Suffering Meaningfully - Aurpon Bhattacharya

Does human suffering have meaning? What metaphysical meaning can there be behind burning people alive? What consolation can one give a mother who has just lost her one and only young son? Of what purpose is life if the end, death, is inconsequential? These are some of the questions that I have attempted to answer in this article.

Is something neither right nor wrong unless and until God has pronounced it one or other?

If we take the case to be that whatever God commands is right then we run into a number of problems. Jerry Falwell preached that it was a Christian’s moral duty to support the Vietnam war and he preached, "Kill a Commi for Christ!" Was he right? Is what God commands right because He commands it, or is it right for some other reason than that he commands it? This seems to be the fundamental question behind the Book of Job and sums up Job’s condition. Job’s argument with God is that he does not, and did not, deserve to be treated the way God has treated him, and God’s argument that Job does not have sufficient knowledge to know what is right or wrong from God’s point of view is not satisfying for us the readers, because we know God’s reasons for bringing ruin to Job—it is a test; it is a test to win a bet with the devil; and it is not about creating some greater good that this requires. It has no more merit than there would be in someone’s doing everything s/he could to make sure his/her spouse was loyal by treating him or her terribly and making sure temptation fell right into his or her lap. Even if the spouse proves loyal, the test itself was reprehensible. Job was prosperous, materialistically successful. God tests his faith and when he finds Job holds true, despite being afflicted with "loath some sores from the sole of his foot to the crown of his head," and receiving severe chastisement at the hands of his wife, He rewards him with double the material wealth.

This raises another interesting question. Should one be faithful to God as God rewards his faithful followers materialistically? "Why," Socrates had questioned Euthyphro in Plato’s Euthyphro, "be ethical, especially if and when it goes against your self-interest?"

The problem we run into, if we look at these ancient tales as they are, without delving into the philosophy underneath, is that these holy texts do not seem so holistic after all. Would we like to be faithful to a god who rewards us financially? In short, does it pay to be faithful? Most of us would, I am sure. But then how does that fit in with the idea of an afterlife. What is hell and what heaven then if we are rewarded with prosperity in this life itself?

© "Mother India" (April 2002) published by Sri Aurobindo Society, Pondicherry 605 002. Website: www.sriaurobindosociety.org.in. Reprinted with permission.

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