“How can a loving God allow evil to exist?”
When I was in High School, I hung out with a group of agnostic friends. They knew I was a Christian, and they constantly attempted to shut down the way I understood reality. I used to be big into apologetics, and I was able to answer every question—or, rather, accusation—against Christianity that they proposed. Except one. “How can a loving God allow evil to exist?” There are a plethora of answers to this question, and it’s been a question that’s been wrestled with since the dawn of time. Even before God called Abraham, this question was dealt with in the ancient Near East. Judaism has wrestled with it. Christianity has wrestled with it. Zoroastrianism has wrestled with it. Islam has wrestled with it. Every ethical monotheistic religion has wrestled with it and continues to wrestle with it. I believe this is because the question is not one that can be answered adequately; while an answer may adequately fulfill the question in the intellectual realm, answers have failed to provide adequate emotional satisfaction. Thus when this question was proposed, I found myself able to spout off multiple answers, but I failed in the arena where it mattered much: personal existence. I do not claim to have the answer. It is one that I still struggle with, and one that I am quite confident of struggling with for the rest of my life. But there is a sense in which the question itself must be examined in order to understand what kind of answer is requested.
In conversation between two people with different metanarratives (worldviews, perspectives, or understandings of reality)—in this case, Christian theism (X) and Atheism/Agnosticism (Y)—there are barriers that must be broken down. Between X and Y, the question is often regarding the existence of God and the reality of evil in the world. This question—this barrier—is often poised as intellectual, but often the question is simply a way for Y to avoid God for personal issues (i.e. wanting a life of moral freedom and no restraint due to God’s existence and subsequent authority in the arena of moral life). The task of X is to discover the real barrier, and the discourse should involve both an intellectual and veiled personal barrier being present.
The question—“How can a loving God allow evil to exist?”—is a loaded question. No matter how you answer, you’re answer will not be adequate. If a loving God allows evil to exist, then He is not loving. If God does not allow evil to exist, then He is not all-powerful. In response to such a question—“How can a loving God allow evil to exist?”—perhaps our answer would best be, “There is no such God.” Because God is not only loving. When X is asked this question, X needs to rephrase the question and answer. This makes sense, because Y will not, in the majority of cases, understand X’s belief system more than X. The traditional question is too simplistic, such as, “Is light a particle or a wave?” It’s both. X’s response to Y’s question needs to clarify three points: 1. The True God, 2. The Identity of True Evil, and 3. The Nature of Bad Things. X must make the question fit the reality of evil. The question, if to be answered by X, needs to be true to X’s theological roots. For example, Y cannot ask X a question brought forth from a Hindu worldview. X must rephrase the question to be true to X’s theological framework. “But how do we do this?”
Perhaps we should first start off with, “Assume this with me…” This brings Y into X’s world, into the Christian theism perspective. It also mellows-out hostility or antagonism. It is then that we should begin to rephrase the question: “If God is X…” This assumes Christian theism and God’s existence. X stands for attributes or characteristics of God. This does not limit the question God’s love; it opens the door to the totality of God’s attributes and the integration of these attributes into an understanding of God’s nature. After all, attributes are simply descriptors—failing, at times—of God’s nature, and thus these descriptors are not independent of one another but combined in an elegant balance. These attributes are descriptors of a person, not a machine. To rephrase the question, we must affirm the EXISTENCE of God and the NATURE of God.
And then we continue rephrasing the question: “If God is X then how can He allow Evil, which is Y…” Y defines evil into two divisions: 1. Personal Evil (Satan, demons, etc.) and 2. Consequential Evil (real, genuine evil; and apparent evil, those things that are not really evil, but interpreted as Evil through human lens). There is a real and genuine evil that exists. This evil is what was seen in the Holocaust when Jewish children became blood factories for the Nazi army. It is seen in the present with what takes place on State Avenue, down the road from my house: 8-year-old girls being sold as prostitutes for $3 a piece. This is real, genuine Evil. But there is also Apparent Evil—things that are not evil but interpreted as such. For example, a cheetah tearing apart an antelope. “That’s evil!” we exclaim. No. It’s how God created things, and He declared it good in Genesis. There’s also the pain we feel when we step onto a rusted nail and it shoots through our foot and digs into the bone. The pain is immense, but it is not Evil. In answering this question, we must distinguish what Evil really is. That is what is at stake here: the identity of evil and God allowing it to exist. Ultimately, the key word here is Allow. God does not create evil, nor force it to happen, but He allows it to happen (which raises questions regarding theodicy, God’s justice; but I’m not going to deal with that right now).
Once X has identified Evil and emphasized that God allows it to exist, the rephrasing ought to continue. “If God is X, and He allows Evil, which is Y, to exist and prosper…” The issue is not merely the existence of Evil, but rather its prosperous, all-consuming nature. The prosperity of evil is evident en masse, and it is numbing and horrific. The prosperity of evil deals not with “bad things” or “misfortune”. Those are not evil. The prosperity of evil is seen in rape, murder, child molestation, sex trafficking, genocide… The list goes on and on. If we do not address the issue of evil’s prosperity, then we fail to answer the question.
The question continues to be rephrased: “If God is X, and He allows Evil, which is Y, to exist and prosper, then how can He still be worthy of Z?” Z here refers to that which God demands of His creation: adoration, devotion, dedication, commitment, service, loyalty, honor, praise, worship, dignity, thanks. The list goes on and on. This is the biggest part of the question. “Sure,” Y might say, “God exists, and sure, He may allow Evil to exist and prosper… but why give Him Z?” This question MUST be answered.
Rephrasing of the question is often shocking to Y, because Y wishes to stump or embarrass X, and X proceeds to complicate and exacerbate the problem! “In complicating the question, in making it more severe, how then do we answer it?” This post is already way too long. If you’re actually reading this part (unless you’ve skipped down to the last paragraph after seeing the breadth of the post), good for you! So I’m not going to propose any answers right now. I’m going to leave that for later. This is a really big question, and it deserves an adequate answer. If you have any comments, feel free to leave them. If you don’t agree with me, that’s totally fine. Christians all across the world, all across the span of church history, have disagreed with one another on this subject. Why not continue the heritage?
When I was in High School, I hung out with a group of agnostic friends. They knew I was a Christian, and they constantly attempted to shut down the way I understood reality. I used to be big into apologetics, and I was able to answer every question—or, rather, accusation—against Christianity that they proposed. Except one. “How can a loving God allow evil to exist?” There are a plethora of answers to this question, and it’s been a question that’s been wrestled with since the dawn of time. Even before God called Abraham, this question was dealt with in the ancient Near East. Judaism has wrestled with it. Christianity has wrestled with it. Zoroastrianism has wrestled with it. Islam has wrestled with it. Every ethical monotheistic religion has wrestled with it and continues to wrestle with it. I believe this is because the question is not one that can be answered adequately; while an answer may adequately fulfill the question in the intellectual realm, answers have failed to provide adequate emotional satisfaction. Thus when this question was proposed, I found myself able to spout off multiple answers, but I failed in the arena where it mattered much: personal existence. I do not claim to have the answer. It is one that I still struggle with, and one that I am quite confident of struggling with for the rest of my life. But there is a sense in which the question itself must be examined in order to understand what kind of answer is requested.
In conversation between two people with different metanarratives (worldviews, perspectives, or understandings of reality)—in this case, Christian theism (X) and Atheism/Agnosticism (Y)—there are barriers that must be broken down. Between X and Y, the question is often regarding the existence of God and the reality of evil in the world. This question—this barrier—is often poised as intellectual, but often the question is simply a way for Y to avoid God for personal issues (i.e. wanting a life of moral freedom and no restraint due to God’s existence and subsequent authority in the arena of moral life). The task of X is to discover the real barrier, and the discourse should involve both an intellectual and veiled personal barrier being present.
The question—“How can a loving God allow evil to exist?”—is a loaded question. No matter how you answer, you’re answer will not be adequate. If a loving God allows evil to exist, then He is not loving. If God does not allow evil to exist, then He is not all-powerful. In response to such a question—“How can a loving God allow evil to exist?”—perhaps our answer would best be, “There is no such God.” Because God is not only loving. When X is asked this question, X needs to rephrase the question and answer. This makes sense, because Y will not, in the majority of cases, understand X’s belief system more than X. The traditional question is too simplistic, such as, “Is light a particle or a wave?” It’s both. X’s response to Y’s question needs to clarify three points: 1. The True God, 2. The Identity of True Evil, and 3. The Nature of Bad Things. X must make the question fit the reality of evil. The question, if to be answered by X, needs to be true to X’s theological roots. For example, Y cannot ask X a question brought forth from a Hindu worldview. X must rephrase the question to be true to X’s theological framework. “But how do we do this?”
Perhaps we should first start off with, “Assume this with me…” This brings Y into X’s world, into the Christian theism perspective. It also mellows-out hostility or antagonism. It is then that we should begin to rephrase the question: “If God is X…” This assumes Christian theism and God’s existence. X stands for attributes or characteristics of God. This does not limit the question God’s love; it opens the door to the totality of God’s attributes and the integration of these attributes into an understanding of God’s nature. After all, attributes are simply descriptors—failing, at times—of God’s nature, and thus these descriptors are not independent of one another but combined in an elegant balance. These attributes are descriptors of a person, not a machine. To rephrase the question, we must affirm the EXISTENCE of God and the NATURE of God.
And then we continue rephrasing the question: “If God is X then how can He allow Evil, which is Y…” Y defines evil into two divisions: 1. Personal Evil (Satan, demons, etc.) and 2. Consequential Evil (real, genuine evil; and apparent evil, those things that are not really evil, but interpreted as Evil through human lens). There is a real and genuine evil that exists. This evil is what was seen in the Holocaust when Jewish children became blood factories for the Nazi army. It is seen in the present with what takes place on State Avenue, down the road from my house: 8-year-old girls being sold as prostitutes for $3 a piece. This is real, genuine Evil. But there is also Apparent Evil—things that are not evil but interpreted as such. For example, a cheetah tearing apart an antelope. “That’s evil!” we exclaim. No. It’s how God created things, and He declared it good in Genesis. There’s also the pain we feel when we step onto a rusted nail and it shoots through our foot and digs into the bone. The pain is immense, but it is not Evil. In answering this question, we must distinguish what Evil really is. That is what is at stake here: the identity of evil and God allowing it to exist. Ultimately, the key word here is Allow. God does not create evil, nor force it to happen, but He allows it to happen (which raises questions regarding theodicy, God’s justice; but I’m not going to deal with that right now).
Once X has identified Evil and emphasized that God allows it to exist, the rephrasing ought to continue. “If God is X, and He allows Evil, which is Y, to exist and prosper…” The issue is not merely the existence of Evil, but rather its prosperous, all-consuming nature. The prosperity of evil is evident en masse, and it is numbing and horrific. The prosperity of evil deals not with “bad things” or “misfortune”. Those are not evil. The prosperity of evil is seen in rape, murder, child molestation, sex trafficking, genocide… The list goes on and on. If we do not address the issue of evil’s prosperity, then we fail to answer the question.
The question continues to be rephrased: “If God is X, and He allows Evil, which is Y, to exist and prosper, then how can He still be worthy of Z?” Z here refers to that which God demands of His creation: adoration, devotion, dedication, commitment, service, loyalty, honor, praise, worship, dignity, thanks. The list goes on and on. This is the biggest part of the question. “Sure,” Y might say, “God exists, and sure, He may allow Evil to exist and prosper… but why give Him Z?” This question MUST be answered.
Rephrasing of the question is often shocking to Y, because Y wishes to stump or embarrass X, and X proceeds to complicate and exacerbate the problem! “In complicating the question, in making it more severe, how then do we answer it?” This post is already way too long. If you’re actually reading this part (unless you’ve skipped down to the last paragraph after seeing the breadth of the post), good for you! So I’m not going to propose any answers right now. I’m going to leave that for later. This is a really big question, and it deserves an adequate answer. If you have any comments, feel free to leave them. If you don’t agree with me, that’s totally fine. Christians all across the world, all across the span of church history, have disagreed with one another on this subject. Why not continue the heritage?
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