Can God Face Up To Evil? | Episode 1009 | Closer To Truth

If I seek God and avoid "the problem of evil," I fool myself. If there is a God, evil is God's hardest problem. If there is no God, evil is No-God's easiest evidence. Featuring interviews with John Hick, Stephen Law, Paul Fiddes, Anthony Grayling, and Robert Russell.

Season 10, Episode 9 - #CloserToTruth

Closer To Truth host Robert Lawrence Kuhn takes viewers on an intriguing global journey into cutting-edge labs, magnificent libraries, hidden gardens, and revered sanctuaries in order to discover state-of-the-art ideas and make them real and relevant.

Closer to Truth presents the world’s greatest thinkers exploring humanity’s deepest questions. Discover fundamental issues of existence. Engage new and diverse ways of thinking. Appreciate intense debates. Share your own opinions. Seek your own answers.

#God #Evil

[robotaholic]

The universe is so vast and things are so old it seems dumb to think a god exists that has feelings like love or anxiety like we do. If a god exists, it is so alien and different than us that human emotions probably don't apply.

[andrewferg]

In the early 1980's, Australian philosopher and atheist J.L. Mackie wrote, “Since this defense is formally possible, and its principle involves no real abandonment of our ordinary view of the opposition between good and evil, we can concede that the problem of evil does not, after all, show that the central doctrines of theism are logically inconsistent with one another.”

[followyourbliss]

It's hard to accept a God that lays such a heavy burden on humans to understand the evil and suffering in the world.

[andrewferg]

It is the nature of Being to give of Itself--- to Love. Love is a creative act that need not entail suffering. Love in a void however is excruciating. For to overcome evil with good is to give to an endless vacuum. Christ on the Cross is not simply an example of this but is the very person of God-- for God is Love. God gives continually even to the point of death and hell.

[bloggerfromthefuture]

If the afterlife is eternal and free of suffering, then this life is no more than an infinitely small point on an infinitely long line. That's as close to no suffering and no evil as you can get.

[RjeanUrah]

I really wish this would cover more than just abrahamic or atheist views. There are so many religions of the world, and i would've love to hear their side as well.

[zsaxeshed]

Keep on that journey, I'm right behind you, we cant stop now Mr.Frodo

[gunbostrom]

Yes....reality is a place of soul making and a person making, the world must not be a paradise .. an earth with no obstacles, nothing to challenge us would not do.. it has to be difficulties to be overcome, because its these that are person- making ... yes that makes sense...and also that we are here to find out who am I ? because I know deep down thru my reactions and choices and actions here in life the truth about me. And we need to learn to be honest...Yes I believe there is a meaning for us to be here and now... all do have a meaning but it might seem very random.. but even in the random is a progress and shaping. All is for a reason, but I think nobody and no teachings have THE truth... I try to be honest to my self and not a blind follower of trends, leaders, doctrines and teachings but still listen to them all and I love christianity as I find a depth there that one can miss at first sight. And I do believe we need science for our progress in this realm of nature, even science has to truly be honest, true and NOT follow leaders or let money be the leading force.

[cvsree]

Suffering exists as long as we don't realize God
Everyone is destined to realize God eventually

[dennistucker]

I have an equation that describes evil. Evil = (Complete Knowledge * Complete Ability) - (Current Knowledge * Current Ability). Good video...love CTT.

[brianedsforth]

From my perspective good and evil are moral judgments that we place on the things and people we perceive with our minds through our senses. There fore God is neither all Good or all evil but who like us, who are made in his image, is a moral agent who veiws and perceives things through a moral lens. Natural events that cause suffering are not evil but just events which we call evil because of the suffering experieced as the result of those events.

[buddhaneosiddhananda]

All power comes from God. The darkness gets its power from light, so God will defeat a foe that is weaker than him...

[divinewind]

No such thing as good without bad (evil)

[jamesruscheinski]

Does good(ness) of God grow in a number of ways, with evil being the lack of growing good? Does evil have something to do with the transition of good from potential to actual?

[mintakan]

The universe is born of chaos. ("Evil" is just our interpretation of it.). The natural tendency is towards entropy. To have life, you have to buck this trend. There is "self" and "other". The bacterial cell has a cell wall separating "self" and "environment". It's a constant struggle for survival, to maintain this separation, maintain the integrity of the organism. Evolution is a competition (sometime cooperation) for survival. The Meeseeks in Rick and Morty state that "Existence is pain". The fact of suffering is the first noble truth in Buddhism. (This also comes closest to Robert Russell's point about thermodynamics.)

[garybalatennis]

Thank you for another thoughtful contribution in your video series.

My take.

The problem of evil, especially natural evil, is far too powerful and compelling to do anything but extinguish the theodicies and the argument for “God”, as TRADITIONALLY DEFINED.

Such a being, entity, force, source or primordial reality could not exist and be either All Powerful or All Good or both.

That leaves open either 1. No God, or 2. No God as we know it.

I am less persuaded about the theoretical postulate of an AFTERLIFE. Or that it somehow changes the rules of the game and allows for a traditionally-defined God.

A distant, undefined and unproven Afterlife is a weak argument in my view. I think it cannot justify the pain and horror of the evil of the here and now.

Any justification has to be far deeper and more profound, if it exists at all.

But that is a discussion for another day. For now, I feel that we’re inching closer to truth.

Thanks again for the video.

[johnbaker]

One of the principal keys behind suffering and evil is free will. The Genesis story about the fall illustrates this very clearly. That freedom was offered to Adam and Eve in the garden. Evil entered the world because man chose to have Knowledge of good and evil. This was moral evil that ended up with man committing all the evils which in turn ended up with mans journey back to God through Abraham and the Ten Commandments instituted by God through Moses. Throughout the Old Testament the main theme is about Gods Love. This is clearly illustrated in the Biblical narratives the prophets, the wisdom literature and psalms etc. Finally God's Love was exemplified through His Son The Lord Jesus Christ. God was willing to share in the suffering of mankind by allowing His Own Son to be nailed to a Cross. The beauty is that we still have that freedom that was offered to the first Adam to chose The Way, The Truth, and The Life. For God so loved the world. Praise God. Amen. Thanks for reading. John B.

[dennyworthington]

“It was miraculous. It was almost no trick at all, he saw, to turn vice into virtue and slander into truth, impotence into abstinence, arrogance into humility, plunder into philanthropy, thievery into honor, blasphemy into wisdom, brutality into patriotism, and sadism into justice. Anybody could do it; it required no brains at all. It merely required no character.”
― Joseph Heller, Catch-22

[timothymeeks]

From the depths of my heart...I say this...I know nothing... intellectually...it has broken me...but my opinion for whatever it's worth...I would choose non-existence.

[afjajul]

Why should I participate in a classroom where what teacher teaches is beyond my comprehension.... If I am an intelligent being i must be able to understand