Can an all-good/all-powerful God allow evil/suffering?
Posted: 21 Apr 2011, 16:49
Hi all,
Here is part of an essay debunking and exposing Christianity that I'm working on. Let me know what you think.
http://www.debunkingskeptics.com/Christian_Problems.htm
Here is something inescapable. It is a valid and logical argument that Atheists and Anti-Christian writers (e.g. Thomas Pain, Robert Ingersoll, Bertrand Russell) have used throughout history that Christians and theists have never been able to debunk or explain away logically.
Now, we all know that there are billions of people suffering in the world, most of whom are innocent, both now and throughout history. And we all know that evil sociopaths often go unpunished and attain positions of power more often than good people do (since power attracts evil rather than good). Therefore, it is logically impossible for there to be a God who is both all-powerful and all-good, as the Christians claim, and yet allows all this to be so. Logically, such a deity would not allow the suffering of billions of innocent people throughout history, nor allow evil sociopaths to constantly attain the majority of positions of power and go unpunished (while the good die young). There is no escape from this dilemma.
To put this in perspective:
1) Billions of innocent people are suffering in the world, both now and throughout history.
2) Evil is allowed to exist, run rampant, and attain positions of power in the majority of cases, more often than good virtuous people do.
3) God is all-powerful and all-good, yet allows #1 and #2 to exist, both now and throughout history.
All three of the above CANNOT logically co-exist at the same time. The only logical possibilities are:
1) God is not that powerful. (if so, then how did he create the whole universe?)
2) God is evil, or not good, or doesn't care.
3) God doesn't exist.
4) God is nothing like what you think he is, or is something beyond your comprehension.
5) God lets suffering and evil exist for reasons beyond your comprehension, and/or does not have the same morals that you do. Thus he does not do what you would do if you were him.
The standard Christian explanation for the above makes no sense at all and is a ridiculous cop-out:
"God allows evil and suffering to exist in the world because Man chose to Sin in the Garden of Eden. God gave Man freewill, and Mankind chose Sin. Hence death, pain, decay and evil entered into the world. God is 100 percent just and righteous, so all this is Mankind's fault, not God's. It says so in the Bible."
I'm sorry but these are mere words and just do not cut it. They make ZERO SENSE and the implications of it are 100 percent ridiculous too. Anyone who takes such an explanation seriously must either be completely insane and lost his marbles, or is completely brainwashed and mind-controlled, in order to accept something that makes zero sense as Gospel Truth.
What the standard Christian explanation implies is that:
"A good and all-knowing God allowed billions of people throughout history to suffer, die, and go to hell (if they died unsaved) simply because two naive people named Adam and Eve took a bite of the fruit of a forbidden tree in the Garden of Eden. In other words, one little mistake (or bite) caused a lifetime and eternity of pain for billions of people, and deservedly so, which all-wise and all-good God allowed."
Um excuse me, but even if I were on crack, I wouldn't buy such an insane explanation. I'd sooner believe that Santa Claus visits every home in the world in one night on Christmas Eve than that! Come on now. Gimme a break. Get real! I mean, I know you don't have to be intelligent to be a Christian, but really... Anyhow, that's their version of reality, which they take seriously, believe it or not.
Not only is this explanation 1000 percent insane, but it is 1000 percent UNJUST as well. I mean, what kind of a parent would allow their children to suffer pain and death (not to mention damnation) as a consequence of taking a bite out of a fruit that you told them not to touch? It doesn't make any sense! Wouldn't such a parent be the most evil and sociopathic parent in the world? (Yet a God who is 100 percent perfect and righteous would do that?!) There is no escaping that. There is no way in hell (pardon the pun) that one little mistake could be worth a lifetime or eternity of pain. No way. No Christian in the world could justify that. It is completely unjustifiable, insane, nonsensical, and there is no logical reason to believe it either.
Yet Christians take this explanation seriously?! And they believe in a 100 percent righteous and just God too?! WTF?! This is nothing short of pure and total mind control. No question about it.
Besides, how do they know that God is 100 percent righteous and just? Because the Bible says so? And that alone makes it true?! Gee, what low standards. I mean, how do they know that Satan isn't the good guy and God the bad guy? They don't! All they can do is believe whatever someone TELLS them, and labels the rest as "lies of Satan". But life teaches us that things are not always what they seem, life teaches us. They simply take it on faith, that the Bible is all true because it is, and that's that. It's the weakest logic of all.
Also, why does Lucifer/Satan wanting a little freedom when he was an angel of God make him 100 percent evil? Teenagers naturally want some freedom from their parents too, but does that make them 100 percent evil and demonic? You see how nonsensical all of this is? Nothing in the Christian fundamentalist version of reality makes the slightest bit of sense...
Plus, if I were an all-knowing God and knew BEFORE I created the world that the majority of the people on Earth would suffer through life and end up in the eternal torment of hell afterward (since most people do not become Christians in their lifetime), I would certainly not create such a world. No sane person would create something knowing in advance that the bad that would come out of it would far exceed the good. No sane person would go through with that, let alone an all-wise God. Think about it: If you knew before setting up a business that you'd incur a loss of $75,000 and reap only $25,000 in profit (based on 1/4 of the world's population claiming to be Christians), would you go through with it? Get real.
So you see, nothing about the Christian version of reality makes any sense at all, in any way at all, once you look at it with a clear mind free of fear and mind control. There are way too many irresolvable problems with it.
In fact, many ex-Christians report in their deconversion testimonials that while they were believers, such logical impossibilities and unresolvable questions as the above, kept entering their minds from time to time. But since they could not be satisfactorily explained away, they had to be mentally filed away on a mental shelf labeled "Unresolvable". However, eventually, such unresolvable questions accumulated until they became too heavy to ignore and deny any longer. At some point, their "mental shelf" simply broke and they could no longer live in denial anymore. It was only then, that the mind control imposed on them by Christianity broke down, and they were finally set free from it.
(One great example of this is my friend Darryl Sloan, an aware skeptic, freethinker and author who described many such logical impossibilities in Christianity in his YouTube videos, which you can see at http://www.youtube.com/darrylsloan. And my own Christian deconversion story is at http://www.debunkingskeptics.com/Christian_Story.htm)
So why do Christians believe such extreme things then? If you ask them about it, their mind-controlled condition will become very apparent, as they say things like "Because God says so in his word, the Bible, which is his revelation to us" and "Because it's true, and truth is self-apparent once you've woken up to it" etc. However, the same could be said about any religion or belief system. So what makes theirs any truer than others? In short, they believe it because they were TOLD TO BELIEVE IT, but they don't really realize that. They simply think "The truth is the truth, and that's that" so they do not question it (nor are they taught to) and do not think freely for themselves either. Their reasoning is 100 percent circular, and besides that, their beliefs do not even have a valid INITIAL FOUNDATIONAL BASIS either (which doesn't cross their mind).
Here is part of an essay debunking and exposing Christianity that I'm working on. Let me know what you think.
http://www.debunkingskeptics.com/Christian_Problems.htm
Here is something inescapable. It is a valid and logical argument that Atheists and Anti-Christian writers (e.g. Thomas Pain, Robert Ingersoll, Bertrand Russell) have used throughout history that Christians and theists have never been able to debunk or explain away logically.
Now, we all know that there are billions of people suffering in the world, most of whom are innocent, both now and throughout history. And we all know that evil sociopaths often go unpunished and attain positions of power more often than good people do (since power attracts evil rather than good). Therefore, it is logically impossible for there to be a God who is both all-powerful and all-good, as the Christians claim, and yet allows all this to be so. Logically, such a deity would not allow the suffering of billions of innocent people throughout history, nor allow evil sociopaths to constantly attain the majority of positions of power and go unpunished (while the good die young). There is no escape from this dilemma.
To put this in perspective:
1) Billions of innocent people are suffering in the world, both now and throughout history.
2) Evil is allowed to exist, run rampant, and attain positions of power in the majority of cases, more often than good virtuous people do.
3) God is all-powerful and all-good, yet allows #1 and #2 to exist, both now and throughout history.
All three of the above CANNOT logically co-exist at the same time. The only logical possibilities are:
1) God is not that powerful. (if so, then how did he create the whole universe?)
2) God is evil, or not good, or doesn't care.
3) God doesn't exist.
4) God is nothing like what you think he is, or is something beyond your comprehension.
5) God lets suffering and evil exist for reasons beyond your comprehension, and/or does not have the same morals that you do. Thus he does not do what you would do if you were him.
The standard Christian explanation for the above makes no sense at all and is a ridiculous cop-out:
"God allows evil and suffering to exist in the world because Man chose to Sin in the Garden of Eden. God gave Man freewill, and Mankind chose Sin. Hence death, pain, decay and evil entered into the world. God is 100 percent just and righteous, so all this is Mankind's fault, not God's. It says so in the Bible."
I'm sorry but these are mere words and just do not cut it. They make ZERO SENSE and the implications of it are 100 percent ridiculous too. Anyone who takes such an explanation seriously must either be completely insane and lost his marbles, or is completely brainwashed and mind-controlled, in order to accept something that makes zero sense as Gospel Truth.
What the standard Christian explanation implies is that:
"A good and all-knowing God allowed billions of people throughout history to suffer, die, and go to hell (if they died unsaved) simply because two naive people named Adam and Eve took a bite of the fruit of a forbidden tree in the Garden of Eden. In other words, one little mistake (or bite) caused a lifetime and eternity of pain for billions of people, and deservedly so, which all-wise and all-good God allowed."
Um excuse me, but even if I were on crack, I wouldn't buy such an insane explanation. I'd sooner believe that Santa Claus visits every home in the world in one night on Christmas Eve than that! Come on now. Gimme a break. Get real! I mean, I know you don't have to be intelligent to be a Christian, but really... Anyhow, that's their version of reality, which they take seriously, believe it or not.
Not only is this explanation 1000 percent insane, but it is 1000 percent UNJUST as well. I mean, what kind of a parent would allow their children to suffer pain and death (not to mention damnation) as a consequence of taking a bite out of a fruit that you told them not to touch? It doesn't make any sense! Wouldn't such a parent be the most evil and sociopathic parent in the world? (Yet a God who is 100 percent perfect and righteous would do that?!) There is no escaping that. There is no way in hell (pardon the pun) that one little mistake could be worth a lifetime or eternity of pain. No way. No Christian in the world could justify that. It is completely unjustifiable, insane, nonsensical, and there is no logical reason to believe it either.
Yet Christians take this explanation seriously?! And they believe in a 100 percent righteous and just God too?! WTF?! This is nothing short of pure and total mind control. No question about it.
Besides, how do they know that God is 100 percent righteous and just? Because the Bible says so? And that alone makes it true?! Gee, what low standards. I mean, how do they know that Satan isn't the good guy and God the bad guy? They don't! All they can do is believe whatever someone TELLS them, and labels the rest as "lies of Satan". But life teaches us that things are not always what they seem, life teaches us. They simply take it on faith, that the Bible is all true because it is, and that's that. It's the weakest logic of all.
Also, why does Lucifer/Satan wanting a little freedom when he was an angel of God make him 100 percent evil? Teenagers naturally want some freedom from their parents too, but does that make them 100 percent evil and demonic? You see how nonsensical all of this is? Nothing in the Christian fundamentalist version of reality makes the slightest bit of sense...
Plus, if I were an all-knowing God and knew BEFORE I created the world that the majority of the people on Earth would suffer through life and end up in the eternal torment of hell afterward (since most people do not become Christians in their lifetime), I would certainly not create such a world. No sane person would create something knowing in advance that the bad that would come out of it would far exceed the good. No sane person would go through with that, let alone an all-wise God. Think about it: If you knew before setting up a business that you'd incur a loss of $75,000 and reap only $25,000 in profit (based on 1/4 of the world's population claiming to be Christians), would you go through with it? Get real.
So you see, nothing about the Christian version of reality makes any sense at all, in any way at all, once you look at it with a clear mind free of fear and mind control. There are way too many irresolvable problems with it.
In fact, many ex-Christians report in their deconversion testimonials that while they were believers, such logical impossibilities and unresolvable questions as the above, kept entering their minds from time to time. But since they could not be satisfactorily explained away, they had to be mentally filed away on a mental shelf labeled "Unresolvable". However, eventually, such unresolvable questions accumulated until they became too heavy to ignore and deny any longer. At some point, their "mental shelf" simply broke and they could no longer live in denial anymore. It was only then, that the mind control imposed on them by Christianity broke down, and they were finally set free from it.
(One great example of this is my friend Darryl Sloan, an aware skeptic, freethinker and author who described many such logical impossibilities in Christianity in his YouTube videos, which you can see at http://www.youtube.com/darrylsloan. And my own Christian deconversion story is at http://www.debunkingskeptics.com/Christian_Story.htm)
So why do Christians believe such extreme things then? If you ask them about it, their mind-controlled condition will become very apparent, as they say things like "Because God says so in his word, the Bible, which is his revelation to us" and "Because it's true, and truth is self-apparent once you've woken up to it" etc. However, the same could be said about any religion or belief system. So what makes theirs any truer than others? In short, they believe it because they were TOLD TO BELIEVE IT, but they don't really realize that. They simply think "The truth is the truth, and that's that" so they do not question it (nor are they taught to) and do not think freely for themselves either. Their reasoning is 100 percent circular, and besides that, their beliefs do not even have a valid INITIAL FOUNDATIONAL BASIS either (which doesn't cross their mind).