topics: |  self-help | religion | philosophy

Why do terrible things happen to people who have been pious?  How can faith
justify God willing such disasters upon the faithful? Classifies the
arguments given into eight philosophical strands, e.g. guilt at having
missed some ritual recently, the rest of the universe is improving, having
arrived at a clean pooint with some major goals met, etc.


[If we give up the idea of an omnipotent God, as the Buddhists have done,
then much of the dilemma disappears.]

Excerpt

Kushner's son, Aaron, stops gaining weight at eight months, and starts
losing hair at one year.  He is diagnosed with progeria - rapid aging,
leading to death in one's teens. 

---

He is called out to help a family, whose nineteen year old daughter was at
university.  

one morning at breakfast, they get a call from the univ -
"your daughter collapsed while walking to class ... a blood vessel [had]
burst in her brain. She died before we could do anything for her."  *

A neighbour calls him.  When he enters their house, feeling inadequare, the
first thing they tell him is: "You know, Rabbi, we didn't fast last Yom
Kippur."  6
		  [fasting on Yom Kippur is a tradition even many otherwise
		  non-observant Jews maintain...]

Eight Arguments

** Argument 1: Guilt
Why is there a sense of guilt associated with God's injustirce 3

   Isaiah: Tell the righteous it shall be well with them... Woe to the
   wicked, it shall be ill with them...

   Genesis: But Er, Judah's first bordn, was wicked in the sight of the Lord
   and the Lord slew him.

   Proverbs: No ill befalls the righteous, but the wicked are filled with
   trouble.

   Job: Consider, what innocent ever punished, or where have the righteous
   been destroyed?

They sat their angry at God for having exacted His pound of flesh so
strictly, but afriad to admit their anger for fear that He would punish them
again. 7

But to believe Isaiah today, one would have to deny facts that press upon him
from every side.

Boy of eleven - eye-exam finds him nearsighted - he has to wear glasses -
both parents and children wear glasses.  But he is morose - while being put
to bed a few weeks later, he tells how he and some friends had come across
some Playboy magazines and had ogled at the pictures.  He had concluded
that with his glasses ... God had begun the process of punishing him with
blindness 9 *

    Psalm 92:
	How great are Your deeds, O Lord,
	Your thoughts are very deep
	...
	When the wicked spring up like grass
	And workers of iniquity flourish...

** Argument 2: At a clean point in life

from Thornton Wilder: Bridge of San Luis Rey:

In a priest's investigations of the five people who died, it turns out that
they had all "recently resolved a problematic situation in their lives" -
they had completed a chapter in their lives, and were taken at a cusp, an
"appropriate time for each of them to die".

I confess that I find that answer ultimately unsatisfying.  Instead of the
five, consider the 250 passengers in an airlinge crash.  15

** Argument 3: For the completeness of some larger picture
					(Tapestry's other side)

Forty years later, and older and wiser Thornton Wilder writes
The Eighth Day.

offers the image of a beautiful tapestry.  From the right side, it is an
intricately woven work of art, with strands of diff length and colour - but
from the other side it is a hodgepodge of many threads, some short, some
long, some cut and some knotted, going off in different directions.
moral: God's tapestry requires that some threads be cut short and knotted.  16

Many people may find this suggestion comforting...

Medieval prayer:
	 Tell me not why I must suffer.
	 Assure me only that I suffer for Thy sake. 16
[somewhat Tagorean in spirit]


** Argument 4: Seems to be hurting, but actually helping

woman who had collected far-eastern antiques after six years of travel.
just as store is to open, the whole block is burned down in an electrical
fire.

--> maybe god wants you to do something else


** Argument 4b: teaching a lesson

Ron, shop owner, who is held up by a drug addict.  As he is going to give the
cash, he stumbles, and is shot, and is now in a wheelchair. *

Friend says: this is how he wants to rid you of pride and arrogance


** Argument 5: Test: only the strong are tested

The Lord tested Abraham by having him sacrifice his son Isaac

Talmud Jewish teachings 200BC to 500AD: Like a potter demonstrating his
pots, hits them with a stick, but only the ones that are strong, so also
  -->  God only tests those who are strong enough to take it.

Harriet Sarnoff Schiff: Bereaved Parent
   clergyman says: I know you will get through it all right, because God
   never sends us more of a burden than we can bear.
In response, Shiff remembers wishing she was a weaker person, then Robbie
would be alive.  27


** Argument 6: They have gone to a better place

God has taken Michael out of this world of sin and pain to a happier land.


** ARGUMENT 7: It isn't so bad, it is just our selfishness


** Argument 8: There is another life
	where "the last shall be first" and all those
	lives cut-short will be fulfilled. 28

Kushner:  Maybe God is not the one deciding which family will be losing a
	  child.  Maybe God "How could God do this to me" is the wrong q;
	  just that He "stands ready to help and cope with our tragedies." 29

Book of Job

philosophical poem, Book of Job:

	Carlyle calls it: "the most wonderful poem of any age and language;
	our first, oldest statement of ... man's destiny and God's way with
	him" 33

Satan comes to God revelling in stories of sinful people on earth.  God says
- have you seen my man Job?  Satan challenges Him - take away your
blessings, and see how quickly he loses piety.  God kills Job's children,
and makes boils appear on his body so he can't move.  He argues with his
friends, who try to make a case for God.  In the end, his wife and friends
ask him to give up piety.  In the end God rewards him for his faith.

Then God himself comes in a whirlwind, and answers Job, saying, in essence,
"What do you know about how to run the world?"

But what kind of a boastful God inflicts such pain on the faithful Job?

[Interestingly these stories are more in the Old testament.  If we look at
Indian stories, we find vengeful gods in the Rg veda and also in the
epics - but the Upanishads are gentler. 

Does the vision of an all-powerful vengeful God decreases with civilization]

Three possible assumptions:
	A.  God is all powerful and causes everything
	B.  God is just, rewarding the good and punishing the wicked
	C.  Job is a good person

when faced with a crisis,
friends: abandon assumption C.  But this is not satisfactory for Job.

Kushner : what God's answer is saying is that I try to do good, but it is not
	always possible.
--> abandon assumption A but preserves others

Sometimes there is no reason

Most people look for connections... They convince themselves that God is
cruel, or that they are sinners, rather than accept randomness.
But why do we have to insist on everything being reasonable?  51

Some people find the hand of God in everything
Crash victim in hospital: Now I know there is a God.  If I could come out of
that alive... " 54
... but does God then not want to save the lives of those who don't come out
    of drunken driver collisions and the like? 54

earthquake that destroyed Sodom and Gomorrah  ...  volcano destroyed Pompeii
- seen as God's retribution for a sinful life

consider a jar of marbles, red at bottom, white on top.  more you shake it
the more they'll mix up --> 2nd law of thermodyn; randomness increases

Einstein was also uncomfortable w this aspect of physics (quantum mech) - he
felt God should not be playing dice

The unchanging character of these laws, which makes medicine and astronomy
possible...
[Why are laws called "laws of nature"?  because unlike God's dispensattion,
they act equally on all humans. Why are large devastations "acts of god"?]

Today, we find proof of God precisely in the fact that laws of nature do not
change.  67
[AM: but they do - Newton's laws are no longer valid.  In fact, are there any
 final laws?  We know there aren't any that are complete for some fundamental
 questions of mathematics
Why this need for compact "laws" that explain complex systems?  Why not leave
them as complex, not describable in a law of twenty words or equation of 5
variables?  ]

"Act of God"

Insurance companies / law refers to earthquakes, volcanoes etc.
But these are rather acts of Nature - blind, without values.  The act of
God is that of rebuilding after the calamity, or the rush of others to help
69

As life evolved from the simpler to the more complex, we retained and
inherited some of the weaknesses of those forms. ...
animals have one important advantage over humans.  If something breaks down,
leaving gthe animal weak and crippled, that animal is less likely to mate and
pass on its defective genes to the next generation.  76
[Parents have def genes; baby born w a congenital heart defect; had he died
then, it would have causes some sadness, but in the end they would begin to
put it behind them.  However, owing to the modern medical magic, it survives
and grows up to be bright and cheerful youth; marries,
has children.  Then at age 35 or 40, his genes catch up w him and he dies.
Only this time, it is a shattering tragedy for the wife and ths small
children.  77

IMMORTALITY:
Ulysses: meets Calypso the immortal.  We gradually realizes that she envies
  Ulyseses his mortality - the limited time makes his life more full of
  meaning, his every decision is more significant...

Gulliver's Travels: land of Luggnaggians, once or twice a generation, a
  child is born w a red spot on the forehead - he will never die.  Gulliver
  imagines these children as being the most fortunate people
  imaginable... but when he meets them he realizes that they are in fact the
  most miserable... They grow old and feeble.  Their friends and
  contemporaries die; at age 80, their property is taken and given to their
  children who otherwise wd never inherit it.  Their bodies wither, they
  accumulate grudges and grievances, and become weary of a life they cannot
  leave.

[Indian epics - Vishwamitra? Durga? ]

God leaves us room to be human

BIBLE's VISION OF MAN: TWO STORIES
A. CREATION
At the climax of the creation process, God is represented as saying :"Let us
make Man in our image."  Why the plural - who is the "us"?
Kushner:
In the creation story, God creates plants, fish, birds, animals and beasts.
He says to them: 'Let us arrange for a new kind of creature, a being in our
image, yours and mine.  Like an animal in some ways - needing to eat, to
sleep, to mate -- and like Me in other ways, rising above the animal... I
will breathe a soul into him.  87

B. GARDEN OF EDEN
they are eating fruits of the Tree of LIfe --> immortal
After eating the fruit from the Tree of Knowledge of Godod and Evil, in part
instigated by the serpent, they are punished:
a  They must leave the garden.  they are told that they will now bear
   children and die, instead of living forever.
b. for Eve: "in pain will you bring forth children.
c. Adam: "By the sweat of your brow will you earn your bread."
d. sexual tension between man and woman: "Your desire will be for your
   husband, but he will rule over you."  87
   [they feel the need to put on clothes 92]

Kushner:
Note that the tree is the tree of "Knowledge of Good and Evil".  Humans have
"good" and "evil", animals don't.  [Not too sure of this.]  "Good doggie" is
based on our own convenience, like "good weather".  88

Animals follow their instincts and have very few difficult decisions to make
- they are "programmed" (using a term which no
	one before our generation could have understood).

The 'image of God' in us permits us to say No to instinct on moral grounds.
We can choose not to eat even though we are hungry.  [Yom Kippur, Ramazan,
amAvasya]

The whole story of being human is rising above our animal nature, and
learning to control our instincts. 89

Sexual Tension

Animals: Females come into heat, males are attracted to them, and the species
	is maintained. Nothing could be simpler.
	[But which male and which female --> tension very much exists.]

The punishments - sexual tension among humans - the teenage girl who waits
for a boy to call, the pregnant unmarried woman not wanting to
abort...victims of rape, pornography, etc.

but a sexual relationship can also be full of love and tenderness.  Only
human beings can know love, with all the pain it sometimes involves.

Giving birth is uncomfortable for animals, but not as painful as fpr humans.
[matter of degree]

Working is full of moral dilemmas for humans - fired from a job, lying to
sell a product; the lion merely kills its prey [excessive killing etc?\]

Moral Freedom

why didn't God remove our capacity for evil?  because he wanted the choice to
be ours.  Without the freedom to choose evil, we could also not have chosen
good.

Evil on a grand scale - the Holocaust - happened because Hitler was an
extreme, a very evil man, but also because he could persuade thousands of
others to join him in his madness.
God was with the victims, but he did not interfere with the human's choice of
good and evil.

God helps those who stop hurting themselves

The worst thing to happen to someone hurt by life is to hurt oneself a second
time.

Iranian proverb: If you see a blind man, kick him, why shd you be kinder than
	God?
reason: God has been unkind to him, God wants him to suffer.  Helping him
would be going against God's justice.

But we do this too, all the time.  When someone is hurt, we tell him,
"perhaps you deserved it."  [e.g. Job's three friends, who genuinely wanted
to comfort him.]
Job needed compassion - a sharing of the pain - more than he needed advice.

Job's friends however, did two things right.  a) they came, and b) they
listened.

Once, Kushner had to officiate after two elderly women died.

The first one's son said: "Had I sent her to Florida, she would have still
lived. It's my fault she's dead."

At the second house, the son said, "If only I hadn't insisted on her going
to Florida - it was the stress of the journey... It's my fault she's dead."
107

one myth leads to another:
every event has a cause --> every disaster is our fault.

psychologists speak of the infantile myth of omnipotence.
A baby comes to think that the world exists to meet his needs, and that he
makes everything happen in it. 109