to it other than some general evolutionary impulse.

Or you can, as I have, chose to just say you don't understand it, and aren't sure it's even important to. If it was important to god, he's perfectly capable of making what the heck he wants crystal clear. This view of life can take an absurdist turn, where you can't but laugh at life, or it can, as it does with me, take more of an approach that most of what passes for god in this world is my and other people's projections of him because we don't really have hard info, and quite possibly, don't have the intellectual or sensory equipment to begin to accurately perceive something as vast as god. For practical purposes, it doesn't matter if god exists or what he is like because he's going to do (or not) what he does (or not) regardless of what we think he should do (or not), and we are going to always be the blind men feeling the elephant's leg or trunk and coming up with our conflicting interpretations of what the elephant is really like.

That is my working theory. Partly it is borne out of mental and spiritual fatigue. I've considered these questions for three decades and basically gotten nowhere certain with it. I have to conclude that we aren't supposed or at least don't need to know much. What reinforces this for me is the observation that the more detailed and dogmatic a person's belief about god, the stranger both the belief and the person tend to become.

I can't tell you what a burden it has taken off me to just let it all go. And some would say that letting go of certitude and illusions and desires is exactly the point of life and the wellspring of meaningful growth.

--Bob

I believe free will gives us the choice of removing evil. The problem lies in not recognizing evil. It comes in many subtle forms seeming to do no harm, e.g judgment and secrets, punishment and reward. Very few can or have recognized their own evil. Those who do are judged and condemned perpetuating the very evil it tries to destroy. God help us

[Acting Like Godot]

Originally Posted by SonoranBob

It's a pretty standard line of Christian rationalization: free will necessitates evil, and evil can't be removed from the world without removing free will and turning us into automatons.

I think that this free will concept needs to be examined more closely. I believe that while human beings possess the capacity for free will, how much free will they actually have is another question.

For example, suppose a person is addicted to XYZ and doesn't want to be. If he truly has free will, he should be able to just STOP doing it. On the other hand, we know that in practice, it doesn't quite work that way.

Naturally this goes far beyond what we normally think of as "addictions" - that is, observable physical habits such as smoking; drug abuse; alcohol abuse etc. It also concerns, for example, our personality. By nature, you may be a quiet, morose person. You would like to be a cheerful, happy person. Are you able to exert your free will and just change your personality? Nahh. It's not quite so simple.

The reason why it doesn't work that way is that human beings are habit-forming creatures. To put it another way, we are the puppets of our karma. We mostly operate according to our past conditioning.

Thus we have very limited free will.

Thus when you say that free will necessitates evil, I don't entirely agree. I believe instead that MOST people would NOT choose evil, if indeed they were able to make a conscious choice. HOWEVER, because most people are largely unconscious and unable to freely choose their own thoughts, deeds and behaviour, evil may result.

The route to increasing your own free will is meditation. I would explain this further, but then those who meditate already know what I mean. Meditation makes you less reactive; allows you to see that you are not your own thoughts; enables you to operate from a deeper place of calm and peace, where you are much less easily a victim of your own impulses.

It is as if the universe slowed down for you, and you are much more able to pick and choose your own reactions to it.

And when I am much more able to pick and choose my own reactions, I always end up choosing reactions with more love / humour / joy / light-heartedness / kindness / compassion etc.

Because .... if you were truly able to choose .... if you truly had free will ..... why would you ever choose something like anger / hate / frustration, over, say, love / joy / peace?

[eskimo]

I think the spiritual realm and karma can explain pretty much every philosophical and ideological construct people have tossed around on this issue.

But a square circle

[andrew]

Or possibly until you realize there's *really* no such thing as absolute good or evil. It's subjective.

Or possibly that dualism is just big cosmic game that we choose to take part in.

[SonoranBob]

Originally Posted by andrew

Or possibly until you realize there's *really* no such thing as absolute good or evil. It's subjective.

Or possibly that dualism is just big cosmic game that we choose to take part in.

Absolute good and evil no longer interest me because even if they exist they are not sustainably achievable in any meaningful way.

At the other end of the spectrum, I can stop judging everything that happens to me as good or bad and just sit with whatever pain or pleasure comes my way. In doing so, one finds that in general neither pain nor pleasure are as intense or enduring as one would expect.

You can also usually choose not to play aspects of the game where the cost / benefit ratio is sufficiently unfavorable. Doing that teaches you that you don't need all the things you thought you did to be happy. Much of our suffering and calamity comes from having overly complicated and/or overly manic lives, and insisting on doing the same things over and over again because they "should" or "must" work.

I don't buy that you can transcend all pain or even avoid turning any pain into suffering. You can, however, come pretty darn close if you are willing to take pain and suffering as information and adjust your life accordingly.

--Bob

[SonoranBob]

Originally Posted by Acting Like Godot

I think that this free will concept needs to be examined more closely. I believe that while human beings possess the capacity for free will, how much free will they actually have is another question.

Just to clarify, I was stating the Christian position about free will and its relationship to evil, not agreeing with it.

Personally I believe that we have both less and more free will than we think.

--Bob