God and Suffering

by AK - Jeff 322 Replies latest watchtower beliefs

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  designs

  Burn,

  Wouldn't you think that most here have studied, intensely, theology and philosophy from many schools of thought.

  Humanities progress has meant evaluating the big Its and What Ifs. Ancient cultures thought God or the Gods inflicted harm or rewarded behaviors. Natural disasters had the accompanying belief the God(s) were angry. Now many just see nature being nature. This does not mean that no Supreme Being exists it simply means that the ancient ways are giving way to the ever expanding Age of Reason.

  Shalon aleichem
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  BurnTheShips

  I'd still like to hear from AK-Jeff.

  BTS
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  zoiks

  Wow, there sure is a lot of disagreement in this thread... I love it! People who don't even come close to seeing eye-to-eye, having it out. Calling each other out, some good arguments, some not so good, some pure drivel. I am glad to have found this group, where people who were formerly not allowed to have their own true opinions can voice what they really think.

  Some are looking for answers. Others are satisfied that they have answers. Disagreement is allowed. No WTS control here, just pure humanity - beautiful, ugly, filthy, glorious.

  For the moment, I'll keep my opinion on the subject of good and evil and god to myself...
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  AllTimeJeff

  I know this is a sensitive subject, because a question will always threaten belief when an apparent answer doesn't exist.

  When I say, apparent answer, it means one that is obvious and that doesn't require an interpretation.

  So tell me God loves me, because your holy book says so. I at best can only take your word for it, because I have no evidence of a personality showing love. God sure is leaving you all in the lurch.

  So for my theistic friends, I say, whatever works for you, thats great. I truly don't mean to mock your beliefs.

  But I am wondering that age old question, one that to me is the essential question, "Where is god?"

  That is very deep, I don't even mean to discuss it here to hijack this thread. But I would like to point out a couple of observations, so hopefully that some more reasonable god fearing people can understand the angst and the anger at "god".

  First of all, God is not doing a thing. God is being defended by you. A person, a non godlike one. Which leads me to wonder, are you defending your idea and worldview because they are so important to you that you cannot consider questions because they could shake your belief?

  Perry, when I see you jump from being a JW to your now stated beliefs, I question you only on the certitude you display and lack of respect for other people's questions and beliefs. I question you because you don't in any of your comments empathize with those who question or their reasons why. You argue as if we are arguing over the color of a piece of furniture we are both staring at, instead of the abstract argument of "god's love" and the question of suffering and evil. These aren't subjects that have questions with a simple yes or no answer.

  And honestly Perry, you are defending god, and you are defending your beliefs, but you most certainly haven't proven anything. I must point out, God is leaving you out to dry, just like so many others. In all of the debates you involve yourself in, you fail to prove anything regarding your beliefs, other then you seem damned determined to point out that everyone is wrong for not believing in god/Jesus the way you do.

  Honestly Perry, do I have to take your word for it? Because thats all you offer is your testimony, your word, your explanation, your interpretation. Thats all you got.

  I read AK Jeff's subjects with great interest, as they are close to my heart. I usually have little to offer in the way of a solid direction or answer, and I sense AK Jeff that you are on your own quest, and use this board to work some things out for yourself. If I am wrong, I am probably projecting, because when I start threads like this for discussions and debates, that I what I try to do. I find your questions rational and relevant, and I wish for you at some point in your life the peace that you deserve to have, even if that peace involves laying down the question for a while.
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  BurnTheShips

  If sky-daddy is really there - his sense of justice is all screwed up isn't it? Oh, that's right, I am like a little child that can't understand. I keep forgetting.

  Why do we suffer, if in fact, an omnipotent, omnibenevolent God actually exists?

  Is it credible that such suffering should be necessary for us? There are two choices. Suffering does occur. If it is unnecessary, then there is no God, or God is not omnibenevolent. But if there is a good God, then somehow these sufferings are necessary. Because no being, even if only moderately good, would allow or inflict such sufferings as befall us.

  If we proceed on the basis that God exists, then only two possibilities: either God is wrong or we are. Either these sufferings are not necessary (or good) or they are. Either we do not need them and yet God allows them, in which case he is either evil or weak or stupid, or we do need them, in which case "all things work together for good to them that love God, to them who are the called according to his purpose". All things includes even the most horrendous and inexplicable tragedies.

  I am speaking as a Christian when I say that we live by faith, not by sight. If we live by sight, we will probably conclude when tragedy strikes, "So that’s what God is like. Let's not decieve ourselves any longer." If we live by faith, by trust, we will conclude that God is the one who knows what is good for us and that we are the ones who don’t, rather than vice versa.

  Is that an unreasonable conclusion?

  In my opinion, suffering is the only credible argument that atheists point to as a refutation of God. Seriously. The only one. And I am not talking about suffering brought about by our own actions, by the way, but truly undeserved suffering. Atheists are human beings, and as such they desire good, and that desire makes them feel disgust when they see undeserved suffering in the world.

  You are hungry. There is food. You are thirsty, there is water. You are lonely, there is companionship. You are tired, there is sleep. You are bored, there is stimulating activity. You have sexual needs, there is also an outlet. For every innate human desire, there is an object that satisfies it.

  But why do we desire perfect goodness? But why do we hate its opposite: evil (and on what basis do we decide what is good and what is evil anyway)? Why do we protest tragedy? Why does injustice disgust us? Why do we innately desire goodness without limit, and hate evil, no matter how insignificant? Even in this world, there is a lot of goodness. But finite goodness isn't enough for us. Our desire is for infinite goodness. No matter how beautiful we find the world to be, we are not satisfied, we want NO evil or suffering, in any way shape or form.

  If we conclude that every innate human desire corresponds to a real object, and that we have an innate desire for unlimited good, then there must be an object of that desire. B ut why do you desire something that doesn't exist? Infinite goodness must exist. But what is infinite good, or rather to use a synonym: omnibenevolence?

  BTS
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  BurnTheShips

  AK-Jeff.

  I'd also like to add, that it is possible that God is not, in effect, omnipotent. In creating beings capable of free will, he has created a domain where he willingly has ceded control. We make our choices. They are ours.

  This is a repost from an old thread I posted on after the Myanmar cyclone spurred the same kinds of questions that the Haitian earthquake does. It never seems to generate a response however. I repost it in hopes that one day it might actually lead to a discussion:

  ....I am thinking that yes they are compromised--at least from our perspective. It depends on how we define omnipotence:

  1. Y is absolutely omnipotent means that Y "can do everything absolutely. Everything that can be expressed in a string of words even if it can be shown to be self-contradictory," Y "is not bound in action, as we are in thought by the laws of logic."[9] This position is advanced by Descartes. It has the theological advantage of making God prior to the laws of logic, but the theological disadvantage of making God's promises suspect. On this account, the omnipotence paradox is a genuine paradox, but genuine paradoxes might nonetheless be so.
  2. Y is omnipotent means "Y can do X" is true if and only if X is a logically consistent description of a state of affairs. This position was once advocated by Thomas Aquinas.[11] This definition of omnipotence solves some of the paradoxes associated with omnipotence, but some modern formulations of the paradox still work against this definition. Let X = "to make something that its maker cannot lift". As Mavrodes points out there is nothing logically contradictory about this; a man could, for example, make a boat which he could not lift.[12] It would be strange if humans could accomplish this feat, but an omnipotent being could not. Additionally, this definition has problems when X is morally or physically untenable for a being like God.
  3. Y is omnipotent means "Y can do X" is true if and only if "Y does X" is logically consistent. Here the idea is to exclude actions which would be inconsistent for Y to do but might be consistent for others. Again sometimes it looks as if Aquinas takes this position.[13] Here Mavrodes' worry about X= "to make something its maker cannot lift" will no longer be a problem because "God does X" is not logically consistent. However, this account may still have problems with moral issues like X = "tells a lie" or temporal issues like X = "brings it about that Rome was never founded."[9]
  4. Y is omnipotent means whenever "Y will bring about X" is logically possible, then "Y can bring about X" is true. This sense, also does not allow the paradox of omnipotence to arise, and unlike definition #3 avoids any temporal worries about whether or not an omnipotent being could change the past. However, Geach criticizes even this sense of omnipotence as misunderstanding the nature of God's promises.[9]
  5. Y is almighty means that Y is not just more powerful than any creature; no creature can compete with Y in power, even unsuccessfully.[9] In this account nothing like the omnipotence paradox arises, but perhaps that is because God is not taken to be in any sense omnipotent. On the other hand, Anselm of Canterbury seems to think that almightiness is one of the things that makes God count as omnipotent.[14]

  If God ordained Free Will, he ordained a domain where he cannot act by definition.

  It seems to me that it must be true that either God cannot or will not exert his power in the context of Free Will:

  If cannot, because Free Will cannot be forced and remain Free or a Will at all---it is because it is a logical impossibility, and logic binds even God on this plane, and he cannot make a square circle.

  If will not, it is because the violation of Free Will would be a greater evil than any suffering it would relieve. In which case we should be grateful despite doloris, as we live in the best of all possible worlds, in which we can be divine within our own domains of the Will. Perhaps even suffering has a salvific power that is not immediately evident to us, but I digress.

  Regarding natural evils, we only know how we would act in a given situation. If two men see a robbery in progress, and they vary among themselves in power, goodness and knowledge, it is reasonable to surmise that they will act differently. Let's assume equal power and goodness between the two characters but a variance in knowledge. The first man might know that he can easily wrestle the armed robber to the ground and defuse the threat. The second might know the same, but he also knows that the robber has a semtex belt and would choose to self detonate if he is physically restrained. The first man would take action, and the second would not.

  My point is that we cannot know how an omnibenevolent, omniscient, omnipotent being should act without being all these things ourselves. How does such a being respond to a natural evil like the Myanmar disaster? We cannot know that a OOO being would prevent such a thing, we cannot even know the probability of such an action. Only human hubris could assume to know such a thing. The OOO being knows about the semtex belt. The human cannot.

  BTS
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  AllTimeJeff

  If we proceed on the basis that God exists, then only two possibilities: either God is wrong or we are.

  Hey BTS, I promise you that you and I won't be arguing or debating tonight. I don't want to. However, I would like to respectfully disagree with your entire last response based on the false dilema you have presented.

  First, we do not have to proceed on the basis that God exists. If we do, we must have some evidence not of a creater, but of a personality.

  I have evidence that the builder built my house, I have no idea if he loves me or cares about my suffering.

  So if you want to say "I believe in creation and in it, I see god." Great. Doesn't mean he cares.

  Secondly, and I can't stress this enough, God is silent. BTS, you are doing God's talking via your defense, via the raising of doubt in what I think are legitimate questions.

  And what if "we" are wrong. How are "we" wrong? Everytime someone asks "Where is god?" the answer is complicated, abstract theoligcal explanations based on scrolls dating thousands of years old, and you wonder why "we" pull out our hair at the dialouge.

  Having said that, I have had my say. I do understand why many do put faith in god, and it isn't my point to dissuade you. What I take exception to is the efforts to dissuade AK Jeff, myself and others, as if we are just clearly missing something so obvious, when your answer is in fact the last thing from obvious.

  Anyway, thats all I wanted to say. I find the theological aspects on the subject evil and the existence of god fascinating, and I read it frequently. However, if one were to be honest, then one would have to conclude that answers are not readily available to point to.

  If its complicated, that only tells me, that the answer isn't really an answer.
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  bohm

  BTS: If we conclude that every innate human desire corresponds to a real object, and that we have an innate desire for unlimited good, then there must be an object of that desire

  Yes IF we conclude that. But so far no proof, only a handfull of examples. Here are some counterexamples: If a kid had an innate desire for a cake the size of germany, would there exist such a cake? what about Santaclaus? If and mathematican had an innate desire for a general algebraic solution to 5'th order polynomials, would that mean it existed? (mathematicans did have such a desire for centuries untill Galois came along...) and if i have an innate desire for funny stuff, does that mean there is an ultimate 'funnygod'?
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  cofty

  I appreciate your thoughtful approach to this topic BTS

  For me it just does not seem possible that suffering is, in some way we cannot understand, for our good. It sounds like an idea that works in theory, it may sound convincing in theology class, but faced with actual pain in the real world it stretches credibility beyond breaking point.

  If suffering is under god's control then the sum total of physical and emotional pain in the world must be precisely what he has deemed necessary for our good. No more and no less. When faced with actual examples of suffering, however horrendous, we should thank god for the generous gift of pain he has imposed on the hapless victim and for the emotional distress of their loved ones because it is all part of gods perfect and inscrutable plan for our benefit.

  OR

  We could simply conclude that shit happens.

  I really don't mean to be sarcastic, I understand what you say about faith but as somebody who decided that faith was not a virtue after all, it does sound like whistling in the dark.

  Do we have a desire for "unlimited good"? I need to think more about this.
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  leavingwt

  OR

  We could simply conclude that shit happens.

  Works for me.