Theodicy in the Face of Horror

For godly sorrow worketh repentance to salvation . . . but the sorrow of the world worketh death.

-Paul in 2 Cor. 7:10

With the news reports concerning the young girls in the Amish school being lined up and shot, apparently before the animal holding them had an opportunity to sexually assault them, the chapter entitled "Rebellion" from The Brothers Karamazov has weighed heavily on my mind. In this chapter, Ivan articulates his problem accepting God's existence to his brother Aloysha, an acolyte at the local monastery. I link it here for your review.

How often has a citation to the evils done to children served as evidence against the existence of God or the existence of a kind and just God? Too many times to note. What does the grave injustice done to those poor girls say about God? How could God be both kind, just, and all-powerful, and yet allow things like this to happen?

I select this quote from Brothers, but, implore you to read the whole chapter:

You see, Alyosha, perhaps it really may happen that if I live to that moment, ... I, too, perhaps, may cry aloud with the rest, looking at the mother embracing the child's torturer, "Thou art just, O Lord!" but I don't want to cry aloud then . . . so I renounce the higher harmony altogether. It's not worth the tears of that one tortured child . . . with its unexpiated tears to "dear, kind God"!

This is an issue which must be answered by every serious, thinking person when contemplating the nature of God, i.e. whether God is kind and/or just. Indeed, if someone can not come to a satisfactory conclusion regarding this issue, and other issues that accompany it, that person's faith must be abandoned. This brings up the concept of Theodicy. Theodicy is the "defense of God's goodness and omnipotence in view of the existence of evil" (Webster's Ninth New Collegiate Dictionary).

To stay with The Brothers, in Ivan's view, when horrible things happen to innocent children, justice has been irreparably breached, whether God exists or not. So, even if God does exist, He must be an unjust and unwise God. Alyosha's rebuts that, through Christ and His Atonement, seemingly senseless suffering is expiated and an incomprehensible world is given meaning through His perfect example and sacrifice:

"But there is a Being," the young novice exclaims, "and He can forgive everything, all and for all, because He gave His innocent blood for all and everything. You have forgotten Him . . ."

However, as the next chapter begins, we learn that Ivan has not forgotten Him. Indeed, Ivan, the "metaphysical rebel" shifts into high gear, introducing the figure of the Grand Inquisitor. It is through this Grand Inquisitor that Ivan attempts to prove to Alyosha, and the Christian community, the complete impotence and even deleterious effect of Christ's plan, while, at the same time, setting forth an alternative plan engineered to minimize existing suffering and, most importantly, explain breaches of justice.

The Grand Inquisitor," a "poem in prose" composed by Ivan, takes place in sixteenth century Spain, "in the most terrible time of the Inquisition." In the poem, Christ returns to earth, is admired and worshiped, performs miracles, and even raises someone from the dead, before the Grand Inquisitor appears on the scene, arrests him, takes Him away and locks Him in a prison cell. That night the Grand Inquisitor returns and delivers his accusations against Him, during which Christ does not utter a single word. I will detail the salient points below, but, you would be better served by reading it in its entirety.

The Inquisitor's thesis is as follows:

"Look round and judge; fifteen centuries have passed, look upon them. Whom hast Thou raised up to Thyself? I swear, man is weaker and baser by nature than Thou hast believed him!"

In other words, while the Grand Inquisitor readily acknowledges the salvation of a few elect who have risen above the world and freely chosen to follow the Lord, his question hangs... what of the rest?

"...dost Thou care only for the tens of thousands of the great and strong, while the millions, numerous as the sands of the sea, who are weak but love Thee, must exist only for the sake of the great and strong?"

The Grand Inquisitor, under a self proclaimed love for the "millions" proposes his own alternative plan for its happiness; or, more accurately, for minimizing its suffering:

Socialism, modern man's Tower of Babel, will eventually fail and "end, of course, in cannibalism," at which point man will "crawl, fawning" back to the Inquisitor and his Church, which will then plan the universal happiness of man. Having already taken up the sword of Caesar, they will assume complete control by relieving man of his terrible burden of freedom and providing instead for those most basic needs. "We have corrected Thy work and have founded it upon miracle, mystery, and authority"

The result:

We shall show them that they are weak, that they are only pitiful children, but that childlike happiness is the sweetest of all. . . . And we shall have an answer for all. And they will be glad to believe our answer, for it will save them from the great anxiety and terrible agony they endure at present in making a free decision for themselves. . . . It is prophesied that Thou wilt come again in victory, Thou wilt come with Thy chosen, the proud and strong, but we will say that they have only saved themselves, but we have saved all.

Christ, silent throughout the monologue, responds only with a kiss on the Inquisitor's lips after it is over. "The kiss glows in his heart, but the old man adheres to his idea."

Though Christ's response is powerful in and of itself, it leaves a gaping hole in the heart and mind of anyone desiring to provide an explicit answer to Ivan's rebellion and accusation. The force of the argument in this pair of chapters is enough to weaken the staunchest believer. In raising the issue of the suffering of children, Ivan has touched upon an existing injustice which is absolutely unanswerable from a rational point of view. By the end of the chapters, Ivan's logic has forced Alyosha to admit that he would not consent to the creation of "a fabric of human destiny with the object of making men happy in the end, giving them peace and rest at last, but that it was essential and inevitable to torture to death only one tiny creature . . . and to found that edifice on its unavenged tears" what seems to be God's plan of salvation.

One can not blame Alyosha for this concession however. If he had, he would have lost his image of God and ceased to be a man. Alyosha's one and only response to the charge levied in "Rebellion" was the image and gospel of Christ, but Ivan's "Grand Inquisitor" dismissed this argument clearly, even self-evidently, as contraty to the best interests of the vast majority of mankind. More importantly, Ivan's argument is not based on crafty rhetoric, idle word games or loose associations. Logic is on Ivan's side. I have tried, for many nights, to refute the logic of Ivan's arguments and have failed time and time again.

However, in my attempts to refute the logic of the argument head-on like the attorney I am, I missed the point entirely. The subtle response, of whether the existence of suffering for the purpose of the "spiritual progress" of man is justified, is set forth by the dying Father Zosima in his last words to Alyosha and the other members of the monastery shortly before his death. Like Ivan's, Zossima's response develops from the elder's own metaphysical reality. However, Father Zosima's God is kind and just. He is one with Christ, whose sinless life set the example for everyone:

"The Word is for all. All creation and all creatures, every leaf is striving to the Word, singing glory to God, weeping to Christ, unconsciously accomplishing this by the mystery of their sinless life."

The question of suffering still remains for Zosima to answer, however, since he starts from a different premise, Zosima's response ends with an entirely different conclusion. As God is kind and just, any suffering which takes place must, by necessity, be the fault of man. However, since the lives of all people are interwoven, it is impossible to distinguish one or even a handful of people to put the blame on them.

"[A]ll is like an ocean, all is flowing and blending; a touch in one place sets up movement at the other end of the earth".

In other words, according to Zosima, everyone shares in everyone's guilt, all of us are to blame for each others' transgressions.

Do not say, "Sin is mighty, wickedness is mighty, evil environment is mighty, and we are lonely and helpless. . . ." Fly from that dejection, children! There is only one means of salvation, then take yourself and make yourself responsible for all men's sins, . . . for as soon as you sincerely make yourself responsible for everything and for all men, you will see at once that it is really so, and that you are to blame for everyone and for all things.

How does this help me when I think of those children, lined up facing a blackboard, with their ankles bound, who were executed by a pederast? Ivan looked to an outward, logical, objective (Platonic?) standard by which to judge God for the horrible acts committed on Earth. In so doing, Ivan places himself in the role a superior lover and defender of all mankind than God. In essence, Ivan proclaims he knows right from wrong better than God, and passes judgment accordingly. Zosima does not look to such an objective standard. Rather than holding justice to an objective standard, Zosima provokes us to look inwardly into ourselves so that the focus is removed from a idealized "Justice", which is left to God, and placed squarely upon each person, who must do what he can to lessen his own blame.

Again, how does this help me when I think of those children, lined up facing a blackboard, with their ankles bound, who were executed by a pederast? I admit that I am not am not sure. However, I do know that Dostoevsky's two paradigms mirror real life. In real life, both good and evil continually strive, slowly approaching a resolution whose outcome is not readily apparent to me. However, if we all think about those horrible acts, in a serious and meaningful way, the spiritual development harnessed in us all might, just might, make sense of it. Indeed, as Dostoevsky reminds us in the very beginning of his book:

"Most certainly I tell you, unless a grain of wheat falls into the earth and dies, it remains by itself alone. But if it dies, it bears much fruit."

-John 12:24

The power of the example set by those two paradigms brings to a fine point the extreme narrowness of the victory of good over evil. While the margin for hope is vaporously thin, it remains pure and distinct....I think.