Shalom everyone,
We are so used to the story of the Exodus, that there are some very obvious questions we no longer think about. A while back, a good friend wrote and asked me:
… since God, being omniscient, knew that the presence of the Hebrews in Egypt would lead to their enslavement, mistreatment, and suffering, …. then could someone take this to mean that God at the very least allowed their suffering, and possibly actually brought about their suffering? This is a process of thinking that I have faced from people many times in my spiritual journey as I have taught the compassion of God, that they would use [the story] to say that God was indeed NOT compassionate, but rather perfectly willing for people to suffer if it led to the desired end.
This is a very profound issue, and to resolve it, I have personally found it needs a complete change in perspective – in how one views the world and how God works. What follows is my personal perspective.
God needed to shelter Israel somewhere where she would grow and become a nation. It also needed to be somewhere where they would not want to stay, but would be eager to leave, in order to return to the Land to fulfil her destiny.
How God presented the problem to Abraham
First of all, it needs to be said that God forewarned Abraham of all this, and made him and his descendants fully aware that they would undergo a period of oppression, but that they would be freed eventually from that oppression, and leave with great wealth (Gen 15:13-14). Furthermore, that all the nations of the earth will be blessed by Yitzchaq’s descendants (Gen 26:4), and peoples would pay homage to Ya`aqov’s descendants (Gen 27:29).
It would have been a different matter if God had said, ‘Your descendants are going to be enslaved, live generations of misery, and then in the far future, your descendants are going to be nearly wiped out in a holocaust.’ If God had given us no hope – giving us only the bad points – then God would truly have lacked compassion! Instead, God tried to comfort Jacob by saying, “Do not be afraid to go down into Egypt, for I will make you into a great nation there. I Myself shall go down to Egypt with you, and I shall assuredly bring you back again.” (Gen 46:3b-4a). Life is such that there will always be trials, but God wasn’t going to abandon Israel in her trials; God was straight with us right from the start, and consoled us by assuring us that God was going to be right there alongside us, and as a people, we would come out of it all.
When you are told that something is going to hurt really, really badly, but that it will ultimately make you better and stronger, you steel yourself for the pain. Ps 34:19 says, “Many are the afflictions of the righteous, but Yahveh delivers them out of them all.” In my own life, God has advised me of many bad things that would happen to me which have indeed come to pass, but that I would come away from such experiences with greater wisdom, knowledge and understanding than I would ever be capable of acquiring by myself. It hasn’t made the suffering any easier – often, I have asked that such knowledge and wisdom be given to someone else – but I know that God wasn’t the one making me suffer. Human beings were the agents of my suffering, not God – God does not allow suffering, humans allow suffering. God was, instead, my loving Refuge, my safe harbour, and my infinite source of strength.
God tries to compensate us for our suffering
Our suffering is not for nothing; there is always compensation. For good people who die an unjust death, they are taken straight to heaven, to sit at God’s right hand; for the righteous who suffer, God is closest to them; in our times of misfortune, God strengthens our character and gives us wisdom; for those who are disadvantaged, God purifies our spirit (cf James 1:2-4).
Reading the passages in the Hebrew Bible that concern suffering (eg Isa 43:2, Ps 23:1-6, Ps 55:22, Ps 119:50, Ps 73:26 etc), the overwhelming sense I get from them is that, there will always be suffering in life – that is the nature of Life in this earthly realm – but God will always be there with us in the midst of our suffering; and that there will always be some kind of compensation or reward for everything that we have gone through. Our loving God is not the source of our misery, but God is the source of our comfort and strength to get through our times of suffering.
Ps 55:22 says, ‘Cast all your cares on Yahveh, and God will sustain you’, and Ps 73:26 says, ‘God is the strength of my heart’. This is the true Yahwist Israelite view of God’s place in suffering – not that God is the source of it, but rather, that God is the way to strengthen ourselves to make our way safely through it.
“If suffering exists in this world, then there is no God“
Returning to the view that ‘God allows suffering’, and is willing to let people suffer: Among atheists, the premise underlying this way of looking at things is that, if there were a God – a compassionate and loving God – then such a God would ensure that there would never, ever be any suffering. But there is suffering, so therefore there is no God. If there were a Creator God, then such a God would have created a world – nay, a whole Universe – without any suffering or misfortune, where nothing ever went wrong, and where nothing bad ever happened to anyone or anything.
I think that part of the problem, is that the religion that such an Atheist came out of, taught them the wrong view of what God is and does – a false view. And notably, this false view was taught to them during their formative years as a child. The type of religious person that such a religion engenders, only knows how to preach a God that causes all suffering – that all suffering comes from this god. I myself would not want to believe in such a god! I honestly cannot blame the Atheist for their view that, “if suffering exists, then there is no God”.
Ironically, for me as a religious person, it has been science that has helped me to understand that the view that God is the source of all suffering is a completely false premise. I will explain this a little bit further on.
The other side of this issue from religious people is that traditionally, religious people see God as the sole cause of all bad things – that if you are suffering misfortune, then you must have done something wrong, and so God must be punishing you.
This is also an incredibly unhelpful way of understanding God; it will either make you terrified of God (as if God were a cruel and abusive parent), or make you resent God, so that you end up leaving religion altogether.
Letting go of our child-like view of how God works
Without meaning to be insulting to people who actually think in either of these two ways (the atheist or the religious), I still have to say that both these ways of thinking are spiritually and intellectually child-like – a very simplistic way of understanding how things work. In contrast, Yahwism encourages God’s children to mature, and become spiritual adults in their outlook.
In response to the premises that atheists argue from, it is like if a small child were to say, “Daddy, Mummy, if you really loved me, you would make sure that nothing ever, ever hurt me, but you don’t stop bad things from happening to me, so I hate you, because you can’t possibly love me!”
This way of proving that there is no God, assumes that a loving, compassionate God would break every natural, physical law, every second of every single day, in order to make sure that nothing bad ever happened to any of us, or to any living thing. Who could maintain their sanity in a universe where nothing ever happened in the logical way that you expected it to happen – where the laws of physics were constantly being broken – in fact, where out of necessity, physics followed no laws whatsoever?
Anyone who knows me knows that I am a big fan of Star Trek. In an episode of Star Trek: Voyager, we finally get to learn why the immortal, omniscient and all-powerful Q are so capricious, sadistic, cruel and merciless. We get to see their Universe – at least, in a way that would allow humans to understand it (it’s initially shown as a long, empty road in the desert). In their universe, everything is perfect. There is no pain, no suffering, no misfortune, no disaster, no weakness, no disease, no sorrow, and no death. With all this perfection, they have nothing to do, and they are utterly bored by life – by existence itself. Nothing in their lives has ever taught them to protect the weak, to show mercy to those who are struggling, to have compassion on those who are without, or to stand up for those who have no voice. Most importantly, nothing in their experience has taught them true wisdom – wisdom that matters. Everyone in their Universe is perfect, and so they engage in playful cruelty in order to give their life meaning.
God still has to work with the laws of physics – most of the time
In Superstring Theory (or ‘Brane Theory’), it is hypothesised that there are ten dimensions (some say even more). Our Universe exists in the Third Dimension. In our dimension, the laws of physics function in a particular way – on a planet with gravity, if you let something go, it will fall downwards – so rain can fall and water crops, or it can also destroy them; a hammer can hit a nail and build something strong, but if that hammer happens to hit someone’s leg, the leg will break; viruses can kill, but a virus that entered mammalian cells millions of years ago changed our DNA, and caused female mammals to form placentas around their embryos; DNA splits and recombines, and sometimes there is an error made – occasionally that error is good, and gives us a positive advantage; sometimes the result is bad, and disables us. Acid in your stomach helps your food to break down, but it also burns and gives you acid reflux. What I’m trying to say here is that, in everything that exists in this universe, there is an advantage and a disadvantage – that’s just how biology and physics are. That’s the very nature of Nature.
When you get to the Ninth Dimension, according to Brane Theory, any beings which might exist in such a dimension would be able to explore multiple different sets of laws of physics; they would be able to move from a universe where things fall down, to one where they fell upwards; they would be able to move from a universe where a blunt force destroyed, to one where such a force repaired; and so on.
We are not such beings, and ours is not such a universe (indeed, every universe will have its own laws; there won’t be any law-free universes). By all the laws in our universe, things work in the way they do, and we cannot change them. With all the laws of Physics, there is often both an advantage and a disadvantage to everything that exists. Therefore, if an atheist were to think that if there were a Creator God, then there would be no suffering or misfortune, then it is a child-like and unscientific way of looking at things – it is simply not reasonable to expect all disadvantage and error to be cancelled out in our universe, if we also expect it to function in a predictable and effective way that allows us to maintain our sanity. The two expectations are just not compatible.
I’ll go on record at this point, and say that I do believe that miracles can happen. However, I suspect that God has to choose very carefully what opportunities can be taken to enact miracles, while avoiding those occasions which threaten to fracture the very fabric of space and time.
Comparing the child-like view of God, and the mature adult way of looking at God
It also doesn’t help that some religious people perpetuate this very same way of looking at things – that an all-powerful God has to stop all bad things from happening to those of us who believe in God, but that is not how God or the Universe works. We tend to fear that if bad things can happen, then God can’t be all-powerful. In order to maintain God’s all-powerfulness in their own minds, some religious people then fall back into thinking that, only truly righteous people never suffer, and so ‘God must be punishing me’.
Here are some common religious misconceptions, and their more adult spiritual counter views:
child-like misconception: It must be possible to go through life without ever suffering misfortune, otherwise there can’t be a God
adult religious mindset: The nature of how this universe works, is that every human being will go through good times and bad times – some occasions will be really good, and some occasions will be really bad
child-like misconception: God makes all suffering happen (i.e. God is ultimately the source of all suffering, disaster and misfortune)
adult religious mindset: God is the living source of all strength and power that our human souls can tap into, which helps us to endure and overcome suffering – God gives us the courage to come through
child-like misconception: If you are suffering bad times, then God must be punishing you – you must have done something wrong, even if you aren’t aware of it
adult religious mindset: If you have striven to live a blameless life, then anything bad that happens to you is just how Nature and the universe work
child-like misconception: Natural disasters are sent by God to punish us – that is how God’s power is manifested in the world
adult religious mindset: God’s power is manifested in the compassion and aid that God’s children show, when they help those hit by natural disasters
child-like misconception: If bad things happen, we ourselves must be to blame, otherwise it shows that God is not all-powerful
adult religious mindset: God’s all-powerfulness is shown in how God is able to give us the inner strength to overcome our suffering – that is how God is truly Sovereign of all.
child-like misconception: A good person would never have to suffer misfortune
adult religious mindset: A good person is more sensitive to the disadvantages in life; because of their compassion, they notice life’s mishaps more
child-like misconception: Bad people seem to have all the luck – God is not just, because nothing bad ever happens to bad people
adult religious mindset: Bad people have less of an empathetic heart, and are less sensitive to the problems around them – they bulldoze their way through life, often ignoring the problems around them, and blinding themselves to what is really going on
child-like misconception: Bad times are opportunities to toughen you up and make you harder and badass
adult religious mindset: Our bad times are a chance to become more sensitive and empathetic towards other people in their misfortune; we empathise, because we have been through the same things ourselves
It is not the case that God makes us suffer so that good things can happen; it is rather that God enables us to overcome the bad things, so that good things can happen. It’s all a difference in perspective. It is not the case that we have to go through misery to obtain the good; it is rather that God compensates us by rewarding us with good after the bad that has happened to us.
Egypt was Israel’s salvation, as well as Israel’s enslavement
Now to return to our initial conundrum.
If God had never forewarned Abraham and his descendants that they were going to be oppressed in Egypt, then God could rightfully be accused of lacking compassion. Instead, God told Ya`aqov exactly what was going to happen, and moreover, that God would go along with them in their suffering. With the nature of how life works on this earth, in this dimension, happiness goes hand in hand with misfortune. There are very few nations on this earth that have never suffered as a people; there are many peoples that have been oppressed, even brutalised, by another people – and that speaks about the nature of the oppressive people, not the nature of God. It is therefore illogical to think that Israel’s time in Egypt would be a 430-year bed of roses. When suffering came, God promised to be with us, and reward us at the end of it all.
When God told Abraham of the future suffering in Egypt (Gen 15:13), God did not say, ‘I will make your descendants strangers in a land not their own, and I will cause them to be enslaved and mistreated’. No. God worded the prediction as a statement of fact; God never claimed to be the cause of the suffering. In the declaration we make at Shavuot (Dt 26:5-10a), in relating what happened during the slavery in Egypt, God is not the source of the suffering – the Egyptians were the source of the suffering, they were the oppressors, not God. Yahveh our God is instead acknowledged as the source of our salvation.
By going down into Egypt, Egypt would become the place where Israel was saved from oblivion. God didn’t make Egypt suspicious of foreigners, they did that all by themselves. God didn’t enslave Israel, Egypt did; Egypt’s suspicion of foreigners would both save Israel and become their source of oppression, but ultimately, Egypt was the womb that gave birth to a nation.
There was a famine in Canaan, and if Jacob, his sons and their families had remained in Canaan, they would have starved to death, and Israel would never have come into existence, and the world would never have known the Way of YHVH; that is the primary reason why Israel had to go down into Egypt. God needed to shelter Israel somewhere where she would grow and become a nation. However, it also needed to be somewhere where they would not want to stay, but would be eager to leave, in order to return to the Land to fulfil her destiny as the ambassador of YHVH to the nations.
The blessing that the citizens of Israel would always be aware of, after all the events of the Exodus, was that God fulfilled God’s promise to give them an abundant and fruitful land; their harvests and crops were proof of God’s promise.
Learning to see God as the source of all strength, and not as the source of our suffering
What we can overcome, we do our best to overcome (either ourselves, or with the help of others); and what we cannot overcome, we ask God to give us the strength to endure, until the trial is finished.
One thing I personally believe, is that before God sent our souls to earth, God did not just blithely chuck souls into random mortal bodies and tell us, ‘Live life, suffer, die and come back.’ No. I personally believe that God asked for only the bravest souls to volunteer, because something tremendously important needed to be done in our Universe. Most human souls – ‘holy ones’, as the Bible calls them – do not get the chance to come to earth; only the bravest and most courageous souls are chosen by God.
I also believe that God forewarned each soul of the life they would be living – both our ups and our downs – but that God would be with us all the way, and that at the end of it all, a reward most great, most wonderful and sublimely awesome would be awaiting us when we returned. At that time, everything will make sense – we will all know the ‘why’ behind everything single thing that has ever happened to us.
Underneath God’s tapestry, it’s all an untidy mess of knots and colours, with nothing making any sense, but once you are above the tapestry, everything makes sense, and it’s all a beautiful, breath-taking picture that God has woven.
I know that this has become a really long treatise, but what I’m trying to say is that it takes a change in perspective, in order to be at peace with what happens to us in life. Everyone will undergo trials at some point – it’s the nature of this universe. God is not the cause of our suffering, God is the source we draw on to get through and ultimately overcome our suffering. Good people are the messengers of that Divine source of All Strength.
Blessings in the Name of Yahveh our Saviour and Redeemer
your brother,
Shmuliq