GOD, EVIL, AND SUFFERING QUESTIONING GOD: WEEK 2
STEPHEN FRY ON GOD DISCUSS…
STATING THE OBJECTION God either wishes to take away evils, and is unable; or he is able and unwilling; or he is neither willing nor able, or he is both willing and able. (Epicurus) 1. If willing + unable à à feeble God 2. If able + unwilling à à evil God 3. If unwilling + unable à à feeble + evil 4. If willing + able, which alone is suitable for God, the what is the source of evil?
BAD SOLUTIONS 1. Limiting the power of God 2. Limiting the goodness of God 3. Denial of evil
WHAT CHRISTIANS BELIEVE 1. Creation was good 2. God is not the cause of evil 3. Evil is not a thing or substance 4. Humans rebelled against God, resulting in moral and natural evil
STILL… Why would God allow the creation of a world which might fall? God must have a sufficient reason for allowing evil. Is there such a sufficient reason?
TWO DEFENSES 1. Free will defense 2. The greater-good defense
BEYOND JUST A RATIONAL DEFENSE… Job and God: ‘Where were you when I laid the foundations of the earth?’ Luke 13:2-5: ‘unless you repent you will all perish’ Matthew 27:46: ‘My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?’ 1 Corinthians 15:52-57: the power and hope of the resurrection ‘Where, O death, is your victory? Where, O death, is your sting?’
ALBERT CAMUS [Christ] the god-man suffers too, with patience. Evil and death can no longer be entirely imputed to him since he suffers and dies. The night on Golgotha is so important in the history of man only because, in its shadows, the divinity ostensibly abandoned its traditional privilege, and lived through to the end, despair included, the agony of death. Thus is explained the “Lama sabachtani” and the frightful doubt of Christ in agony.’
C. S. LEWIS My argument against God was that the universe seemed so cruel and unjust. But how had I got this idea of “just” and “unjust”? … What was I comparing this universe with then I called it unjust? … Of course I could have given up my idea of justice by saying it was nothing but a private idea of my own. But if I did that, then my argument against God collapsed too – for the argument depended on saying that the world was really unjust, not simply that it did not happen to please my private fancies … . Consequently atheism turns out to be too simple.
C. S. LEWIS Could there really be any such thing as horrifying wickedness [if there were no God and we just evolved]? I don’t see how. There can be such a thing only of there is a way that rational creatures are supposed to live, obliged to live … A [secular] way of looking at the world has no place for genuine moral obligation of any sort … and thus no way to say there is such a thing as genuine and appalling wickedness. Accordingly, if you think there really is such a thing as horrifying wickedness (and not just an illusion of some sort), then you have a powerful argument [for the reality of God].
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