Why Innocent People Suffer

A question that has often come to mind, or that I hear often from even religious individuals, is an age old dilemma in regards to doubt and the questioning of faith in God:

Why do innocent people suffer?

More specifically, why are children stillborn? Why do good people have such horrible things happen to them? Why are young kids contracting turmoil diseases and suffering slow, drawn out deaths?

In order to try and gain an understanding of this, we must consider God and His Creation (us). There are two divergent opinions on this relationship: That God is an independent force, who created us separately, essentially assuming that we are fallen and cut off from God (for the most part). The other opinion is the one that I accept; God is not separate from us, nor we from Him. We are extensions of the Divine, a creation of love out of love from He who is the source of all that is good and lovely.

If we accept the former opinion, then innocent people suffer for mostly unknown reasons. We can explain it as merely being "God's mysterious ways", or that because man has fallen and is inherently sinful that these sorts of things happen.

To me, that isn't adequate. Simply chalking it down to God's will, something we cannot possibly understand, and our inherent sin and corrupted bodies does not really answer this.

However, if we are to look at ourselves as being extensions of God, essentially physical displays of God's will, then it brings up a more interesting question:

Why would God, thus manifesting himself in us, come to Earth just to suffer as a child and ultimately die at an early age? What would be the reason of this?

Perhaps we cannot understand the great Mystery. We cannot truly comprehend the Divine. But we can gain a true appreciation of God's love: He not only came to Earth as Christ Jesus of Nazareth, to suffer and die on the cross, but He manifests his love and will in every child in pain and illness.

Why would He do this? We may never know exactly why until the day we shed our flesh and become one with the Great Architect of the Universe. But the fact that He would manifest in this way, and allow suffering upon Himself through the flesh shows us that we must have the same compassion and love. That there is a reason for all things, and in our suffering upon this physical dimension, we may become greater. We show kindness and selflessness to those who suffer, for as we are manifestations of the Divine, so are those who suffer. And when we help them, and that they should help us in our times of need, we truly are enacting the love that God has and is upon our world.

He suffers through us, and we help those who suffer for Him. This is part of the glorious Mystery.

Usually innocent people suffer at the hands of a controlling class. This can include religious influence, dictatorial governance, military and/or corporate greed, among many other social factors, but those are the big 4.

I truly believe that a world with free clean water, free electricity and worldwide peace is around the corner. I want everyone to enjoy this world, even those who currently take advantage of the innocent.

reply to post by FollowTheWhiteRabbit

Originally posted by FollowTheWhiteRabbit

Why would God, thus manifesting himself in us, come to Earth just to suffer as a child and ultimately die at an early age? What would be the reason of this?

Boredom?

Because everyone has a chance of something bad happening to them, and being innocent doesn't affect the chances of something happening to you. Life is unfair.

I've been debating this in my head recently, I myself have suffered illnesses in my life some that had absolutely no explanation even after spinal taps and extensive therapies....literally the doctors had no idea what was going on, then i just got better out of nowhere. I myself believe in God, but i will have to take the Buddhists approach and say that life is suffering whether it be a child or adult someone in the equation is learning something on a spiritual level. To suffer is to learn, that's how i see it and i believe that may be part of the giant equation cause like you said when we learn we become more accepting of the people whom we see learning or in the process of learning. But honestly I will never know the answer that's just my opinion on the matter, I think that's the beauty of this life, constant chaos when you think things will go one way they will go the other. Keeps me on my toes. S&F

I agree about unfair life.

But IMHO, for those innocent people who died, maybe it's time for them to move for the next stage of learning, in the new life (If you believe in reincarnation).

Innocent? I truly believe no living being in this material reality is innocent. When I say innocent I mean completely selfless, faultless, impeccable, etc. this may or may not apply to alternate realities or "dimensions" that are non-material as well.
In a microscopic point of view, there is constant war and death within our bodies of billions of cells, microbes, bacteria, parasites etc etc. Just the fact that we are alive and are able to survive by destroying and consuming other living beings and that energy is transferred to us in the way of nutrients suggests that we are inherently non-innocent.

In a sense we deserve to suffer for being incarnated in a reality where pain exists. It's the incarnation that brings the pain, although it can be argued that spirit can also experience a type of pain that is not necessarily emotional or biological, and by biological I mean dependent on a central nervous system.

So my conclusion is suffering is probably linked to free will and that fact that you simply....exist.

Originally posted by SpearMint
Because everyone has a chance of something bad happening to them, and being innocent doesn't affect the chances of something happening to you. Life is unfair.

edit on 5-3-2013 by SpearMint because: (no reason given)

i agree with this but i'd go a step further and ask what is fairness anyway? it's just another mental construct we've evolved to use to insure our mutual survival. fairness implies there is someone making a choice. diseases, natural disasters, and the laws of physics have no concept of fairness. it's all just the nature of existence playing itself out. s

Originally posted by homeskillet

Originally posted by SpearMint
Because everyone has a chance of something bad happening to them, and being innocent doesn't affect the chances of something happening to you. Life is unfair.

edit on 5-3-2013 by SpearMint because: (no reason given)

i agree with this but i'd go a step further and ask what is fairness anyway? it's just another mental construct we've evolved to use to insure our mutual survival. fairness implies there is someone making a choice. diseases, natural disasters, and the laws of physics have no concept of fairness. it's all just the nature of existence playing itself out. s

And it's also subjective.

our inherent sin and corrupted bodies does not really answer this

How can you say such a thing about God's work? Is he some second-rate artist?

Secondly, isn't it a grave injustice to see oneself in this manner? Too say we are corrupt and sinful is to say you are without the strength to prove otherwise.

That was quite a long and drawn out explanation, and far fetched if I may say so without sounding rude.

Ever consider Occam's razor? You know... that the simplest explanation is usually the correct one: We evolved out of random chaos and nature isn't perfect. Therefore - illnesses.

Innocent? yea, yea..

It takes much becoming innocent my son. At least for me, and I'm at the age of 30.

I believe the good deeds I do make me return to innocence, or at least is a bond for my sins. Jesus within me only benefits when I act right.

reply to post by Xaphan


If you want to take the wonder and beauty out of the universe, then sure. The universe is just a dumb, chaotic system.

To me the most logical answer is random horrible things happen randomly.

An idiot person that chooses to drink and drive (yes if you make the choice to DUI you are an idiot) happens to be crossing an intersection the same time as a family. Because that idiot is drunk they run a red light and destroy that family.

From the innocent family side a horrible random event just happened .

I starred your post OpethPA.

I think there could be wrong judgement on when people are truly good, and just 'good-looking' but really wolves in sheepclothing.

I like SpearMints contribution too in this thread.

Originally posted by FollowTheWhiteRabbit
reply to post by Xaphan

 

If you want to take the wonder and beauty out of the universe, then sure. The universe is just a dumb, chaotic system.

I'm not trying to say that the universe isn't amazing and interesting. I'm just saying that it's unplanned, random and chaotic. There's no denying that. There's too much imperfection for it to have been created intentionally.

reply to post by Xaphan


Maybe it is random and chaotic. Lets say for argument that in the beginning god was all alone, and she decided to create a universe in order to experience herself and better understand herself from outside perspectives. If this universe were perfect and predetermined it wouldn't be of much use to god since god would know all the outcomes beforehand - therefore there would be no need to create the universe in the first place. Maybe that's why god created a universe where at the quantum level all reactions are based on probabilities.

Since god created this universe, the substance of the universe would have to be god herself. The fact that we are all basically an extension of god would also have to be kept hidden from the inhabitants of the universe. We couldn't know we are god because there again, that would not provide any help or NEW insights to god.

Maybe that's why the universe was created in such a way that we need to feed off one another and compete with one another in order to survive. This necessitates the formation of an individual ego to separate us from god in order to be able to do such "awful" things. For such beings to be able to see past this ego, and indeed find his way back to god, and understand the plan - well this is not something everyone should be able to do right? Because then the game would end.

St. Thomas Aquinas (1225 - 1274 ) basically went through much of this original post's line of thought. If God exists, why does he allow evil to exist?

It seems that God does not exist; because if one of two contraries be infinite, the other would be altogether destroyed. But the name God means that He is infinite goodness. If, therefore, God existed, there would be no evil discoverable; but there is evil in the world. Therefore God does not exist.1

Ultimately, I believe it would be 'the Dumb Ox' from Aquinas this is found in?, he produces that God is so good that he allows evil to exist so that it may make good more good, and so that evil can become good..

if God chooses and should choose a given good, and that good logically implies an accompanying evil, God is not blame-worthy for the evil. For God to choose the good but prevent the evil is a contradiction. The occurrence of the evil, in such a case, is logically necessary, and so God cannot be blamed for it. He would still be all-good, even though this evil were present in his creation.

Thomistic Philosophy Page

The best answer I've ever heard to this question is the Buddhists' idea of karma. Hear me out.

The idea is that our actions have an impact on our mind. Allowing ourselves to succumb to anger and act on it (violence, etc) creates the tendency for our mind to draw itself into anger more easily in the future. That's considered karma in Buddhism. It's also believed to take place on a macro scale. Consciousness continues after death (I think there's a strong case for this, even in quantum mechanics) and the mindstates we've cultivated during our life are remembered. Thus, when a person with a lot of bad karma dies, their consciousness jumps to a new body to continue to have experiences. It's drawn to a body that is in, or will be in, a situation that they can identify with based on their previous mindstates. Thus, a violent and harmful person would die and be reborn in a body where there is a lot of suffering.

This may sound cruel or unjust at first, but it's just the opposite. Only in a body are we given the opportunity to overcome negative mindstates and suffering, and find peace of mind. It's the ultimate form of justice where we are given limitless opportunities to find peace.