The problem of evil; if God is all good how could he allow his people to suffer? This has been a controversial topic many people have questioned over the centuries. The first record of this question is dated back to the Greek philosopher Epicurus. If God is a benevolent, omniscient and omnipotent God, how could he allow such horrible things to happen to good people? "Western religion has always held that there is a deep problem about why there is pain and other suffering—which there would not be if God were not supposed to be morally good" Richard Swinburne, Providence and the Problem of Evil pg.7 1998. It is only natural for people to question why God would seemingly do nothing to prevent the bad things that happen everyday. Some of the …show more content…
Others argue that because God has given humans free will to make our own choices, people can choose to do bad things that may inflict harm and hurt good people. Then, there is also the belief that bad things happen because God has a greater plan for the greater good and although some are harmed by this, it the end it is for the best possible solution and we must have faith in this because God is all knowing.
When we are faced with tragedy or pain, we often try to figure out why something like this would happen. We look for someone or something to blame, and it is often ourselves. Sometimes we say this is happening as punishment for my previous wrong doings. When a mass of people of a same faith, race or simply located in the same region are affected by a singular act, we blame the sins of our ancestors for such punishment. The Holocaust was the one of the most memorable events where a group of people were persecuted due to their faith. They were incarcerated in prison camps, tortured, separated from …show more content…
3. God gave us free will, this means that we can act on our discretions and knowingly choose to do right or wrong. We see in the Bible that God provides us with the Ten Commandments as guidelines of what is right or wrong. Jesus also tells us in the Bible that if we choose to have faith and believe in God our father and abide by the rules of God and choose to do good, we will see the kingdom of God. We hear throughout history of so many awful acts done by individuals. We see on the news everyday that there is a shooting somewhere, a murder, a child being abused by someone, animal cruelty, or hate crimes against people of a certain race or religion. These are all examples of things we know to be wrong or "bad". Yet the people who choose to do these things have the free will to choose that path. When someone is faced with the loss of their child due to a shooting at a school, in their grief they may question why God would allow such a horrible act to have happened. They may feel anger because we are taught to have faith that God will protect us from harm. So how could he have allowed this to happen? It appears that although God is all-powerful, he cannot sway our free will one way or another. This is a hard concept to digest in the moment of such a tragedy. The truth of the matter remains that humans can choose to do