Why Does A Loving God Allow Suffering?
It’s obvious to anyone who watches the news that there is a lot of suffering in the world. In the face of all this suffering, it’s reasonable to ask the question: Why would a loving God allow it?
In fact, many atheists and skeptics use the existence of evil and suffering as evidence that God does not exist. After all, they argue, if he did exist, surely he wouldn’t allow it to go on.
So then, is there a reasonable explanation for why God would permit suffering?
Some suffering is inflicted by humanity
First, if we’re honest with ourselves, we have to admit that a lot of suffering is caused by humanity itself.
For instance, millions of people are starving in Africa. Yet money that could be used to buy food is often diverted to buy arms and fight wars, which creates yet more starvation and suffering. In cases like these, humans themselves could prevent a lot of that suffering, but don’t.
After observing the ways of others, king Solomon once said: “All this I observed while applying my mind to all that is done under the sun, while man lords it over man to his hurt.”
However, while acknowledging that a lot of suffering is caused by mankind, this still does not yet explain why God permits it in the first place.
Suffering that can be avoided
Then there is avoidable suffering. For instance, on cigarette packets nowadays are clear warnings spelling out the dangers of smoking, that smoking can lead to premature death.
These warnings were added so that the smoker cannot say, “I didn’t know!”
If they become ill later in life because of smoking, we could reasonably argue that they didn’t heed the warning - the suffering was avoidable.
However, not all suffering is man-made, and it’s not all avoidable by any means. For instance, some people die or are injured in accidents and tragedies that are not their fault. And, of course, we all die at some point anyway.
To understand why suffering is allowed to continue, we must first address the very origin of our existence.
Not like that from beginning
According to the Bible, the way the world is now (with all the suffering) was not the way it was meant to be. King Solomon said: “See, this alone I found, that God made man upright, but they have sought out many schemes.”
According to Genesis, God created the first human pair, and placed them in the Garden of Eden - a paradise environment free of suffering. As well as trees for food, there were two special trees in this garden - the “tree of life”, which would have kept them living indefinitely; and the “tree of the knowledge of good and evil”, which we’ll discuss shortly.
(Incidentally, regardless of whether you believe this account is true or not, having a full grasp of what transpired there explains much of why a loving God would permit suffering. You can find this account in chapter 3 of Genesis.)
Now, the first human beings (Adam and Eve) were different from us in two important ways:
(1) First, they were not born. They were created as fully functioning adults. This meant they did not go through the usual human process of coming out of a womb, learning to walk and talk, puberty, and all that fun stuff.
(2) They had no growing up experience. Most of us learn how to act and behave through experience. For instance, when we were children, we threw tantrums and acted in other childish ways, often because we didn’t know any better. As we “grow up”, we learn to deal with others better and to find better strategies for dealing with others, than throwing a tantrum. Adam and Eve did not have that growing up and maturing experience.
(I think these differences are important for understanding why they did what they did, as we’ll see).
Also, there were no rules at the time, except for one simple command laid upon them by God: “You may freely eat of every tree in the garden; but of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil you shall not eat, for in the day you eat of it you shall die.”
Simple enough, eh? God was saying, It’s all yours, apart from that one tree. If you eat from that tree, you’ll die.
Right there, God was teaching them two things: (a) that as humans we have freedom of choice, and (b) that our choices come with consequences.
Then something happened that changed their world. Along came a serpent, and suggested to them that God was perhaps lying to them, and holding something back from them. The serpent said to Eve: “You will not die. For God knows that when you eat of it your eyes will be opened, and you will be like God, knowing good and evil.”
Putting aside the bizarre fact that a serpent was talking to her (for which there is a reasonable explanation, which we’ll talk about a bit later), consider what happened next:
The temptation became too much for Eve, and so she ate the fruit. Then she gave some to Adam, who also ate.
Why did Eve do this? The Christian apostle Paul says she was “seduced”, and who of us haven’t been “seduced” by someone or something at one time or another?
How many of us, when we were young, put our hands in the cookie jar when our parents weren’t looking, even though we knew it was wrong? Our parents may have told us, “No more cookies”… but the temptation proved just too strong? (Mmm, cookies…)
Eve was like the child with her hand in the cookie jar. She wasn’t a child, but she acted just like one.
We do not know why Adam went along with Eve and ate, but he did. Later on, God called out to them, and what did they do? Did Adam behave like a man, and admit to what he’d done? Did he at least try and take the fall for Eve?
Nope… they both went into hiding!
And when it seemed obvious that God knew about what they’d done, Adam blamed his wife! And Eve blamed the serpent.
So while physically Adam and Eve were fully grown men and women, they acted altogether like children - Eve being “seduced” by the garden’s forbidden “candy”, both of them hiding from God, and then when being caught out, passing the buck!
(Does that sound like the actions of mature human beings, or of children?)
I think the likely explanation for their behavior is because they were different from us, in that they were not “born”, and had no “growing up” experience. So they were adults, but not yet adult.
However, in this instance, what they did was more important than simply sneaking a cookie from the cookie jar. God warned them they would die when they ate; the serpent said they wouldn’t, but rather they would become “like God, knowing good and evil”.
(Ironically, Eve wouldn’t have even known what “knowing good and evil” would actually mean to her, but it was likely the sheer appeal of knowing something she wasn’t supposed to know that tempted her!)
So when Adam and Eve ate from the tree, they were effectively declaring their independence from God. They wanted to be “like God, knowing good and evil”.
To be “like God”, and to know “good and evil”, God had little choice but to expel them from the Garden of Eden and the tree of life, to allow them to live their life of independence. After all, they couldn’t be “like God” if they were dependent on a mere tree! And if they wanted to know good and evil, they could really only know them by experiencing them both. (They would hardly get that in the sheltered environment of the Garden of Eden!)
However, since Adam and Eve had not yet had offspring by the time they ate, their children were born and grew up outside of the Garden of Eden, and away from the tree of life. This is the reason all of us - their offspring - grow old and die.
At this point, you might be thinking: “That sounds unfair. Why should I suffer for what Adam and Eve did?”
Who’s to blame? God or the parent?
Well, it’s a fact of life that the actions of a parent have consequences for the children. For example, if a woman drinks heavily during pregnancy, and the baby is born with some disorder as a result of it, who is to blame? Is it God, or the mother?
Surely it is the mother who is to blame in this particular example - especially if she’d been warned of the consequences beforehand.
So yes it is unfair that we grow old and die because of what Adam and Eve did, it’s the ultimate example of bad parenting. It’s not our fault, but neither is it God’s.
Of course, knowing this still doesn’t make suffering and death feel any better. And it still doesn’t explain why God allows it to continue. So…
Why hasn’t God ended suffering?
There’s actually a good reason why God has allowed suffering to continue. It involves the exact same issues faced by Adam and Eve, but for all of humanity… which is why we need to get a deeper understanding of what transpired in the garden of Eden.
That first human pair wanted their independence from God, because they thought it would mean something better for them. They wanted to be “like God”, and to know “good and evil”.
So God respected their freedom to choose, and gave them what they wanted - the opportunity to see whether or not their life would be better without God, to know “good and evil”.
But in doing so, he also gave that opportunity to the whole human race.
The permission of suffering down through the centuries has enabled mankind to learn and discover for themselves what it means to be independent from God. We have seen and witnessed for ourselves both good and evil.
Whose rules should we follow?
As a parent, you may give children rules, and you know those rules are usually for their own benefit - but children often see them as unfair, and might try to break them, even if they get hurt by doing so. Sometimes, you have to let them break the rules, so they learn “the hard way” why those rules were there in the first place.
Though Adam and Eve were fully grown adults, they still behaved like children. They thought the simple rule “you must not eat from that tree” was unfair, and wasn’t given for their benefit. So, like children, they broke it.
While God punished them for disobeying, he also wanted them (and us) to learn something much more important: Why the rule was there in the first place.
After all, it wasn’t there because God had a particular fondness for the “tree of the knowledge of good and evil”.
It was ultimately there to teach Adam and Eve, and by extension the whole human race, that God’s rules were the best possible rules for them.
How many times have parents said to their children, “Do as I tell you, because I know best!” To many a child’s mind, that’s not enough. The child thinks they know better, because their limited experience doesn’t tell them otherwise!
It’s like parents telling their children, “No more cookies”. The parents aren’t being mean to them - they just don’t want the child to become greedy and fat! Only when the child grows up, can he or she appreciate why the cookies were restricted.
For humanity, God’s ultimate aim in my opinion was not to have just blind, unthinking obedience. Instead, he wanted the kind of obedience that comes from a loving, trusting relationship between a son or daughter and their father or mother.
Such a relationship eventually matures to the point where the son or daughter can stand on their own two feet as adults, and there is no longer any need to even speak in terms of “commands” or “obedience” any more.
The rules were simple for Adam and Eve because, while physically they were adults, they were still like children in many ways.
They wanted to be “like God”, yet they weren’t mature enough or responsible enough to get even close, or to know what that even meant. Ironically, had they remained as a genuine son and daughter of God, they would have been more “like God” than their independence ever gave them!
So while I personally believe the Adam and Eve account to be real and literal, it is also a metaphor and lesson for all of humanity.
We are all like Adam and Eve in many ways
The fact is, most of us act like Adam and Eve at some time in our life. Most of us have “put our hand in the cookie jar” in some aspect of life, and when faced with that fact, we’ve perhaps hidden our responsibility, or passed the buck!
When Adam and Eve were cast out of the Garden of Eden, God did it for them, because they wanted to be “like God”, and to know “good and evil”.
Yet isn’t that what many want today? They consider themselves to be gods of their own world, and they want to decide for themselves what is right and wrong, with nobody telling them what to do. Is there really all that much difference in attitude between Adam and Eve, and mankind in general?
This, I believe, is why God has permitted suffering to the present. He wants mankind to “grow up”, and realize that the vast majority of the suffering on the planet is actually a consequence of man’s own attempt to be “like God”, and to decide for themselves what is good and evil, without reference to him.
Unfortunately, as King Solomon noted, man’s efforts to be “like God” usually involve “lording it” over their fellow man.
What about suffering inflicted by the natural world?
What about hurricanes, and other “natural” disasters? Well, it’s highly unlikely that the Garden of Eden would have been inflicted by such disasters.
When Adam and Eve declared their independence, they were saying they didn’t really need God. Now, to a certain extent, God had designed both them and the Earth to be self-perpetuating. For instance, they could plant seeds, and grow food, which did not require God’s intervention.
However, it may not have been fully self-perpetuating. For instance, the author of the book of Hebrews argues that the physical heavens will “perish” and “grow old”. (Hebrews 1:11) So just as Adam and Eve were actually dependent on the “tree of life” in order to keep living, the heavens and earth may be dependent on God in some way.
When God’s support was withdrawn (in keeping with Adam and Eve apparently not needing him any more), the Earth may have gradually started to wear down, with natural disasters possibly being a consequence of this.
In addition, the Genesis account tells us that there was later a Flood, which had a devastating impact on the surface of the Earth. In that flood, springs of a vast watery deep were broken open, mountains were pushed much higher and valleys sank deeper. The Earth may well be suffering the after-effects of that event!
Either way, “natural” disasters are ultimately a consequence of Adam and Eve’s declaration of independence.
What about that talking serpent?
So how could the serpent in the Garden of Eden talk, anyway? Skeptics point to this as evidence that the account is therefore clearly fiction.
However, there is another account in the Bible of an animal talking, which may shed more light on the matter.
In Numbers chapter 22, the prophet Balaam goes out to try and curse Israel. He’s riding on an ass, and finds himself in a narrow passage. An angel blocks the passage, and so the ass sits down. Balaam starts beating the ass, so God opens the mouth of the ass, which then starts having a conversation with Balaam!
Clearly, in this account, the ass can only speak because of God. So this begs the question, is God or someone else behind the serpent talking?
The book of Revelation implies this is likely to be the case. It identifies “the original serpent” as “the one called Devil and Satan, who is misleading the entire inhabited earth.” (12:9)
So just as the ass could only speak because of God, it’s likely that the serpent was only able to speak because a spirit creature known as Satan was causing it to speak.
While today a talking serpent may raise more than a few eyebrows, in the new environment that Adam and Eve found themselves in, it may have been more of a curiosity than a surprise.
So will suffering continue forever?
Fortunately, the answer is no. Speaking to the people of Athens in the 1st century, the Christian teacher Paul said of God: “He has set a day in which he will judge the world with justice by the man he has appointed. He has given proof of this to all men by raising him from the dead.” (Acts 17:31)
While many people today are skeptical of the claim that Jesus Christ was resurrected, Paul asked a related question in front of a king in his day: “Why should any of you consider it incredible that God raises the dead?” (26:8)
If God can create, why should it be considered incredible that he can also re-create something, even if it dies?
Jesus said: “Do not be amazed at this, for a time is coming when all who are in their graves will hear his voice and come out.” (John 5:28,29)
So by resurrecting Jesus Christ, God was demonstrating his willingness to do the same for mankind in general. In fact, one of the most famous passages that Christians quote often actually has a deeper meaning in relation to the issue of suffering:
“For God so loved the world that he gave his only Son, that whoever believes in him should not perish, but have eternal life.” (John 3:16)
Adam and Eve wanted to be “like God”, but instead they took the path of selfishness, which plunged their own offspring into suffering and death. Jesus Christ showed us what it really meant to be “like God” - he was selfless, and laid down his life so that the human race could eventually live again!
Thanks to him, the cruelty, injustice and inhumanity that mankind has inflicted on one another for thousands of years (in their quest to be “like God, knowing good and evil”), not to mention the death brought about as a result of Adam and Eve’s declaration of independence, will eventually be reversed.
Adam and Eve, along with the rest of mankind, did indeed learn “the hard way” the knowledge of good and evil, which is why God permitted suffering.
Although that knowledge came at a high price, all of the pain and suffering will one day become a distant memory, as the final outcome is assured:
“Behold, the dwelling place of God is with man. He will dwell with them, and they will be his people, and God himself will be with them as their God. He will wipe away every tear from their eyes, and death shall be no more, neither shall there be mourning nor crying nor pain anymore, for the former things have passed away.” (Revelation 21:3,4)
So suffering and death will be one day reversed, and with an understanding of what being “like God” and “knowing good and evil” really means, the human race will eventually come to the full maturity that God desires us all to have.
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5 Responses to “Why Does A Loving God Allow Suffering?”
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Very good explanation.
“For I consider the sufferings of this present time are not worthy to be compared with the glory that is to be revealed to us. For the anxious longing of the creation waits eagerly fo the revealing of the sons of God. For the creation was subjected to futility, not of its own will, but because of Him who subjected it, in hope that the creation itself will also be set free from its slavery to corruption into the freedom of the glory of the children of God. For we know that the whole creation groans and suffers the pains of childbirth together until now. And not only this, but also we ourselves, having the first fruits of the Spirit, even we ourselves groan within ourselves, waiting eagerly for our adoption as sons, the redemption of our body” (Romans 8:18-23).
I really rejoice that you give spiritual food. And my comment to the question why so long God permits this world to continue is: God have not yet found from every nation members to his heavenly kingdom, 144000.
http://www.musingsaboutgod.com/many.htm
This explains it all
God knows everthing, and everything is part of his master plan.
So than, it seems clear that God wanted Adam and Eve to eat from the tree of knowledge, or else why did God place it there in the first place?
Thus the question is why?
I think inorder to create us in his own image, we would surely have to know what good and evil is.
Which is to bad: all this knoweledge isn’t what its hype up to be.
Woe onto you Adam.
Woe onto you Eve.
I could be chilling in the Garden of Eden right now if it was not for the both of you.
This is a fantastic and down to earth explanation of suffering in a religious light that can be read and understood by virtually anyone. Keep up the good work!