Again I saw all the oppressions that are done under the sun. And behold, the tears of the oppressed, and they had no one to comfort them! On the side of their oppressors there was power, and there was no one to comfort them. And I thought the dead who are already dead more fortunate than the living who are still alive. But better than both is he who has not yet been and has not seen the evil deeds that are done under the sun. - Ecclesiastes 4:1-3
There are few things more unsettling to the human conscience, that are more morally outrageous than observing the strong exploiting the weak. In The Brothers Karamazov, Ivan—the intelligent skeptic—explains that when looking at all the evidence, it seems almost certain that God exists. Yet, he rejects any faith because of the problem of evil, because of the suffering of children in particular: “I’d rather remain with my unrequited suffering and unquenched indignation, even if I’m wrong.”
Maybe you have an inner Ivan Karamazov in you—maybe you hear stories of brutality and suffering that makes something inside of you say: God, could you really permit this? Could a good God really exist and this happen?
What do you do with that?
The Head
Well, an intellectual response is to ask yourself: If there is no God, if we have only come into existence through chance and survival of the fittest, then my moral outrage is just a by-product of my social conditioning which has habituated me into thinking that children and the elderly and disabled shouldn’t be treated this way, but were I in a different social environment, I’d likely have a different set of moral values—in fact, the reason that my species, my clan, my family exists today is through the strong dominating the weak. Why then do I recoil at it now? Why is oppression wrong now when it was the mechanism that has brought me to where I am today?
That’s a rational argument you can work with.
The Heart
But here is another kind of argument—when you look out at a broken world of injustice and say: This is horrible! Know that you can find the same response in the Bible.
Solomon looks out at the injustice in the world and is likewise morally outraged. Sometimes, skeptics who attempt to use the problem of evil to disprove the existence of God or invalidate Christianity assume that the Bible presents a Disneyland perspective on life: God loves you and has a wonderful plan for your life! And the skeptic thinks that by pointing out the stories of children dying at the hands of abusive step-parents they are puncturing the balloon of the naivety of Christianity. Look at how despicable this world is?
But Solomon, under the inspiration of the Holy Spirit, sees the injustice of the world and then claims: “You’re right. It is despicable. Death—nonexistence even—is better.” His heart is so torn at the plight of the oppressed that he admits that at least the grave covers us from no longer having to observe the pain. That response takes some of the wind out of the skeptics sails. It demonstrates that the version of Christianity that they were attacking is, in fact, a straw-man.
Faith is not turning a blind eye to the tragedies of this world. It is not confidently explaining how all the bad is really good if you just squint hard enough. It is true: God knows how to fold even the darkest of deeds into His good plan, He sees all ends—but we don’t. We are to trust Him, yes. But, God also inspired Solomon to pen these words, which tells us that of all the possible responses to the problem of evil, one of them is to collapse in sorrow and admit that it is unspeakably wrong and inexplicably confusing. In other words, God too sits on the curb with us at the scene of the drunk-driving accident and weeps (John 11:35).
That doesn’t answer every attack of the skeptic, of course—but it does demonstrate that the Bible has a much more mature, sophisticated approach to the problem of evil. And it also shows that human beings need more than rational answers to problems as personal as pain and suffering. Sometimes, what we need most is to know: God, do you care about this? Solomon’s jarring response shows us that God Himself is, mysteriously and ineffably, heartbroken by evil.