The below February 2005 Rationally Speaking article is being posted a bit late, but damn it's good and worth your time. Please read and add your comments!

So why did God allow the tsunami to kill 300,000+ innocent people?

Here is a link to the article, and a link to our Rationally Speaking Index page. Of course, you are welcome to just read below.

---

N. 58, February 2005



In 1755 a great earthquake struck the city of Lisbon, in Portugal. As a result, roughly 100,000 people died, in the process sparking a new debate about an old and deep theological dilemma: if (the Christian) God is all-powerful, all-knowing, and all-good, how could this happen? The answer, such as it is, has always been that we simply can't understand how such calamities fit into God's plan, but they do, so we should simply have faith in the supreme being and not be as "arrogant" as constantly questioning His plans.

Of course, any human being who deliberately causes the death of thousands, regardless of the stated motive or "higher" purpose, is branded as a horrible criminal, hunted down and prosecuted to the full extent of human law. Rational people feel rather frustrated by this sort of nonsensical double standard, and one defense against the irrationality of the world is, as Mel Brooks once said, a good sense of humor. If anything good came out of the Lisbon earthquake was that it inspired the French philosopher Voltaire to write what became a classical masterpiece of world literature, Candide. In it, Voltaire makes fun of the simplistic attitude that we live "in the best of all possible worlds," as affirmed by one of the main characters, Dr. Pangloss (loosely based on the philosophy of Leibniz), and clearly implied by theological "explanations" of natural disasters.

Recently, I have witnessed two more examples of "Pangloss' syndrome," one in response to an event publicized throughout the world, the other while attending a religious gathering celebrating a rite of passage. The scopes of the two episodes are wildly different, and yet they reflect the same irrational, and highly dangerous, attitude about what happens in the world and why.

The largest event was, of course, the tsunami that caused two hundred thousand people to die in southeast Asia. For several days after the tragedy there was a serious debate in the media, eerily similar to the one that moved Voltaire's pen: how could God allow such a tragedy to occur? Christian theologians, Jewish rabbis, and Muslim clerics all gave the same answer: we don't know, but it must have been for a higher good. Some of these self-appointed experts about nothing went so far as to claim that perhaps the people who died were in fact somehow undeserving, and that the tsunami was God's punishment for their sins. A colossal and outrageously insulting instance of blaming the victim, if ever there was one! It is hard for me to imagine the degree of mental gymnastics that one must perform in these cases to save one's cherished pet religious views. This sort of events must cause an almost unbearable degree of cognitive dissonance, and one has to be particularly skilled at fooling oneself in order not to perceive the sheer absurdity of the whole plot. And yet, it seems to work for hundreds of millions of people the world over. This attitude "explained" Lisbon, the tsunami, the 9/11 attacks on the US, and essentially anything else bad that happens in the world: it is either our own fault, or it is for the pursuit of God's inscrutable (but certainly supremely good) plan.

The same bizarre logic applies in reverse, of course: just in the same way as God is never responsible for anything bad happening to us, He takes all (or most) of the credit whenever something good happens. A good gig if you can get it! The second example I witnessed falls into the category of "God did it (because it's good)." I was at a religious ceremony celebrating an important rite of passage for a young girl, followed by a feast at which everybody was having a jolly good time. At one point, the father of the girl took the microphone and told us a very poignant story: his daughter had actually been born very prematurely, and both her and her mother had barely survived the ordeal. Moreover, the girl had been in desperate conditions in the hospital after birth, and the doctors had little hope that she would make it. However, some doctor had the daring and brilliant idea of trying a new experimental drug, after having asked the parents' permission. It worked, and the result was the beautiful young woman that we were now celebrating.

Had the story ended there it would have been a wonderful and moving tale of human compassion and ingenuity. But of course the father had to go on and add that, although he was sure the doctors had some merit for the final outcome, really this was a clear example of a miracle, a direct intervention of God to save his child. There are so many things that are simply wrong with all of this that it is, again, hard to imagine how perfectly normal, functional, people can sincerely embrace this sort of "reasoning." To begin with, why does God get the credit for solving the problem, but not for creating it in the first place? Second, isn't such an unwarranted shift of credit insulting for the doctors who did the actual hard work and took on a huge responsibility in case of failure? More generally, if we all (including doctors) adopted such attitude, wouldn't that spell the end of any attempt to better humanity's condition? If it's all in God's hands (why does He need hands, anyway?), then why bother? Which is, of course, exactly the attitude of so-called Christian scientists (an oxymoron of grotesque proportions), who leave their children to die because they think that all disease is the result of poor faith and can be cured only by restoring the latter.

I am no Voltaire, and this essay is no Candide. Therefore, I will leave it to the great French Enlightenment writer to make a final comment: "Doubt is not a pleasant condition, but certainty is absurd." We would find ourselves in a much better world if more of us lived by such words.

---

Edited by: Chris OConnor  at: 2/23/05 2:13 am

No posts yet? This should be a hot topic. hmm

Chris

---

I suppose I'll take a crack at it, even though the problem of good and evil doesn't interest me as much as other theological issues. I'm not really going to bother attempting to answer the issue once and for all, but at the least I can give more frame to the discussion.

First of all, I would take issue with the idea that most religiously-minded people would take a theological ciew of the tsunamis over a phenomenological view. Most industrialized people, even those of a religious inclination, are savvy enough to admit that what we colloquially refer to as "acts of god" are in fact natural phenomenon with causes that are explicable in meteorological terms. So right off the bat we can reject the opinon that God instigated the tsunami in order to deal with certain infidels or sinners as a minority opinion. In the Judeo-Christian tradition, at least, we can see a rather clear shift from "acts of God" to the notion of God merely withholding protection. That, really, is the issue that presses most on the theological mindset.

From the historical Judaic viewpoint, God's protection is part of a covenant promised to the children of Abraham. In Biblical terms, instances of God's withdrawal are always in response to the infidelity of Israel -- once the human side of the covenant was broken, God was free to protect or not protect. Judaism in this form professed a theological relationship that was legalistic in nature, and it should be noted that it dealt specifically with communities. God was entirely willing to play favorites with individuals (cf. the flight of Lot from Sodom), but the community was exempt from the caprice of nature only so long as it conformed to the convenant. The cosmological view implied by all of this is of a world that proceeds according to all the rules governing natural phenomenon, but into which God will occasionally intervene in the interests of those faithful to God.

From such a theologically legalistic viewpoint, the relationship of the tsunami to God is fairly clear. The communities involved were not Jewish, were not a part of the covenant, and therefore God was not obliged to protect them. The tsunami was an entirely natural causal event, and the only theological mystery that it implies is that of why God would protect any given community or individual at all.

That said, I'm not sure that the traditional Biblical viewpoint, so clear in the books of Judges and Kings, hold much currency with modern Jews. A more common notion among post-Holocaust Jews, as I understand it, is the possibility that God does not possess all of the divine attributes accorded to a pure God. God is either not omniscient, or not omnipotent, or so forth. There are a few theological consequences to this idea, and I'll get to them in a second. The overall implication is that God is merely doing the best possible with limited means. The most extreme conclusion drawn in this supposition, one that is more rare, perhaps, and more often leads to apostacy, is the reduction of God's benevolence. But that notion leads us either to the notion of an predominantly neutral God (even in regards to Israel, the people not the nation) or back to the notion of the "wrath of God", albeit with a modern connotation of God's malevolence.

Now, for the consequences of the view. Within a polytheistic view, the limitations of any given god are explicable by reference to other gods. That one god cannot handle the whole of creation is not so terrible when there are other gods to cover the gaps. But strict monotheism tends naturally towards an omni-predicated God, particularly when that God is held to be Author of Creation. So the post-Holocaust scheme of a Judaic God merely doing the best possible, of a God only partially omni-predicated or not at all, must ultimately suggest something about the nature of God's relationship to Creation. Two suggestions occur to me. One is the erosion of the monotheistic ideal, ie. the idea that there is something else comparable to God (this is an idea we'll return to when we look at Christianity). The other is the idea that Creation is or has become, in some ways, comparable to God: either that God has lost control of Creation, or that God was not the Creator.

We might pause for a moment here and consider the basis of the problem. The author of the essay muses: "It is hard for me to imagine the degree of mental gymnastics that one must perform in these cases to save one's cherished pet religious views." The difficulty of imagining the scope of the problem is built into his sentence: if, for the believer, it is possible to characterize his or her religious views as a sort of "pet", then they'll likely jettison those views in the face of real difficulties. The apparant fact is that, for many people, the value of their religious views is so great that they are willing to entertain, at least temporarily, any seeming paradox that arises. That does not mean that they'll live with irresovable paradox indefinitely, but for some people some things are worth a prolonged struggle. The views expressed in the preceding paragraph demonstrate this principle. They were formed in large part in response to the Holocaust, an event which seemed to indicate to many Jews that God had withdrawn from the Jews altogether. For many, the contradictions were too great, and we may credit those theological difficulties with much of the phenomenon of modern secular Judaism. But in considering the remainder of religious Judaism, that contingent of the post-Holocaust tradition that continued to believe despite the apparant difficulties involved in maintaining the belief, I think it would be a gross underestimation to think of them as merely obstinant or foolish. The perpetuation of religious belief cannot be merely ingrained (though it admittedly does spread to large degree via indoctrination); it must also take hold in reference to experience. So despite the theological difficulties created by one event, like that of the Holocaust or of the recent tsunami, it is only reasonable to assume that there are other events, sometimes less apparant to the general public, which reinforce a given religious belief, and indeed, reinforce the basis of a religion in general. "Mental gymnastics" take place, no doubt, but they must be motivated. It is a grave misstep on the part of bewildered atheists, I think, to assume that the rules that guide their beliefs have been suspended in those who maintain religious faith. The principle that all belief is grounded in experience is as applicable to the general religious believer as it is to the materialist. The distinguishing factor is the experience at play.

Moving on to Christianity, we have to recognize in the first place that we've turned to what has historically developed as a dualistic theological scheme. Christianity is not to evenly divided along lines of conflict as Zoroastronism , and that's where much of the problem builds. In a strict system of ethically dualistic theology, where good and evil are represented by equally powerful deities, there'd hardly be any problem in explaining the tsunami at all. You'd merely observe that the evil deity had gained the upper hand (or in a more convoluted ethical scheme, that the natural disaster was needed in order to undermine a greater evil). In Christianity, though, the Enemy has always held a lesser status. God is absolute, and the Enemy, when held as an actual personage, is merely a rebellious or even ethically necessary (as in the book of Job) subordinant.

The problem of speaking meaningfully about the role Satan plays in the Christian worldview is that there's very little agreement from denomination to denomination of what that role is. Nor is there much consistency in ascribing specific powers to Satan. It is not generally accepted, it seems to me, that Satan would have much sway over natural phenomenon, and so the question of the tsunami doesn't much involve Satan so long as we stick to mainline Christianity. We should note, however, that there likely are segments of the tradition that would ascribe natural disasters on such a scale to the tradition of Satanic conflict and leave it at that. Such traditions tend more towards a dualistic theology than traditional Christianity would admit: the monotheistic rule exerts too much power over the tradition as a whole.

Now, a real exposition of the problem of good and evil in mainline Christianity is the sort of thing that fills volumes, so I can't do more than suggest some general trends. One line of reasoning that I'll point to is derived from Christianity's Stoic origins, and it conforms to the model of the "greater good" scenario. The explanation unfolds in roughly ecological terms. The Stoics were atomists, and part of their doctrine was the contingency of all phenomenon in the world. Nature (only half-heartedly personified) seeks her own good; that is, nature works to sustain itself. In doing so, she will sometimes sacrafice parts of nature in the interests of the whole. By this means, the Stoics gave a naturalistic explanation of death as a natural necessity. Christianity departs from this scheme to some degree, but it is still possible within the scheme of Christian cosmology to hold the ecologically balanced view of nature. Faith would necessitate that you ascribe the foundations of this balance to God, but you could hold it nonetheless, and for a progressive contemporary Christian I would say it's almost a necessity in that it allows the simultaneous deference to Christian doctrine and scientific discovery. The greater good incurred by the tsunami, then, would be the continued balance of the world ecosystem. Devestating though it may have been, the tsunami was the discharge of a build-up of force that would have continued to build otherwise, eventually resulting in a far more cataclysmic event. God might have staved off the tsunami, but it would have been inconsistent with the general structure of nature to have held off the discharge forever. A necessary correlation to this explanation is that God is interested in maintaining the consistency of that general structure.

That does not, of course, resolve the problem altogether. The progressive contemporary Christian is still left with the questions of why the structure is as it is, and why God is so interested in maintaining that structure. The second question is moot to the atheist, of course, but the first question strikes me as more fundamental than a merely theological problem. The ontological question of why anything should be as it is underlines any scheme of knowledge, and to that end I think the problem is unresolvable.

As for the initial question of why God would allow a disaster of this magnitude to take place, I tend to think that it overstates the importance of the event itself. Why would God allow so many people to die? Well, everyone dies, so the real question is, why would God allow so many people to die in one event? Which isn't a particularly meaningful question -- at least, not compared to the question of why any given one of us should have to die at all. If everyone is consigned to death at some point or another in their life, does it really make a difference in terms of the question of God's benevolence that more people die on one particular day than on any other?

The question of death itself is a strange one, really, because implies a further question: why is life as it is? As you can see, the problem gets more and more complicated as we go, and not all of these complications are unique to a theological perspective, so I think it's best that I leave off here for now. What I've written so far should, at least, provide grist for discussion. In the meantime, I'll respond to a few of the articles points directly.

This attitude "explained" Lisbon, the tsunami, the 9/11 attacks on the US, and essentially anything else bad that happens in the world: it is either our own fault, or it is for the pursuit of God's inscrutable (but certainly supremely good) plan.

The author's difficulty in grasping the ability of the faithful to maintain their faith in view of such complications probably stems from his reductionist attitude. He only offers two solutions corresponding to the religious perview, but as I've attempted to show above, those are not the only two options. Moreover, the author seems to view religion as paradigmatic in the sense that it underlies or overrides all other considerations in the mind of the truly religious. I've referenced Paul Veyne a number of times in other discussions, and at the risk of seeming redundant I'll point to his "Did the Greeks Believe Their Myths?" again. Part of Veyne's general thesis is that the truth expressed by programs like religion can exist simultaneously with seemingly contradictory programs of truth, like that of science. So save in particular individuals, the "cognitive dissonance" caused by such difficulties are probably much less than the author would suspect.

The same bizarre logic applies in reverse, of course: just in the same way as God is never responsible for anything bad happening to us, He takes all (or most) of the credit whenever something good happens. A good gig if you can get it!

This is not a bad argument, really, save that it makes a fairly disproportionate generalization about the credulity of religious believers. The example that he gives is fairly straightforward: the father telling the story of his daughter's birth has made the explicit claim (as told by the author of the article) that God influenced the outcome of the event. The way the story is told permits no doubt on the subject. But in my experience, I far more common response to unexpected or unlikely windfall has been a sense of wonder. Yes, a given event may have been the natural outcome of circumstances, some less apparant than others, but the religiously-inclined may also wonder if God had not swayed events in their favor for whatever reason God has for doing anything. Attempts to assume knowledge of God's involvement tend to be more rare, though certainly more pronounced, and in this case I don't think what you see of religious believers in the news serves as a very accurate guideline for actual practice. The more extreme sects always tend to be the more vocal and visible. If we went by television alone, we'd have to conclude that the 700 Club is more representative of Christianity than the Vatican.

"Doubt is not a pleasant condition, but certainty is absurd."

I'd agree, but I'd hasten to add that, in the case of an assertion as unprovable as the existence of God, the same logic would apply. It may be unpleasant to remain in doubt, but it is absurd to pretend to certainty that no God exists.

Edited by: MadArchitect at: 2/25/05 12:27 pm

I really don't understand why it is that when events like this occur, people think it should have a massive impact on one's religious beliefs.

There is no human alive that is not aware of suffering and death. Why should an unusual amount of suffering and death impact upon one's religious beliefs? If you believe in an all-knowing, all-powerful, loving God and an after life, then you are going to interpret events in a way that reflects that view.

Personally, I could theorise about the reasons and causes behind the Tsunami, but really I haven't got the time (which is why I hope this thread takes off and others can do play the mind games for me). Ultimately, I believe in the all knowing, all powerful, loving God, so I trust that those impacted by the events will gain from what ever afflictions they encounter which were ultimately not of their own making.

Let us agree, there is no one single reality. Not upon this stage, not in this world, all is in the mind... imagination is the only truth. Because it cannot be contradicted except by other imaginations - Richard Matheson

There are no conclusive indications by which waking life can be distinguished from sleep - Rene Descartes

If God loves us why doesn't he save innocent people from such horrible disasters? I think it is rather obvious why this thread exists and why some of us ask such questions.

The concept of a loving God makes no sense. Basically, theists are saying that God KNOWS a disaster is coming, CAN stop it, yet does NOT stop it. Imagine if your parents raised you with this approach. Would you love them? Would you respect them? Would you actually believe they loved you?

Chris

---

This also speaks to the free-will debate considering god. Is god sadistic or uninvolved?

We discussed this in one of the other forums recently and briefly.

Mr. P.

The one thing of which I am positive is that there is much of which to be negative - Mr. P.

I came to get down, I came to get down. So get out ya seat and jump around - House of Pain

HEY! Is that a ball in your court? - Mr. P

I came to kick ass and chew Bubble Gum...and I am all out of Bubble Gum - They Live, Roddy Piper

Your values aren't God's Chris! These are only horrible disasters from your perspective.

What happened was that a lot of people died and many people are currently suffering. So the issue is why would God allow suffering and death.

I'm not saying that these aren't interesting questions in themselves. I'm only saying that questioning how Christians etc. can continue to believe in a loving God after such events is strange. I guess people forget that the belief comes first. People don't look at the world and conclude that logically a loving god must exist. They believe that a loving god exists so when they see suffering and death, they might ponder why a loving god allows such things, but they will tend to accept their limitations. If they can't harmonise the presence of suffering and death with the idea of a loving god, they aren't going to conclude that a loving god does not exist, they will just conclude that they aren't capable of understanding it.

In regard to the parent questions Chris, take a very young child to get an injection and see what happens. They scream, shout, cry, kick and bite. They don't understand the underlying logic. All they experience is the pain. Their parents sit there, watching them suffer but do nothing to stop the pain.

From a Christian perspective, death and suffering aren't so important. Suffering is an opportunity and we don't believe in death. We all move on at some point. Which is not to say that we don't feel pain when we watch others suffer. We are obliged to help. It just means that we have something of a consolation.

After all, Jesus taught that

Quote:

---

Happy are those who mourn: they shall be comforted. Happy are those who hunger and thirst after righteousness: they shall be satisfied. Happy are those who are persecuted: theirs is the Kingdom of Heaven. Happy are you when men abuse you and persecute you and speak all manner of evil against you on my account. Rejoice and be glad, for your reward is great in Heaven

---

Let us agree, there is no one single reality. Not upon this stage, not in this world, all is in the mind... imagination is the only truth. Because it cannot be contradicted except by other imaginations - Richard Matheson

There are no conclusive indications by which waking life can be distinguished from sleep - Rene Descartes

Niall

Quote:

---

I guess people forget that the belief comes first.

---

Nah, we don't forget it at all, Niall. We shake our heads in utter amazement that people think it is ok to form beliefs "first."

Chris

---

Then you are forgetting the basis of your own outlook.

Let us agree, there is no one single reality. Not upon this stage, not in this world, all is in the mind... imagination is the only truth. Because it cannot be contradicted except by other imaginations - Richard Matheson

There are no conclusive indications by which waking life can be distinguished from sleep - Rene Descartes

You are incapable of functioning without making assumptions first. For this reason all knowledge is provisional. Provided the assumptions you made are true, the x is true. Any assumptions seems justified once you view it using the lens of the world view which itself is the result of making those assumptions in the first place.

What you seem to forget is that many of those who believe in God view the world with different eyes. Just as you assume that the world can be understood and predicted, logic is valid, language is generally correct and so on, those who believe in a god make an assumption and it seems necessary to them because it is part of the foundation on which their world view is based.

Let us agree, there is no one single reality. Not upon this stage, not in this world, all is in the mind... imagination is the only truth. Because it cannot be contradicted except by other imaginations - Richard Matheson

There are no conclusive indications by which waking life can be distinguished from sleep - Rene Descartes

Edited by: Niall001 at: 2/28/05 8:26 pm

Now what is that supposed to mean?

Chris

---