Some more on Haiti and the problem of evil, this time from The Rev. Dr Giles Fraser:
The word "theodicy" describes the intellectual attempt to justify the existence of God in the face of human suffering. Coined by Leibniz at the beginning of the eighteenth century, he argued that out of the various possible worlds that God could have created, he might have created the best of these, a world containing less suffering than all the other options available. With this suggestion, Leibniz sought to explain how it's at least logically possible that a merciful God could create a world with the suffering that it has.
And then, in 1755, some years after Leibniz published his famous argument, a massive earthquake hit Lisbon on the morning of the first of November, the popular feast day of All Saints. A 15ft crack opened down the middle of the street. Locals watched the tide disappear only to return as a huge wave that drowned most of the city. 30-40 thousand people were killed.
It was in the face of this terrible disaster that Voltaire came to mount his celebrated attack upon Leibniz in Candide. Voltaire cast Leibniz as the foolish Dr Pangloss, ready to trot out the absurd idea that this is the best of all possible worlds whatever misfortune befell him. The satire was biting. He was claiming that all theologians seem to care about in the face of human misery is getting God off the hook. Theodicy, Voltaire insists, is a moral disgrace and a sick joke.
Well, I have no answer to the question of how God can allow so many innocent people to die in natural disasters, like the earthquakes of Lisbon or Haiti. And indeed, I can quite understand that many will regard these events as proof positive that religious people are living a foolish dream like the idiotic Dr Pangloss.
And yet, I still believe. For there exists a place in me - deeper than my rational self - that compels me to respond to tragedies like Haiti not with argument but with prayer. On a very basic level, what people find in religion is not so much the answers, but a means of responding to and living with life's hardest questions. And this is why a tragedy like this doesn't, on the whole, make believers suddenly wake up to the foolishness of their faith. On the contrary, it mostly tends to deepen our sense of a need for God.
What many believers mean by faith is not that we have a firm foundation in rational justification. Those, like Leibniz, who try to claim this are, I believe, rationalizing something that properly exists on another level. Which is why, at a moment like this, I'd prefer to leave the arguments to others. For me, this is a time quietly to light a candle for the people of Haiti and to offer them up to God in my prayers. May the souls of the departed rest in peace.
The word "theodicy" describes the intellectual attempt to justify the existence of God in the face of human suffering. Coined by Leibniz at the beginning of the eighteenth century, he argued that out of the various possible worlds that God could have created, he might have created the best of these, a world containing less suffering than all the other options available. With this suggestion, Leibniz sought to explain how it's at least logically possible that a merciful God could create a world with the suffering that it has.
And then, in 1755, some years after Leibniz published his famous argument, a massive earthquake hit Lisbon on the morning of the first of November, the popular feast day of All Saints. A 15ft crack opened down the middle of the street. Locals watched the tide disappear only to return as a huge wave that drowned most of the city. 30-40 thousand people were killed.
It was in the face of this terrible disaster that Voltaire came to mount his celebrated attack upon Leibniz in Candide. Voltaire cast Leibniz as the foolish Dr Pangloss, ready to trot out the absurd idea that this is the best of all possible worlds whatever misfortune befell him. The satire was biting. He was claiming that all theologians seem to care about in the face of human misery is getting God off the hook. Theodicy, Voltaire insists, is a moral disgrace and a sick joke.
Well, I have no answer to the question of how God can allow so many innocent people to die in natural disasters, like the earthquakes of Lisbon or Haiti. And indeed, I can quite understand that many will regard these events as proof positive that religious people are living a foolish dream like the idiotic Dr Pangloss.
And yet, I still believe. For there exists a place in me - deeper than my rational self - that compels me to respond to tragedies like Haiti not with argument but with prayer. On a very basic level, what people find in religion is not so much the answers, but a means of responding to and living with life's hardest questions. And this is why a tragedy like this doesn't, on the whole, make believers suddenly wake up to the foolishness of their faith. On the contrary, it mostly tends to deepen our sense of a need for God.
What many believers mean by faith is not that we have a firm foundation in rational justification. Those, like Leibniz, who try to claim this are, I believe, rationalizing something that properly exists on another level. Which is why, at a moment like this, I'd prefer to leave the arguments to others. For me, this is a time quietly to light a candle for the people of Haiti and to offer them up to God in my prayers. May the souls of the departed rest in peace.
Comments
Much better would be to do much of the very little and encourage as many others to do their respective little things in order to create a big wave.
Mine is to complain bitterly of what is looking like a military invasion of a disaster area.
www.richarddawkins.net/articles/4947
I hope we pass the word on to our friends.
"It's time quietly to light a candle.."
'nuff said.
In the past I have had many discussions with religious friends about this, and none of them came up with convincing answers. One in particular - a really impressive woman who did a great many practical good works - devoutly believed that if one laid one's concerns before God, He would take care of them, and that in the end Goodness had the edge over Evil.
If only it were that simple!
Faith, I suppose, means believing against the evidence. A superb recent example was this exchange between the Archbishop of Canterbury and Richard Dawkins in a BBC interview:
DAWKINS: You believe in science?
ARCHBISHOP: Yes.
DAWKINS: But what about the Virgin Birth?
ARCHBISHOP: Oh yes, I believe in that too.
DAWKINS: But isn't that just superstitious nonsense?
ARCHBISHOP: In a very real sense it could be thought of as Nature opening herself up to her own depths.
DAWKINS (incredulously): What on earth does that mean?
ARCHBISHOP: Well nothing I suppose. I was just trying to be poetic.
That's not true. There is no such "place".
That we can choose to interpret signs and determine our actions accordingly; is also a human trait.
I believe God is; that is my opinion.
Haiti needs is a simple truth.
The conversation that anticant
metionned could be found here
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2DcySbAt-l4&feature=PlayList&p=CB1716D775295506&playnext=1&playnext_from=PL&index=6
But it is quite different from the way anticant presented it - so maybe it's not such a great quote - if quoted correctly
I checked it and it's OK - the actual interview starts at 1:32 or thereabouts
It is very odd - and I thought that it is the World Wide Web - a universal thing - it's very strange that the same url would yield two different virtual locations in two different geographical locations - here (in Israel) and there (the UK)
Anyhow - I suggest you just search for "Dawkins interviews Rowan Williams" on youtube and you'll find it
Giles Fraser is one of those people who lambast atheists for not understanding sophisticated theology - the kind that does not have a firm foundation in rational justification.
With regards Fraser's justification, I think the telling phrase is "deeper than my rational self". This clearly refers to his irrational self, but the comparative deeper is used to imply there is something more profound at his core. I say imply, because the statement makes no more sense than saying "hotter than my rational self" or "fatter ..." or "nearer the surface ...". Fraser is saying he is compelled to respond to tragedies with irrational nonsense. Fair enough, I suppose, but hardly a very grown up way to respond.
So God is going to do whatever he wants. There is a "mysterious purpose beyond the ken of our limited human minds......but lets pray anyway! Lets ask him to do stuff and when he does (at about the rate of random chance) then lets thank him for his benevolent divine mercy but when he go right ahead and slaughters thousands well.....lets not try to reason about it, that only leads to realising what a giant heap of steaming dung this religion lark really is, no! instead lets appeal to our deep seeded need for a sky daddy. That will make us feel much better. Cognitive dissonence be damned!!
Praise Jesus! Pray to God that he at least doesn't postumously torture all those people he just killed and lets them 'rest' in peace. God is love and mercy and mystery. God is so gosh darned awesome!
I would say this was more about presenting the problem of evil, shrug with impotence, come around with how religion has a function in giving this reverend some consolation in times when little can be done. When we are confronted with our limitations. In other words. It is just "being poetic" at the same time as he inadvertently gives us an example of one reason why there are religions (around invented anthropomorphic superbeings): because we feel impotent, we try and rationalize that someone else might be able to truly do something about it.
G.E.