Divine Evil responses

Why does God allow suffering?

1. Free will - if God allows us to have free will then suffering is the inevitable consequence - as it is impossible for God to create a world which has free agents that will not ultimately sin
2. Soul making - going through suffering gives us the opportunity to have experiences that allow us to have ‘great souls’
3. The best of all possible worlds - given all the constraints facing God despite appearances this is the best of all possible worlds
4. Human epistemological uncertainty - it is not reasonable to expect humans with all their limitations to know why God allows suffering (see God’s response to Job)

How can we reconcile a good God with earthly judgements and eternal judgement

1. With regard to earthly judgements God did not author those parts of the Bible - they are a product of violent cultures (I suspect such writers would also argue for either the non-existence of hell or its limited duration)
2. Earthly and eternal judgements are for each individual concerned the best outcome they could experience given the choices they have made, or in the case of cultures that receive destructive judgements; the culture had reached a point where there was no reasonable expectation of any of its children being anything other than even worse than their parents. (This viewpoint holds existence is so good even a limited existence that is separated from God is better than no existence)
3. Earthly and eternal judgements are real and therefore they represent the reasonable response to sin. God alone knows how serious sin is and therefore if Jesus says that eternal hell is the appropriate response to sin then as God we must trust His verdict. Jesus indicates that if we have not received salvation we shall each experience judgement that is proportionate to our sins and knowledge of God’s will - this will also reflect our previous suffering