The Problem of Pain is a 1940 book on the problem of evil by C. S. Lewis, in which Lewis argues that human pain, animal pain, and hell are not sufficient reasons to reject belief in a good and powerful God.
Lewis states that his writing is "not primarily arguing the truth of Christianity but describing its origin – a task ... necessary if we are to put the problem of pain in its right setting".C. S. Lewis, The Problem of Pain. p. 5 He begins by addressing the flaws in common arguments against the belief in a just, loving, and all-powerful God such as: "If God were good, He would make His creatures perfectly happy, and if He were almighty He would be able to do what he wished. But the creatures are not happy. Therefore God lacks either goodness, or power, or both."C. S. Lewis, The Problem of Pain. San Francisco: HarperSanFrancisco, 2001, p. 16 Topics include human suffering and sinfulness, animal suffering, and the problem of hell, and seeks to reconcile these with an omnipotent force beyond ourselves.
Summary
Introduction Lewis starts with his former atheistic stance and paints in broad strokes the "problem of pain". He asks how, if the world is so bad, did humans ever attribute it to a benevolent deity? He then describes three attributes that all developed religions have and a fourth attribute peculiar to Christianity. An experience with the Numinous (a sort of awe, dread, and a general sense of experiencing something otherworldly "uncanny"). An acknowledgement of morality. The Numinous as guardian of the morality. Actual historical events.
Divine Omnipotence Lewis states the problem of pain again in a simpler way: "If God were good, He would wish to make His creatures perfectly happy, and if God were almighty, He would be able to do what he wished. But the creatures are not happy. Therefore, God lacks either goodness, or power, or both."C.S. Lewis The Problem of Pain. p 16 Lewis says that if the popular meanings attached to the words are the best or only possible then the problem is unanswerable. The possibility of answering it depends on understanding the words 'good,' 'almighty,' and 'happy' in a bigger sense.
He discusses the nature of "impossible" with the conclusion that anything self-contradictory is not under the auspice of God’s omnipotence because it would be a non-entity; anything is possible with God.
Lewis then talks about the nature of nature/matter. Because there are things outside an individual and God, things cannot be configured to suit the individual perfectly. He also introduces the concept of Free Will and how that further inhibits everyone being pain-free all the time, although he does allow and say miracles do exist. Lewis postulates that maybe this world is not the 'best of all possible' universes but the only possible one. He acknowledges the objection that if God is good and he saw how much suffering it would produce why would he do it. Lewis doesn’t know how to answer that type of question and says that that is not his objective, but only to conceive how goodness (assured on other grounds) and suffering are without contradiction.
Divine Goodness Lewis draws an analogy to compare our understanding of goodness to that of God’s. He says it differs like that of a child’s attempt at drawing a circle for the first time to that of a perfect circle. He goes on to say that people don’t want a good God or a Father but a "senile benevolence who likes to see the young people enjoying themselves." Love and kindness are not one and the same thing. Lewis then summarizes all the different kinds of loves and analogies in scripture that describe God’s relation to humans. Lewis says that the problem of pain is insoluble if we attach a "trivial meaning to the word ‘love’." God loves His goodness into us and our highest activity is response and not initiation; the love may cause us pain but only because the object needs alteration to become fully lovable.
Human Wickedness Lewis starts off by asking why humans need so much alteration. Immediately he shares the Christian answer that humans have used free will to become very bad. He then talks about when Jesus and the apostles preached people understood a real consciousness deserving a divine anger, but in the 20th century people don’t believe they are "mortally ill". He blames misattributing kindness to ourselves and the effect of psychoanalysis on the public mind for driving out a healthy sense of shame from our collective minds.
Lewis acknowledges the critique of what specific, individual harm have we done to God for God to be always angry. Lewis says that when a person feels real guilt, this critique falls away. "When we merely say that we are bad, the ‘wrath’ of God seems a barbarous doctrine; as soon as we perceive our badness, it appears inevitable, a mere corollary from God’s goodness."
He then goes on to add a few considerations "to make the reality less incredible".
We are deceived by looking on the outside of things: we should not mistake our inevitably limited utterances for a full account of the worst that is inside. While there is a social conscious and corporate guilt, don’t let the idea distract you from your own "old-fashioned guilts" that have nothing to do with the ‘system’. Often, it’s an excuse for evading the real issue. Once we’ve learned of our individual corruption, we can go on to think about corporate guilt. "We have a strange illusion that mere time cancels sin." We must guard against the feeling that there is "safety in number". Different ages excelled in different virtues. Other times might have been more courageous or chaste but God was not content with them, so why should he be content with us. All the virtues need to control one another, if not then the virtue which stands above others will tumble all into vice. The Holiness of God is something more and other than moral perfection. Don’t shift blame for human behavior to the Creator. While it is not possible to follow the moral law perfectly, "the ultimate problem must not be used as one more means of evasion". You could be as pious as the early Christians but many don’t intend it.
Lewis then says that he doesn’t believe in the doctrine of Total Depravity on logical and experiential grounds. Also, shame is of value, not as an emotion but for the insight that it provides. He shares how he notices that the holier a man is the more fully aware he is of his vileness.
The Fall of Man Lewis explains how the Christian answer to human wickedness is the doctrine of the Fall: "Man is now a horror to God and to himself and a creature ill-adapted to the universe not because God made him so but because he has made himself so by the abuse of his free will."
He details two "sub-Christian" theories which the doctrine of the Fall guards against: Monism and Dualism. The first saying God, being above good and evil, produces impartially the effects to which we call good and evil. The second saying there’s an equal and independent power that produces evil.
Lewis says that he doesn’t think the doctrine of the Fall answers whether it was better for God to create or not to create. Or if it is ‘just’ to punish individuals for the faults of their remote ancestors.
He then reviews the story from Genesis 3 and follows it with an argument saying that we cannot call our early ancestors more ‘savage’ than we are today. He gives a defense of civilizations past and says they were probably just as civilized like us but in different ways.
He concludes that science has nothing to say against the doctrine of the Fall, but acknowledges a more philosophical problem. That the idea of sin presupposes a law to sin against and the first man could not commit the first sin. Lewis points out though that the doctrine doesn’t say the sin was a social sin but a sin against God, an act of disobedience. Lewis says, "We must look for the great sin on a deeper and more timeless level than that of social morality."
Lewis shares how Saint Augustine called this sin Pride and all humans face it when they become aware of God as God and itself as self. He gives a few illustrations of this choice then paints a picture of what he guesses actually happened when Man fell.
After his illustration, Lewis says, "the act of self-will on the part of the creature, which constitutes an utter falseness to its creaturely position, is the only sin that can be conceived as the Fall". God then began "ruling" Man not by the laws of the spirit but by the laws of nature. Therefore, the human spirit moved from being the master of human nature to become a mere lodger or prisoner in its own house. Lewis then says this condition was passed down biologically. He says that our present condition is because we are a part of a spoiled species, not that we’re suffering for the rebellion of remote ancestors.
Lewis says that his explanation is shallow for he has said nothing about the trees of life and knowledge of good and evil, and nothing about what the apostle Paul has said on the subject. He also uses an analogy to quantum physics in that when we try to draw illustrations we are moving further away from reality. He does use an example from the Old Testament to show how original sin might have been passed down if we take a more communal/societal view of things. He sums up the chapter by saying "man, as a species, spoiled himself, and that good, to us in our present state, must therefore mean primarily remedial or corrective good".
Human Pain He says that pain is inherent in a world where souls meet and souls acting wickedly towards each other probably accounts for four-fifths of the World’s pain. And he says it’s a legitimate question to ask why humans are given permission to torture each other. He refines his previous statement that the people can only experience remedial good and says it’s an incomplete answer. He classifies pain into two senses: 1) a physical sensation and 2) any experience, physical or mental, that person dislikes.
He says that the proper aim of any creature is to self-surrender – to offer back the will which we claim as our own, and this necessity is a daily occurrence which is inherently painful. He says this process is made easier through pain itself because 1) people would not surrender if all was well, so pain is recognizable and unmasked evil; "every man knows something is wrong when he is being hurt". 2) Pain shatters the illusion that we have enough for ourselves. 3) We know we’re acting for God’s sake if the material action of our choice is painful or at least contrary to our inclinations.
For the first, Lewis says sadists and masochists are no different, they just isolate and exaggerate an aspect of normal pleasure. The sadists exaggerates the moment of union by saying "I am such a master that I even torment you" and the masochist exaggerates the complementary side by saying "I am so enthralled that I welcome even pain at your hands." If these people recognized pain for what it was, their habits would cease to provide a pleasurable stimulus.
To underline his point he says probably the most famous line from this book: "God whispers to us in our pleasures, speaks in our conscience, but shouts in our pain: it is His megaphone to rouse a deaf world."
He says that a recognition of this truth underlies the universal feeling that bad men ought to suffer – a sense of retribution. While some people want to do away with retribution, Lewis says that to do so would make all punishment unjust and any act to correct behavior would contradict itself. On another level, Lewis says that we experience a thirst for revenge. This passion though loses sight of the end in the means. He notes how biblical ancestors probably meant retribution when they spoke of God’s ‘vengeance’. Pain gives the only opportunity for bad men to amend.
Human Pain, Continued