Newsletter Article

From the June edition of The Parish Visitor:

A View From the Pulpit: A Radical Thought on the Problem of Evil [1]
Rev. John R. Collins

Perhaps I should begin by attempting an adequate definition of the “Problem of Evil.” It is the ancient problem of claiming that God is omnipotent (all-powerful and all knowing [2]), and omnibenevolent (completely good), while confronting the fact that evil exists in the world. This problem raises difficult questions: wouldn’t an omnipotent God have knowledge of the existence of evil and the power to eliminate it? Wouldn’t an omnibenevolent God want to eliminate it? And yet, evil continues to exist. This problem is probably the most commonly cited reason given by people who don’t believe in God, for not believing in God.

There are three ill-advised “solutions” to this problem, each involves the failure to take one side of the quandary seriously. The first denies that evil really exists. I have seen too much suffering among parishioners and other people I love to go this route. The second would be to deny that God is omnipotent, to claim that evil exists because God is not capable of getting rid of it. The account of creation in Genesis 1.1-2.4, the example of the exodus from Egypt, and the resurrection of Jesus Christ are examples of why I refuse to take this route. The third “solution,” seldom invoked, is the assertion that God is not wholly good, the most powerful rejoinder to this “solution” is the life and death of Jesus Christ. So we are back where we started, how can Christians assert God’s omnipotence and omnibenevolence in the face of evil’s existence.

I believe that the best solution to the problem of evil is found in the second account of creation in Genesis, which begins right where the first account left off at Genesis 2.5. This is the story of how the primordial fall of Adam and Eve, due to their disobedience to God, brought an end to creation as God intended it. As we talked about Sunday, “Adam” is Hebrew for “John Doe” and Eve is Hebrew for “Jane Doe.” The story is metaphorical, describing a reality that the early Isaelites (and perhaps we as well) would not be able to understand if it were put any other way.) The point of the metaphor is that because of human sin (both theirs and ours), humanity can no longer experience the blessed existence free of evil that was the creator’s original intent. I believe that the effects of the fall were felt not only by Adam and Eve and their descendents, but by all of creation, that is, the fall of humanity from a state of grace had a cosmic impact.

Recently, my understanding of the problem of evil was enhanced by reading N.T. Wright’s engagement in a "blogalogue" [3] with the agnostic Biblical scholar Bart Ehrman (yes, apparently there are such people). Wright is the Anglican bishop of Durham and a leading New Testament scholar, renowned for his defense of the literal resurrection of Jesus from the dead. Wright made many good points, but I want to highlight just two. The first is that the Bible is less interested in addressing the question of why suffering exists than it is in describing what God is doing about it, namely the whole arc of salvation history from Genesis through the book of Revelation. The second (and this is the radical one) is one I will share in his own words and comes initially from the head of the Anglican Church, the archbishop of Canterbury: "I once heard Rowan Williams suggest that it might actually be immoral to try to ‘solve’ the problem of evil, because as soon as you say, ‘There, look, that makes it all right, doesn’t it?’ you have radically belittled the problem, blinding yourself to the real, powerful and radical nature of evil." I am reminded that Job’s friends were initially doing well as they made themselves present to Job in empathy to his condition and sympathy to his plight. Things went wrong only when they began to attempt to explain why what was going on was going on. Perhaps we can all learn from their example.

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[1] Regular readers of the blog may recognize this title and some of the content of the article, but I have expanded it considerably.
[2] All knowing, or omniscience, is sometimes considered as a distinct attribute of God, but for this article I will consider God’s omniscience a sub-category of God’s omnipotence.
[3] A “blogaglogue” appears to be a dialogue in blog form. According to The American Heritage Dictionary: A blog is a Web site on which an individual or group of users produces an ongoing narrative.