A Cruel God

INTRODUCTION

Christianity nowadays hyperfocuses on the aspects of how to be a Christian. How to act, what to say, what to do, and what to believe, of course. More and more often, political and religious views are mixed together and the terms become interchangeable: liberal Democrats and conservative Republicans. The laws of the land become governed by personal convictions, and debates spiral downwards into calling each other idiots or immoral. Nobody wins and everyone feels like the other party gets too much. Middle ground is nonexistent.

Therefore, I have decided to preface this article by first stating that this is not an attack on Christianity. I grew up in a Christian home, and I have very few complaints about my upbringing. However, as Paul stated so eloquently (in 1 Corinthians 13:11):

“When I was a child, I spoke like a child, I thought like a child, and I reasoned like a child. But when I became a man, I set aside my childish ways.”

And so I have now found, after nearly five years removed from my own childhood, that I cannot blindly accept things that I had before. I have questions that want answering, or at least discussion. I have thoughts that haunt me and keep me awake, in the most real sense of that condition, as I have had bouts of both depression and insomnia for the last two years. The very real fact is that I do not think I am capable of accepting Christianity as it is anymore. Why? I want to explain that to you in as clear terms as I can without letting this deteriorate into another slugfest between atheism and Christianity, which helps no one and discourages any sort of productive discussion. This is by no means the final word on the subject of belief. Neither is it a declaration against belief. Rather, it is an observation of the foundations of Christianity which I have personally found wanting.

BUT

My entire presentation will take place within the context that EVERYTHING in the Bible is fact. Everything is true. Nothing is incorrect. I want this to be on a middle ground of sorts. I feel that most people who state nonpositive things about Christianity often begin by attacking its very existence and its veracity. I want to show what I think, while remaining on the foundation of Christianity so that no one can say that I misrepresented or demeaned its content. That being said, let me begin with a most basic question.

WHY DID GOD COMMAND DEATH?

A major argument against God has always begun in the Old Testament with the many cruel things that he commanded. For making fun of a bald man, children were killed by bears in 2 Kings 2:23-25 (for the sake of article length, I will leave the verses here but refrain from quoting so you can peruse your own favorite version for translation). He turned Lot’s wife into salt for looking back at a city’s destruction (Genesis 19:26, which also seems harsh that an entire city must be destroyed for some of their citizens’ sins), tested Abraham by commanding him to kill his own son (Genesis 22:1-12, which, regardless of God’s “psyche!” moment, was cruel), and tested Job by allowing his entire family to be slaughtered (Job, which was “made better” by giving him a new family, because our relatives are that easily replaceable). Not to mention, he ordered the complete genocide of the Amalekites and the Canaanites, including “every man, woman and child” (1 Samuel 15:2-3 and Deuteronomy 20:16-18), which I guess pales in comparison to when he did not like how the human race was going and wiped everyone out in the Flood (Genesis 6-9).

All of this begs the question: why did he do these horrible things? They are all recorded biblically, and all evidence of cruelty. I have seen two arguments regarding these actions, however, the first of which being that Moses would often speak or write claiming to be the voice of God but actually adding his own words. Since Moses wrote Genesis and Deuteronomy, that explains those books, but what of the two books of Kings? Are those falsely worded through their scribes as well? But then, the entire validation of the Bible as fact and being inherently God-breathed falls apart, as you are now allowing the existence of fallacies and lies within the writing of its text. How can we trust any of Moses’ writing if he lied about these parts? How can we accept the entirety of the Bible as truthful if some of its God-breathed contents are stained by human error or translation? And if you do not question Moses’ honesty, then you freely admit that these despicable actions are factual and real, and they are commands from God. That is a difficult pill to swallow.

The second argument I have seen against these actions is that the Old Testament is little more than history for the modern Christian, since our new covenant, established in the New Testament through Jesus Christ, changed everything. This is a valid argument, but opens a whole new can of worms.

DOES GOD CHANGE?

If we accept that the new covenant has replaced the old one of the Old Testament, then that means that God completely changed his tactics. The Old Testament was all about works and rituals, doing your best to be good enough to be accepted into heaven. The New Testament shuns this and states that only through accepting Christ as your savior will you be able to enter heaven. So, what gives? Did God cry uncle? Why did he go from being a solemn, cruel god who demanded much of his people (while playing favorites) to becoming an open-armed god who accepted anyone as long as they accepted his son?

God has very obviously had a change of heart, resulting in a new religion that has now grown alongside the two older ones (being Judaism and Islam). But this now calls into question another fundamental aspect of Christianity: that God is omniscient, omnipresent, all-powerful, and never changing (Malachi 3:6 for OT, Hebrews 13:8 for NT). If he never changes, then why did he change? And if he did not change, but rather altered his tactics, why did he use the failing ones of the Old Testament in the first place? He is supposed to know everything that was, is or will be, so why would he use a method that he knew was doomed to fail? And in this paradox, we come to the most crucial point of this article.

GOD CANNOT CLAIM BOTH FREE WILL AND AN ULTIMATE PLAN

When God created human beings – or even angels, for that matter – he allowed them to have free will; that is, the option to either love and follow him, or go their own way and become selfish and evil. By allowing us free will, he gave the ultimate test of loyalty (which we promptly strayed from). But if we are allowed free will, then why does he have an ultimate plan (Jeremiah 29:11, Romans 8:28)? What is the point of free will if our ultimate destinations have already been established long ago? An equivalent would be scientists breeding (“creating” if you will) mice then placing them inside of a maze that they designed, and then allowing the mice to run around within the maze. Sure, there is the illusion of free choice since they must make decisions at each turn, but they are all ultimately going to exactly where the scientists want them to. That is not true free will; it is a lightly disguised puppet show.

If you are capable of explaining how we can have free will while God has a plan, then explain this conundrum to me: within both halves of the Bible, and within modern life as claimed by many, God performs miracles and interferes with our lives. HOW CAN THAT BE POSSIBLE? He created Lucifer, allowing him free will (and leading to his choice to become Satan) but then immediately punishing him, but only after Lucifer had tainted God’s newest creation. Why did he allow that to happen? When he created the angels, he knew immediately what they would do with their free will, but allowed it to happen then promptly punished them (Hebrews 12:22). When he created humans, he already knew exactly what was going to happen, all the way down to when Jesus would have to die on the cross for our sins. Since he had given us free will, we could choose what we wanted to do, and he would allow the consequences of our choices to hurt us (e.g. Adam and Eve eating the fruit). But why did he even go through all of the ineffective religion of the Old Testament before deciding to start the new covenant? Why did he CHOOSE to make the only way to righteousness incredibly difficult, and above all else, why did he decide that THE ONLY WAY for him to save us was to incarnate a part of himself as Jesus Christ, then sacrifice himself? Could he not have done it any other way? Did this all-knowing, all-powerful being have no control over the situation at all?

Once again, you can argue that he did it that way to encourage us, once again, to exercise our free choice in order to choose to accept him through Jesus Christ. But our free will means nothing when the hand of God can touch us at any time. He stopped the sun for Joshua (Joshua 10:13), he broke the chains of Paul and Silas in prison (Acts 16:16-40), and as I already stated, many claim that he performs miracles even nowadays. This means that, although he allows us to choose poorly and suffer the consequences of our actions, he will sometimes (or frequently, depending on your viewpoint) interfere with these natural consequences in order to favor someone.

WHY?!

If he can reach out and part the Red Sea for Moses and the Israelites, why could he not save them when Hitler had over five million of them murdered? If he can heal an 80-year old man of cancer one day, then allow a 4-year old girl to die of leukemia the next day, then what is he thinking? Oftentimes, Christians will state that, “it’s all a part of God’s plan,” or “we can’t understand the way God thinks,” or “the Lord works in mysterious ways.” So, somewhere, written down in heaven, or within the massive expanse of God’s brain, it says “Jenny will be allowed to die today because it will make Mike a better person.” Or perhaps, it said, “Over two thousand people will die on September 11 because it will unite the nation to attack the Middle East.” Seriously? Is that how God operates?

The most common argument I hear at this point is that God does not cause these things: the Devil does. Alright, but who created the Devil? Who allowed him to do these horrible things? We have proven that God is fully capable of preventing these events, and completely competent at rendering the Devil’s works useless. So why does he still allow it? The next reason given is because it is part of his allowing our free will, once again. We have now completed the circle. So does God have a dartboard, where he decides at random whether he will help us or not? Does he have an infinitely-sided dice with which to make his decisions regarding our well-being or mortality? Can our free will even exist within such a finite space in comparison to God’s enormity and all-knowing plans?

A CRUEL GOD

And here we are. Or perhaps, here is where I am. Limiting myself purposefully to arguing within the logic and confines of Christianity and its beliefs, I have come to the conclusion that if such a god exists as within these beliefs, I want no part of him. I still hold onto the belief that something did create us, but I have very little reason to believe that this god which has been presented to me is that being. This is a malicious and rabidly selfish being that literally created us so that we would choose to love him. That is the whole purpose of our being according to Christianity: to exist only to worship him. Think about that. If I stumbled upon the secret to artificial intelligence tomorrow, what would people think of me if I created a small race, capable of breeding, then told them to do as they wished, but if they did not choose to love me, I would destroy them. Only if they chose to love me, their creator, would I allow them to live.

I refuse that life. If such a god exists, then I want no part of him. He is Charles Foster Kane: a being incapable of feeling or giving love, only performing actions which he hopes will turn us towards him. He wants us to love him… or else. He created the entire universe and everything in it for the sole purpose of our existence, whose sole existence is to worship him?

That would be one of the emptiest lives I could ever live.