God's Problem or Ours?

It is difficult to imagine a more relevant question than that of the problem of evil and suffering in the world. Whose problem it is, however, is not as clearly established as the existence of the problem itself. But, University of North Carolina religion professor, Bart D. Ehrman, believes it is God's problem, that it is the most important question facing man, and he believes he can demonstrate that the Bible fails to provide an answer to the problem. He confronts this task in his most recent book, God's Problem: How the Bible Fails to Answer Our Most Important Question--Why We Suffer.

I was introduced to the work of Professor Ehrman, one of America's foremost textual critics today, a while back when I read his book Lost Christianities: The Battles for Scripture and the Faiths We Never Knew. While I found the central thesis of that book completely unpersuasive, Ehrman struck me as a sincere and serious scholar. But, what fascinates me most about his previous work (he is a prolific writer), and his latest book, is how reflective it is of a soul who simply cannot seem to shake his religious imprint no matter how hard he tries.

A former evangelical from a somewhat fundamentalist background, with a mother who remains devout in her faith, Ehrman underwent a crisis of belief and eventually abandoned his Christian faith. Nothing noteworthy there. It happens to some, and Ehrman is certainly not the first or last professor who gains a PhD and loses his religion. But, what I do find interesting is the fact that Professor Ehrman, who rejects Christian faith and the authority of Christian Revelation, devotes so much of his scholarship to the refutation of Christian claims by means of Christian Revelation (the Bible). 

Now, how does that work? How is it that one can demonstrate empirically the falseness of a religion, the truths of which its adherents have for 2000 years asserted are a matter of faith? While it may be possible to establish that a religious claim is contrary to reason, how is it that one proves that evil/suffering is God's problem and the Bible demonstrates that--while at the same time rejecting the Christian God and the Bible as an authoritative source for anything? While perhaps not on par with the question of evil and suffering, I find Professor Ehrman's approach equally perplexing. Peter Kreeft's words may have some application here: "The reason for unbelief is an unfaithful lover, not an inadequate hypothesis. The unbeliever's problem is not just a soft head but a hard heart."

Nonetheless, God's Problem is well written and evil and suffering in the world does indeed appear irrational. The latter is why I am a bit puzzled at what Professor Ehrman thinks he actually achieves when he carefully goes about proving that the Bible nowhere gives a satisfactory explanation of why a benevolent God would allow suffering (caused by human behavior or nature) in the world. Isn't all one is really left with after such a scholarly exercise is the distinct possibility that the Bible doesn't purport to provide a satisfactory answer to that question? Moreover, a satisfactory explanation to whom? I thought it was God's problem, and if an explanation is satisfactory to Him, isn't that enough? Must it be explained to the satisfaction of humans by means of the Bible?

I don't mean to make light of the problem of suffering and I would very much like to understand it better than I do. That's why, while I appreciate the effort, I cannot appreciate misdirected attempts to resolve the problem. A person who is relieved at having abandoned his Christian faith, whether an agnostic or an atheist, can't be expected to be of much help in understanding the mysteries of Christian faith that may only be understood by faith. Certain questions, like the existence of God, demand a strictly philosophical answer before a proper theological application can be made. Any person who sincerely approaches the question of God's existence philosophically and thereafter remains either an agnostic or atheist is not going to have much in the way of sound Christian theological applications to make about God or His mysterious ways. Theological truth is primary, but unattainable, in significant part, by the uninitiated. 

For an intriguing explanation by Professor Ehrman of how the problem of suffering ultimately ruined his faith, see this link. I find it intriguing because it seems to illustrate the very phenomena I note above--the further one drifts from faith the less clear and reasonable Christian explanations and Christian revelation appear. Makes sense to me. 

Comments

[R.]

Thank you for this post.

[Beau Baez]

But have the adherents of Christianity asserted that faith is the only way of proving the truths of Christianity? If I understand correctly, there were those in the University of Paris (and elsewhere) in the Midddle Ages that attempted to understand the truths of scripture using reason. This is what led to the controversy between Abelard and Bernard. Not that Abelard and others rejected faith, but they believed that a rational answer to Christian truths could be proven (i.e., there is no distinction between Christian truth and truth--"all truth is God's truth").

[BWG]

B:

We'd likely find ourselves in agreement on this matter. While Abelard was a bit heterodox on a number of theological issues, with respect to the relationship between faith and reason, he simply gave full scope to the use of reason in explaining and defending faith. And, in this respect he was no innovator during his time. But, he was among the consensus of the day in believing that truths of the faith were not accessible by reason alone. They come by means of revelation.

Professor Ehrman's approach is far from Abelard or any other of the Scholastics, who were Christians who indeed believed reason was to be used in understanding and explaining the faith. Ehrman is a man who, admittedly, has no faith--denies it to be precise--and nonetheless purports to explain the meaning of sacred text and sacred mysteries. That approach is more akin to rationalistic dissection of faith than it is to using one's reason to understand faith.

As for the adage "there is no distinction between Christian truth and truth--'all truth is God's truth'", I am not sure I find it that helpful. If truth is the correspondence of the mind with reality, it is certainly accurate then that, strictly speaking, there is no uniquely "Christian truth." Just truth, and, in that sense, there is no distinction. But, if one speaks of the means by which truth may be found, there is a distinction. Some truths are discovered only through revelation (e.g., the Trinity), while others may be discovered through the exercise of reason (e.g., I am human; there is a Supreme Power/God).

I believe Abelard and St. Bernard would have been in agreement with all this--more or less. But, they likely would have articulated it much better.

Regards, BWG

[Anthony]

Thanks for another excellent post and for the insights into both Professor Ehrman's approach and into the methodology we use to examine the question of suffering. I generally don't leave comments because this blog gets my thoughts flowing so much that I find it hard to be brief! But this time I can't resist. I agree that the question of why we suffer is probably the most difficult question for a person of faith. The way I approach questions of faith has been profoundly affected by the fact that the most plausible answer to the question of suffering that I have found so far is also the one that has been the most challenging - precisely because it has forced me to reckon with the idea that the way God has planned things is supremely perfect, and therefore any problems I have with accepting His planning are really weaknesses in my faith or my submission to His supremacy over all things. This has forced me to reconsider how I approach a lot of questions about life and faith, and to examine my preconceptions.

I think that a lot of people who ponder this question, whether believers or skeptics, do so with an almost implicit assumption that God needs to explain suffering more by way of apology to mankind than simply by way of instruction. The preconception that seems to be rooted in our minds is that suffering *shouldn't* happen, and therefore God needs to provide to us a satisfactory answer for why He isn't making sure that it doesn't.

I am reminded of the tragic words of a brilliant atheist shortly before his death (I think it was Asimov, but I can't be sure). He was asked if he is concerned about meeting God and having to explain himself. He responded that he thinks God will have more explaining to do to him than he will to God. This illustrates exactly the problem with our attitude about this question: if there really is a perfect Supreme Being who rules the universe, then whatever He has chosen to do in ruling the universe is inherently right and perfect. But when we have difficulty accepting how things happen, we want to critique God's decision to allow them to happen that way, and we expect an explanation that addresses our dissatisfaction. It doesn't seem to often occur to us that the explanation may simply be: "You need to trust me, because I can see many, many things that you cannot."

Having addressed that point, I will say that the answer I have found most plausible and logical is that God is in complete control over everything that happens, even our suffering, and the reason He allows suffering to happen is that there is something far better that He has prepared for us which we can't experience without first experiencing suffering.

The simplest illustration I can think of is the death of Lazarus. Jesus is told that Lazarus is very ill. In John 11:5-6 we are told that Jesus loved Lazarus and his sisters. And then John says "So, when he heard that Lazarus was ill, he stayed two days longer in the place where he was." In other words, John seems to be saying that *because* Jesus loved Lazarus and his sisters, He *delayed* in coming to aid them. And Lazarus died. How can this make sense? I think the answer is found in John 11:40. Jesus says to Martha: "Did I not tell you that if you believed you would see the glory of God?" And then He raises Lazarus. And we know from John 11 and 12 that many Jews believed in Him because of this sign.

It seems that God revealing His glory to mankind, and especially His revealing His son, the Christ, are more important than sparing us from suffering. If indeed we have eternal life in Christ, and nowhere else, then this is hard to argue with. We would rather have it come without suffering, but if it won't, then it would be silly to argue that it would be better for us to be spared suffering than to see the glory of God and receive eternal life.

A further point about this passage that seems to drive this home is that Jesus also subjected Himself to suffering in order to reveal the glory of God. John 11:33 tells us that when Jesus saw Mary weeping, He was deeply moved in His spirit and greatly troubled. And verse 35 tells us that He also wept. But He knew that this suffering was worth the price in order to display God's glory to man. Ultimately, that is why He endured the incalculably greater suffering of the cross. As Hebrews 12:2 says, He endured the cross for the joy set before Him.

These ideas have been brilliantly explained by others before, but I have been most enriched by the way that John Piper explains them through his seminar Suffering for the Sake of the Body: http://www.desiringgod.org/ResourceLibrary/Seminars/1589_Suffering_for_the_Sake_of_the_Body_Part_1/

Coincidentally, John Piper has been giving short podcasts on this very topic since November 19 that give a very good summary of his ideas:
http://www.desiringgod.org/ResourceLibrary/AskPastorJohn/

While I find this explanation of why suffering occurs to be very good, I will no doubt spend the rest of my life wrestling with it and (God willing) growing in my understanding in this area. Some answers are easier to find than they are to accept, and I think that this is one of those questions that doesn't have an answer that is easy to get used to. No matter how well we think we have answered the "why" question, we are still going to experience the pain of suffering in ourselves and in those around us for the rest of our lives. No answer is going to keep us from being hurt by suffering.

Therefore, another hint of wisdom that I think I have come across in wrestling with these questions is that not all answers are going to make us happy and free us from further doubt. That does not necessarily mean the answer is not correct. But we have certain ideas about how we want life to be, and many of those ideas are motivated by a longing for a "better" life than we have now. When the answers to our questions don't match what we want to believe is true, that is going to be hard for us to live with. And some of us will just reject the answers because they don't satisfy our expectations. Some people keep on searching for truth not because they haven't found it, but because they don't like what they found.

The fact is that we have longings for a better world precisely because we were created for one. We were designed for heaven, for an eternity of pure joy in the living presence of God. We are not meant to be temporal beings who live a certain length of years and then cease to exist. I think a great deal of our disappointment comes from our thinking that all of our longings are meant to be fulfilled in this life (leaving nothing left to look forward to in the next, incidentally), instead of recognizing that this life is merely an introductory journey leading us to the destination where all our deepest longings will be fulfilled. We have longings that are deeper than this life can possibly fulfill because God has planned for us greater joy and satisfaction in eternity than anything this world has to offer.