Questions - Natural Disasters
On this page we look at natural disasters and the way that these phenomena are understood in the world today – considering questions such as
Within this page you will find an extract from the chapter on 'Natural Evil' in The God of the Cruel World, some links to websites where people are attempting to provide answers to these types of questions.
Extract from 'God of The Cruel World'
The final strand considers natural disasters from the perspective that they are directed and orchestrated by God. This is the idea that God intervenes and brings about natural disasters to punish human transgression. However, this is immediately problematic as it returns us to the idea that the goodness of God is somehow compromised because the Divine is capable of both good and evil actions. Moreover, it makes God out to be arbitrary because some people are clearly the recipients of these terrible events whereas others are not. The natural disaster makes no discrimination between innocent victim and guilty person.
This indiscriminate destruction of the innocent along with the guilty naturally causes us to question whether it is God who is orchestrating natural disasters. The reasoning being that the Divine would be unlikely to carry out a judgement in such a haphazard and unreliable way. However, during the 18th century, an event happened in Portugal which for many people put the idea of an avenging God finally to rest.
The event happened in the year 1755. It was All Saints' Day and many Christians were at church when the city of Lisbon was rocked by a huge earthquake that lasted approximately 10 minutes. The earthquake caused total devastation, demolishing virtually all of the buildings in the city, killing upwards of 60,000 people and destroying valuable works of art. As the majority of people around that day were believers, this group suffered large in the death toll. Those survivors who managed to escape the earthquake and resulting fire took refuge in Lisbon's less developed sea front area. On the beach people did not run the risk of being struck by falling debris or inhaling smoke, but the choice was not a good one. A short time later, several giant tsunamis swept in from the Atlantic killing the majority of those who had escaped the earthquake.
This event, more than any other, shook the foundations of religious faith within Europe because it challenged the conventional understanding about God in the post-Enlightenment context – an understanding that suggested God was better understood through an examination of the natural world. If this was so, then it seemed God was angry and violent towards creation – moreover, God appeared aggressive towards people and their environments, particularly those who believed and worshipped the Divine.
Extract from 'The God of the Cruel World' (Natural Evil) © 2007 Bob Eckhard
Further Reading
Links
Short article by creationist and apologist Dr Hugh Ross on the benefits of hurricanes.
Article by Krista Kay Bontrager on natural disasters from biblical standpoint.