Why do bad things happen to good people?

Great Debates
1

Not sure if this one has been discussed before.

Why do bad things happen to good people, and vice versa? I would guess the answer is basically that it’s all random chance, and that it’s foolish to try and apply rationality to our chaotic world.

However, what I’m really interested in is the different mechanisms by which various religions answer this question. What kind of justifications do religions use to explain this?

No matter how devout you may be, you can still get run over by a car, etc.

Do religions universally concede that good behavior (moral behavior) doesn’t protect you from random disaster or catastrophe? Or do some religions still try and make disaster a product of personal choice? (e.g. “Fido died because you didn’t try hard enough at school”)

My thought is that if this concession is made, then moral or good living might lose its appeal in favor of a kind of “instant gratification because you could die tomorrow” viewpoint.

What’s the point of denying yourself pleasure when you never know when you’re going to die? So, steal that wallet. Take those drugs. Rape that woman. Seize the day!

What does religion promise that makes morality so appealing? Is it entrance to heaven or paradise?

By admitting the supreme power of chance, they make it much more attractive to just “do what you want.” But by not admitting it, they paint themselves into a corner trying to rationalize random chance.

Thanks for your thoughts.

Dave

2

Are you kidding? In Christianity you get eternal happiness if you are “good”. Be “bad”, and it’s eternal suffering. Eternity is a really, really long time!

And Karma? Well, let’s just say that Karma is a bitch!

3

The answer seems to be that there is sin in this world and sin and it’s consequences (ultimatly death) is transferable to others, even the innocent.

Job had to repent of something to end his torment with the line that “Now I know you (God) can do all things”.

Johan was told by God to do something, Johan went the opposite way.

There was a woman crippled all her life to show the glory of God (which Jesus healed)

Jesus had to suffer and die

4

It’s all garbage of course, but some religions say there are hidden variables - an apparently good person isn’t. Or that bad things make you stronger some how, especially if they kill you. Or else it is all part of god’s plan so don’t ask questions.

In the Bible we have an evil, wicked king who died at a ripe old age in bed, and his virtuous son who died early in battle. It was the father’s fault. :rolleyes: So when they got the the history part the Bible can’t figure it out either.

5

Randomness is a big part of it. Even a saint can get cancer.

But the fact that our civilization exists at all indicates that there is some element of positive-sum gaming to it all. If you’re a good person, the odds are better that good things will happen to you: you’ll have more friends, get a better job, be listened to at parties, and so on.

It isn’t all random, or else we’d still be RNA chains floating in puddles.

6

True. But you’ll have less chance to be a CEO and a billionaire.

7

I don’t claim to be an expert in theology, but it seems to me that most religions try to have it both ways. They make claims about deities meeting out punishment, but if something bad happens to someone that they for some reason doesn’t believe deserves it, then their god is either testing that person, or ‘moving in mysterious ways’.

The simple truth is that good and bad things happen to everyone, but that some people are luckier than others. There’s a great deal of random chance, as far as I can tell, but we also have the power to change our fates. Yes, you might get cancer or get hit by a bus tomorrow, but you might not, and if you behave antisocially by committing theft, rape and murder, or whatever, your odds of winding up in prison are pretty good. If you are a decent human being, you improve your odds of being treated decently in return, though there is no guarantee.

Properly socialized humans don’t feel pleasure from stealing or rape, they feel guilt. Humans who take pleasure from taking whatever they want despite the misery they cause are sociopaths.

8

“The sins of the father are visited upon the sons down to the seventh generation” or something like that. Hell, we’re all still paying for the sins of Adam and Eve. God’s got plenty of reasons to be crapping on everyone all the time. It’s like a police state with so many laws on the books that it’s pretty much guaranteed everyone is breaking the law all the time, and it’s entirely arbitrary when and why the cops are going to kick in your front door and haul you off to prison.

But that doesn’t mean you necessarily want to go full retard and break laws even more than you already do. God is also a big surveillance camera in the sky, recording everything you do and say. Sure, you’re screwed in this life. But behave a little less criminally than the other people around you, and maybe you’ll earn some extra commissary privileges in the next life. Maybe you’ll even be made a trustee and get to sit on God’s right hand and help him smite the unworthy or something.

It’s all about sucking up to The Man. That’s part of the reason I’m an atheist.

9

Sure would be nice if some religious person had addressed the question.

10

Didn’t the ancient greek and roman religions teach that the gods were unjust and cruel? This idea of a just world with rules that if you follow them good things will happen may be a new development.

11

Some traditions wouldn’t even see the so called problem. Yeah, you might get hit by a bus or stabbed by a maniac, so what? Life is tough, wear a helmet. Needing a juice box and a cookie for doing good things is a childish sense of entitlement. The universe doesn’t owe you anything, it just is. Do the rituals, venerate your ancestors, don’t disappoint your mother, etc.

Hindus believe there are cosmic cycles. Unfortunately, we’re currently in the Kali Yuga, the age of strife.

Lots of Eastern traditions have dualistic belief systems. You can’t have truth without lies, good without evil, etc. Or our world is an illusion, and the true reality transcends notions of good and evil and our lives are a struggle with ignorance and deceit.

My favorite is the old gnostic traditions. God is love and light and lives in a beautiful realm. Our souls are also light. But the material world was fashioned by an evil or self righteous Demiurge, or Satan in later traditions like the Cathars, to trap our souls. Worldly pleasures poison our souls and if we allow ourselves to be dragged down by temptation they’ll be too impure to enter Heaven.

The Abrahamic faiths weren’t the first to posit a fall from paradise. It’s a reoccurring trope. The Greeks had the Ages of Man. The spirituality of mankind has been degraded over time because we don’t worship or uphold the traditions correctly, or we disobeyed the gods and were punished for our vanity.

Lots of mythologies specifically have evil/destructive/chaos gods, malevolent spirits, etc. that cause mischief and lead people away from the path of enlightenment. Angra Mainyu and Whiro make Satan look like a wuss.

Other cosmologies have some god ruining everything through a rivalry with the rest, or some romantic triangle that goes wrong, basically a “this is why we can’t have nice things” story.

Aztecs had the Five Suns myth. Creation by committee doesn’t work so well.

Then there are the religions where you really do deserve everything bad that happens to you. Catch a disease? That’s your punishment for impure thoughts.

12

Not exactly. They were extremely just, when it came to retribution against wrongs done to them. Carve your initials in the wall of a temple to Apollo…and Apollo would come and turn you into a skunk cabbage. Look at Actaeon, and his sin (seeing Diana naked in her bath) was completely accidental.

Moreover, if you did right, were obedient and reverent, and cherished the gods, they would do right by you. They were always giving rewards to people who paused on their travels to help others (especially when those others were the gods disguised as mortals.) Being good in your public and private life was likely to earn the favor of the gods. Being greedy, or vain, or selfish, or mean was likely to earn their ire.

But, yeah, they were also a bit quirky about things, and if you happened to be a beautiful young maiden, and Zeus noticed you, your own personal preferences didn’t matter a bit: he’d have you over a fence-rail somewhere and you’d bear him a demigod for a child, who would go off and have fantastic adventures. Nice for everybody except the maiden!

13

Thanks guys. So what do religions do to measure the overall good of a person? I mean, if 90 percent of the time you’re an angel, and the other 10 percent you are an abusive ass, do you still enter paradise? Or 80/20, 70/30 percent? What’s the ratio? There has to be a ratio, right? Or if there isn’t, then how is goodness defined? Is it based on adherence to ritual or actual good deeds? What counts more?

How would a religious person answer this question:

Why should I do rituals at all if what really counts more are my actions? Can’t I stay home from church or temple if the same time could be spent serving the poor or homeless and doing more good?

14

That’s the “faith vs. good works” debate. It differs from religion to religion. Some religions say it’s more important to worship God and observe religious rituals. Other religions say it’s more important to do good deeds and live a productive/righteous life and not worry so much about kissing God’s butt directly.

So pick your church according to which way you yourself would rather swing. “Cafeteria Christianity” and all that. Or you could disembowel animals and read God’s will in the entrails. Do what ever works for you. God’s really just a reflection of how you yourself think the universe should work.

15

No, there does not have to be a ratio. Jesus told a parable about a Pharisee and a tax collector. (Luke 18:9-14) The Pharisee bragged about how much he prayed and fasted, how much money he donated to good causes, and how he didn’t steal, commit adultery, and so forth. The tax collector only asked God for mercy. The parable ends with Jesus saying that the tax collector was justified, but not the Pharisee.

Yes, you can do that.

16

Because one doesn’t know the karma a person sowed in past times, be it in this world or some other realm, I give God the benefit of the doubt … and assume the person is bringing the balance back to their soul by atonement. And for me to look at it that way makes horrendously horrible things happening to others, including little kids, a bit easier to accept it. (Or course said way of looking at things doesn’t do much to mend my aching heart when animals are harmed … though I still feel in my heart of hearts that because God’s love and sense of fairness is infinitely greater than any person’s, He’ll no doubt in some way ultimately see to it that animals will one day be richly blessed too on account of the unfair suffering they’re too often put through.)

For myself, with respect to karma, I figured it out a long time ago that I’m on the “one time around plan” in that I’ll likely not have to come back to this disgusting world again, but if I do bad things to others while here, which I’ve done, then I’m hit with “instant karma,” and so things unpleasant come down the pike after a period of time passes. (Fortunately, I’ve gained some wisdom through the pain and thus do what I think is a pretty good job of living by the Golden Rule by treating people with respect and kindness, thus while I’m not exactly over joyed with my life for certain reasons, I do have it pretty easy these days and there’s not much to stress about – THANK THE LORD!

One other thing, many years ago God sent me an experience that let me know beyond all doubt that Satan IS in the world! I’ll spare you the details except to say that it was far more terrifying than any words I’ll ever be able to find to described it! I mention it because it could be that even for people that know in their own way that Satan is real and in the world, that it might be a fact that he and his power are in some ways being waay underrated … and so maybe there’s much more to your question than what meets the eye, like maybe God and Satan are playing a game of multilevel chess for human souls that only they understand while us finite creatures called people are only able to see things more as a simple game of tic-tac-toe covered in thick fog.

It’s always best to give Almighty God the benefit of the doubt!

17

Speaking of karma…

I’m reminded of an old Dilbert cartoon where Dogbert says, “I believe in karma. That means I can do bad things to people all day long and I assume they deserve it.”

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Gotta love how karma works. “You got cystic fibrosis? Multiple sclerosis? Suck it up, buddy, it’s your own fault. You must have been a real prick in your previous life.”

(Sorry, couldn’t resist.)

18

Never been a Dilbert fan.

I don’t see where the cartoon makes much sense, as it would be like a person shoving someone off a building and then claiming it’s okay because they, the shover, are gravity on account of their action.

19

From the OP:

Nobody ever talks much about the “vice versa”.
I’ve long wanted to write a book entitled “When Good Things Happen to Bad People”

20

He addresses the question, but does he adequately answer it in your opinion? I don’t feel like Epicurus ever has been answered satisfactory. Read a few of the reviews. In them, I collectively gathered, that this author continuously writes about how God is sad as we are over the pain and suffering in the world, but is powerless to do anything about it. “Don’t bother praying or hoping for your suffering loved ones, God can’t do anything to help them.” Prayer is of no use, but it will give you spiritual strength to move on. Others seemed to sum it up, by him saying basically just to suck it up, accept your fate, and move on.