The Bible and Suffering
Originally published in the Human Wholeness and Suffering (Spring 2019) issue
We all experience suffering of various kinds. Some suffer physically, others emotionally, and still others spiritually. Christians suffer like everyone else. For many Christians, the Bible provides a deep and abiding resource for understanding our experiences through its stories. In what ways does the Bible speak to our experience of suffering? What meaning does the Bible ascribe to suffering, pain, and sorrow?
It is tempting to think that the Bible just gives a flat answer, much like a rule book or field guide. That would be to misunderstand what the Bible is. It is an anthology of texts, written by many authors over more than a millennia. The portraits of the meaning of suffering it gives are polyvocal, mutually enriching and dynamic. And for Christians, these stories are inspired, used by an inexhaustible God to deepen our lives. Instead of one simple answer to human suffering, the Bible provides several themes that pervade its stories. I will trace out two themes here, the theme that we suffer because of our wrongdoing, and the theme that we do not suffer because of our wrongdoing, but rather through the time of trial. These themes pull against each other, but they present an important tension that enriches our understanding of life.
The first major theme of the Bible is one of justice. Bad things happen because people violate God’s justice. When you are virtuous, God blesses you, and when you sin, God disciplines you. God tells Moses regarding the sins of a particular Israelite generation, “Not one of the men who saw my glory and the miraculous signs I performed in Egypt and in the desert but who disobeyed me and test me ten times—not one of them will ever see the land I promised on oath to their forefathers. No one who has treated me with contempt will ever see it.”[1] God disciplines the people for their disobedience. From their perspective, the misfortune of being unable to reach the promised land in their lifetime was a result of God’s justice upon them. The converse, a reward for virtue, is seen in God’s favoritism towards a particularly faithful Israelite: “Because my servant Caleb has a different spirit and follows me wholeheartedly, I will bring him into the land he went to, and his descendants will inherit it.”[2]
When God makes his covenant with King Solomon, he sets forth a contract, promising Solomon an eternal throne if he and his sons observe God’s commands and decrees.[3] If Solomon doesn’t, God will cut Israel off from the land he has given them.[4] The King of Assyria conquers Israel, not because of the Assyrian’s military might, but because the Israelites sin against God: “Therefore the LORD rejected all the people of Israel; he afflicted them and gave them into the hands of plunderers, until he thrust them from his presence.”[5]
The prophetic literature especially develops this theme, as most of the writings come from various exilic periods. Hosea repeatedly describes how God will punish Israel for her unfaithfulness to him. God emphatically reminds the Israelites he is just in his judgement because he was the one who rescued them from Egypt on the command they acknowledge only the one true God. Yet because they forgot, he says he will come upon them like a lion, and that they will fall by the sword.[6] Amos provides a similar warning, with God telling the Israelite community, “You only have I chosen of all the families of the earth; therefore I will discipline you for all your sins.”[7] This includes telling the people of Israel he will crush them as a cart crushes when loaded with grain.[8] All of this is done to chastise the people and call them back to faithfulness to God. God uses bad things in a disciplinary fashion, hoping to bring about a return to obedient behavior.
The foregoing examples suggest that suffering is a result of sinfulness, of not doing good and of disobeying God’s justice. The aphorisms of the book of Proverbs often suggest this very thing:
The Lord’s curse is on the house of the wicked,
but he blesses the home of the righteous.
The Lord does not let the righteous go hungry
but he thwarts the craving of the wicked.
No harm befalls the righteous,
but the wicked have their fill of trouble.[9]
But in the same wisdom literature that the Proverbs come from, we find biblical themes that suggest this cannot always be true. The book of Job spends its entire 42 chapters wrestling with the problem of suffering. Job, a man who is experiencing extreme suffering, is “comforted” by three neighbors who all defend the notion that suffering comes only to those who are sinful. Bildad, one of the neighbors, implores, “[S]urely God does not reject a blameless man or strengthen the hands of evildoers.”[10]
However, Job challenges them, asking, if God does not reject blameless people or bless evil people,“Why do the wicked live on, growing old and increasing in power? . . . Their homes are safe and free from fear; the rod of God is not upon them.”[11] He describes in detail the happiness the wicked have.[12] From his perspective, his friends’ worldview is not born out: “Yet when I hoped for good, evil came; when I looked for light, then came darkness.”[13] Additionally, Job questions the authority of the Hebrew traditions, even some of the Ten Commandments, asserting that they are unfair: “It is said, ‘God stores up a man’s punishment for his sons.’ Let him repay the man himself, so that he will know it!.”[14] It’s not fair for God to punish innocent generations and spare the wrongdoer. Job does not see suffering and blessing applied consistently: the innocent suffer and the wicked go free.[15]
In a neighboring wisdom text, Ecclesiastes, the Teacher concurs with Job’s testimony: “In this meaningless life of mine I have seen both of these: a righteous man perishing in his righteousness, and a wicked man living long in his wickedness.”[16] Both voices question the doctrine espoused by Job’s friends, for they notice there is a judicial inequality in life, an inconsistency regarding how suffering is experienced: “There is something else meaningless that occurs on earth: righteous men who get what the wicked deserve, and wicked men who get what the righteous deserve.”[17]
Regardless of how people live their lives, the same death awaits everyone. Nature shows utter impartiality and indifference to the righteous and the wicked. Here Job and the Teacher agree in almost haunting unanimity:
One man dies in full vigor, completely secure and at ease, his body well nourished, his bones rich with marrow. Another man dies in bitterness of soul, never having enjoyed anything good. Side by side they lie in the dust, and worms cover them both.[18]
The wise man has eyes in his head, while the fool walks in the darkness; but I came to realize that the same fate overtakes them both. Then I thought in my heart, ‘The fate of the fool will overtake me also. What then do I gain by being wise?’ I said in my heart, ‘This too is meaningless.’ For the wise man, like the fool, will not be long remembered; in days to come both will be forgotten. Like the fool, the wise man too must die![19]
Job and the Teacher conclude that not all who suffer are sinners, and not all who prosper are saints.
These themes are not purely Old Testament, but continue in the New Testament. Jesus speaks to recent tragedies in the lives of his community to illustrate that suffering is not an indication of sinfulness or righteousness, as Job’s friends thought: “Do you think that these Galileans were worse sinners than all the other Galileans because they suffered this way? . . . Or those eighteen who died when the tower in Siloam fell on them—do you think they were more guilty than all the others living in Jerusalem? I tell you, no!”[20] And in Matthew 5:45, Jesus teaches, “[God] causes his sun to rise on the evil and the good, and sends rain on the righteous and the unrighteous.” Indeed, Jesus’ sacrificial death illustrates acutely that not all suffering is due to sinfulness, for Jesus was our sacrificial lamb, presented “without blemish or defect,” free of sin.[21] If Jesus did not deserve his Cross, though he freely accepted it, not all humans deserve the crosses they are asked to bear either.
These observations do not lead Job or the Teacher to reject God as their Creator and Sovereign Lord.[22] But why then do they suffer? The first two chapters of Job suggest that God is testing him. But why put him through such agonizing suffering? What test could be worth such torment?
I want to suggest that the Bible is very unmodern in this respect. For God values our holiness far more than our sinful happiness. Deuteronomy 8:2, referring to the Israelites’ 40 years of suffering in the wilderness, fills in a context of God’s testing: “Remember how the LORD your God led you all the way in the desert these forty years, to humble you and to test you in order to know what was in your heart, whether or not you would keep his commands.” The true state of the soul of humans is what concerns God. It appears then that a holy soul is preferable to a happy livelihood, and even worth a miserable one. The Bible is challenging us to value holiness, not just happiness.
The voices of Job and the Teacher suggest that, at least sometimes, suffering is a test of holiness, not condemnation for sinfulness. This does not mean that God wants us to suffer; rather, it means God wants us to be holy, even if that requires a trial by suffering. Incredibly, Job comes out of his trials not in despair, but proclaiming, “Surely I spoke of things I did not understand, things too wonderful for me to know.”[23] Suffering is a refining fire that purges our lives of meaningless complications that keep us from focusing on what is necessary for our lives.
This second theme provokes some tough questions, however. Job and the Teacher are describing a faith that remains even when our hoped-for deliverance doesn’t appear. If someone trusts me because I come through for them, should they continue to “have faith” in me when I don’t? It can feel like Job is maintaining a faith in a God who does not deliver when the chips are down. He doesn’t deserve to suffer, and yet God allows Job’s suffering to persist. However, this might overlook the literary structure of the Bible, for prior to these tests God had already proven his generosity and faithfulness. These tests are crucibles of remembrance. Job, for example, had already lived a long life blessed by God, as had the Teacher. God wants to see that those who trust him do so not because God will continue to bless them, but because they really do love and trust him. This perspective is exemplified by Shadrach, Meschach, and Abednego in one of the Bible’s later stories:
If we are thrown into the blazing furnace, the God we serve is able to save us from it, and he will rescue us from your hand, O king. But even if he does not, we want you to know, O king, that we will not serve your gods or worship the image of gold you have set up.[24]
What good is faith if we abandon our commitment to God at the first sign of trouble? The story of Job is one of testing a person as to whether he loves God for God’s own sake, or only for the benefits. A real faith in God is one that is grounded much deeper than God bribing us for our love with an easy life.
Two themes have been briefly traced in the Bible on suffering, two themes which seem in tension with each other. Parts of the Bible seem to espouse an idea of suffering being a disciplinary response by God to sin. If you don’t want to suffer, then obey God and carry out God’s commands. But Job and the Teacher seem to say the opposite, that the world is filled with injustice, where good people are taken advantage of, and cruel people flourish. Which of these two themes are correct? Perhaps they both reveal truths about our world. It does seem that the Bible strongly conveys a picture of God correcting and stopping evil in the world, refusing to stand idly by. But this cannot reasonably be applied to every case of suffering, because good people do suffer. Job and the Teacher provide a useful corrective that neither position is a law of the universe that predicts when and where people will suffer. It is both the case that God brings judgment on the guilty and that God tests the innocent. Job is nothing if not remarkable for his acceptance of good from God as well as trouble.
This case study illuminates something about how we approach the Bible as well. We must be careful seeing the Bible with a monolithic voice. We just saw two themes in the Bible that seem to illustrate different stories of suffering, and there are other themes besides these. Either taken alone would lead us to a distorted understanding of what the Bible has to say. We humans are taught to think of meaning flatly, as an effect that arises simply from a word or sentence presented by a speaker or writer. But we know from metaphor and literature that often meaning can only be suggested, seen in the interplay between images, or between characters. Often the Bible can be the same. Its revelation of God appears as the stories culminate and overlap, speaking to and with each other. Perhaps the truth lies not in choosing one or the other theme on suffering, but in letting the two themes speak to each other, where the meaning arises between them, and carries the voice of God.
[1] Numbers 14:22, 23 NIV
[2] Numbers 14:24
[3] 1 Kings 9:4-9
[4] 1 Kings 9:7
[5] 2 Kings 17:5-20
[6] Hosea 13:4-16
[7] Amos 3:2
[8] Amos 2:13
[9] Proverbs 3:33; 10:3; 12:21
[10] Job 8:20
[11] Job 21:7, 9
[12] Job 21
[13] Job 30:25
[14] Job 21:19; Cf. Exodus 20:5
[15] Job 21:28-30
[16] Ecclesiastes 7:15
[17] Ecclesiastes 8:14; Cf. Ecclesiastes 9:2-3, 11
[18] Job 21:23-26
[19] Ecclesiastes 2:14-16
[20] Luke 13:2-5a
[21] 1 Peter 1:19
[22] Job 42:1-6; Ecclesiastes 5:7
[23] Job 42:3
[24] Daniel 3:17-18
Michael Fitzpatrick is a doctoral candidate in Philosophy at Stanford, and a student leader for the Episcopal-Lutheran Campus Ministry. A self-admitted theology and liturgy nerd, Michael can be found most Sundays worshiping at St. Mark’s Episcopal Church in Palo Alto.