“Well I Wouldn’t Start From Here”
Earlier this year I was asked about my
perspectives on Theodicy, which inspired me to want to write a series of
reflections on suffering and evil.
Theodicy, of course, is the age-old question: “If God is good, whence
evil.” Theodicy comes from “Theo” or God and “dike” or justice. When
beginning to talk about God’ Justice in the light of human suffering and evil
the most important question I think is, “Where to begin?”
I am reminded of a story when I was just a bit
younger and riding on my motorcycle in Western Virginia. I was a bit lost, and wanted to find a way to
get back onto Skyline Drive (a beautiful drive along the Blue Ridge Mountains,
I recommend it). At the time I still had
a flip-phone, so it had no GPS, and besides I was on a motorcycle so GPS would
not have helped anyway. I stopped at a rundown gas/gift shop and humbled myself
to ask directions. I walked in and saw
an older man with a brown and white beard, wearing overalls and a red flannel
shirt, and after some short polite banter about my motorcycle and the weather I
asked “how do you get to Skyline Drive from here?” I will never forget how his response started,
“well, I wouldn’t start from here…”
I feel that is the perfect line to begin this
topic. The questions of theodicy are so
broad, and it can be approached in so many different ways we are bound to find
ourselves disjointed with any systematic approach. No matter how it is approached some will say,
“Yes!! Finally! This is where I am at, and where I am coming from, but….!” While others will say, “What is
he talking about? He is not even
answering the questions I have, but…?”
In Theological Studies, I believe the branch of Theodicy to be different from other branches of theology. Soteriology, Eschatology, Christology,
Epistemology, Metaphysics, etc. all are very cerebral, they are academic. Theodicy is different, because Theodicy has
to do with suffering, and suffering smacks our souls hard with our fragility,
our mortality, and if we let it, our humanity.
When we discuss Theodicy we are not asking lofty questions on the nature
of Scripture or Virgin Births, but we are asking questions regarding human
suffering; the pain of others, and inevitably our own pain. We all encounter suffering in some way as
human beings. The other branches of
theology can be discarded if one is not a Christian, but you cannot discard the
experience of suffering from the human condition. This makes Theodicy a very personal theology;
we ask these questions mainly out of our vulnerability…and if we don’t, then we
risk a very artificial theology when it comes to suffering and evil.
So where we do go from here? I will start us on the Classical Approach…we
will first head to the Book of Job. From
Job we will briefly explore suffering in Scripture and in history and God’s
apparent silence. We will look at
Post-Holocaust Jewish Theodicy and ask the question: “Is God Abusive?”
We will then continue with reflections on
Jesus of Nazareth, the mystery of the Incarnation, His Death, and His
Resurrection. Finally, we will end with
an approach to suffering from the perspective of Christian Spirituality.
I hope in this journey you will allow yourself to get
lost, as I often do…and then perhaps to have some hope, even if it may only be a fool’s hope.
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