The Problem of Pain - Essay Example

? The Problem of Pain From time immemorial people have struggled with the issue of evil and of human suffering. For some, these problems invali any belief in the supernatural or in a deity. For others, they qualify such belief. And for still others they are left unresolved as they continue on with their faith. These are some of the oldest and most difficult questions in any theology, and in his book The Problem of Pain, C.S. Lewis tackles them head-on. He explains how they formed the cornerstone of his early atheism and how he began to see them differently as he adopted the Anglican faith. Throughout the book Lewis uses very persuasive and precise arguments to make his case. At the beginning of Chapter Two, Lewis examines the problem of pain. The argument is based on some contradictory premises: 1. Because God is good and all powerful, he would want to create a good world 2. The world is not good 3. God is therefore either not good or not all powerful Lewis examines these premises throughout Chapter two and decides the issue is more nuanced. Words like “omnipotence” are problematic, as is the word “goodness.” Our words and terms do not really fit God, in all his glory. We cannot be expected to understand the mysterious ways of the universe, Lewis argues. Essentially this is an argument about faith. Lewis seems to be saying: If you don't really understand things, just trust the priests to understand it for you. These premises rely on a number of logical leaps that Lewis uses throughout his argument. For example, he looks back over history and concludes that religious feeling has always been with us. From the dawn of humanity people have believed in something larger than themselves. At first their knowledge of these phenomena was far from perfect and they mistook all sort of occurrences as signs of divine power. Now nothing is more certain than that man, from a very early period, began to believe that the universe was haunted by spirits . . . It is therefore theoretically possible that there was a time when men regarded these spirits simply as dangerous and felt towards them just as they felt towards tigers. What is certain is that now, at any rate, the numinous experience exists and that if we start from ourselves we can trace it a long way back (15). This is an interesting observation, but it would have been best to explore what a numinous experience really is. Is it an actually transaction with the supernatural? Or is it something physiological? Without an understanding about the reality of mystical experiences it is hard to go much further with this. There are for example, studies which suggest the commonly observed phenomenon in near-death experiences—a white light at a tunnel—is a physiological reaction that can be replicated by cutting off oxygen to the brain. Is this too a numinous experience? He asks us to expand on our definitions of goodness and omnipotence while narrowing the possible explanations for phenomena in the world. Indeed, as Lewis explains: The problem of pain is a problem about the order of the universe. As Lewis puts it, Christianity is not a solution to the problem, but in fact brings the problem into question as it promises something better than pain: “for pain would be no problem unless, side by side with our daily experience of this painful world, we had received what we think a good assurance that ultimate reality is righteous and loving” (21). So how has Christianity promised any of this? Those who believe pain dominates all, argue that it cannot and that it is a sham. But Lewis does not believe this. The argument Lewis makes can be generalized by saying that humans do have a power over their lives and are not part of a clockwork universe. They choose how to live and who to obey. If they wish to turn their backs on God and ignore him they are entirely capable of doing so. If they wish to behave in a bad manner and injure their fellows and disrespect authority, again they can do so. But this will not make them happy or fulfil them in any way. They have turned their backs on God and embraced evil. God has no control over evil, as no part of him is evil. But likewise, “A man can no more diminish God's glory by refusing to worship Him than a lunatic can put out the sun by scribbling the word "darkness" on the walls of his cell” (47). But Lewis also questions what God is capable of doing. He suggests that it is unfair to believe that God is so omnipotent that he can prevent all suffering. God is far too much for us to understand and his omnipotence may in fact be limited. As Lewis, unintentionally ironically, puts it: “It should, however, be remembered that human reasoners often make mistakes, either by arguing from false data or by inadvertence in the argument itself.” Indeed, human reasoners do make mistakes, especially when they expound on the unproven supernatural. A single epiphany is enough to convince a faulty human reasoner that a celestial clockwork exists in the sky above and that something dominates and guides our lives besides ourselves. While Lewis' writing is very persuasive and elegant, and the man behind the writing appears very charismatic, this is not an objectively insightful book. Lewis has missed the boat on a number of important questions and his logic is bogus at virtually every point. That the historical aspect of religion should be held to be evidence that God must exist is a faulty one, and is plainly an example of a fallacy of perception, namely that of correlation vs. causation. Early man could not understand what made the sky rain and so he ascribed to this event a supernatural power. Again and again, in anthropological studies we see humans ascribing supernatural powers to things we do not understand. It would be interesting to have Lewis' opinion on the South Pacific cargo cults, one of the finest examples of this strange fact about people. Overall, his work is a piece of breathtaking supposition. The terms induction or deduction could not possibly be used since there are no solid facts upon which his case is built. It occurs entirely in his own mind. This is a fine example of a powerful intellect folding in on itself. Religion is a complex human phenomenon. There are those who believe it is evolutionarily hardwired into us so as to make as work better within communities and encourage us to act better to one another. It has its uses. Thousands of men and women have tried to explain it and justify it over the years in treatises such as The Problem of Pain, but few have been successful. There is a reason religion is largely dying out in the Western World, and that is because of the numerous contradictions within it. Lewis's book, elegant though it is, shows off many of these contradictions. Read More