Objection · Case 06 · Problem of Evil
A future in which suffering ends doesn’t justify the suffering. If I torture you for a year and then give you a million dollars, the money doesn’t make the torture right. “Heaven fixes it” isn’t an answer.
One objection from the free evidence repository at apologetics.pro.
Response
This is Ivan Karamazov’s objection and it is the strongest one in this case. The Christian reply distinguishes compensation from redemption. The claim is not that heaven pays for suffering but that God can take the suffering itself up into a good that could not have existed without it, the way a rescue is a good that requires the danger. Whether every evil can be redeemed that way, or only some, is the question that separates a full theodicy from a defense. The position taken here is a defense: the resurrection shows that evil is not final, not that every evil was worth it.
About this exhibit
This objection is to Paul’s first letter to the Corinthians on death defeated.
Paul writes that at the resurrection an old promise comes true, “Death is swallowed up in victory,” and then taunts death, asking where its sting has gone. For Paul the resurrection is not a private…
Under Claim 03: Scripture presents the resurrection of Jesus as God’s declaration that death and evil do not get the last word.