Introduction
Since the earliest Christian commentators, two main approaches have traditionally been taken to the problem of natural disasters: they are divine punishments for sin, or they are the product of a fallen world:
When such evils as disease or natural disasters are discussed, they are viewed as God’s just judgment against sin (Tertullian’s “penal sin”), or as “ambassadors” which direct us toward God (as such, Basil the Great prefers not to call them evils), or as the result of the fallen world order.[1] [2]
The latter remains popular in mainstream theology,[3] but both these approaches fail under scrutiny. The most simplistic view of natural disasters (a punishment for sin), finds only superficial support in Scripture. It is true that there are numerous cases of God using natural disasters as a punishment, either on His covenant community or on those responsible to His commandments; God Himself takes responsibility them (Isaiah 45:7).
However, in Luke 13:1-5 Christ teaches that not all who perish (either at the hands of others or by disaster), are being punished for sin, and in Matt 5:44-45 he teaches that God provides environmental benefits to both the just and the unjust. This shows natural disasters should not be interpreted simply as a punishment for sin, and we should appreciate that God has arranged certain natural weather patterns for the benefit even of the wicked. It is true to say that there is some connection to be made between human sin and natural disasters insofar as sinful human activity may disrupt existing ecosystems, but these disasters are not caused by God:
Some floods are ‘freaks’ of nature, but increasingly it is evident that so-called ‘natural’ disasters are directly the result of man’s mis-management of the earth’s economy, his pollution of rivers and seas, his exploitation of forests and farmland.[4]
As for the view that natural disasters are defects resulting from the fall which will be ‘fixed up’ in the Kingdom age, Scripture never characterizes them either as the product of the fall[5] or as flaws in the natural creation to be ‘corrected’ at Christ’s return. On the contrary, the storms, lightning, and hail which heralded destruction for an Israelite farmer are presented to Job as superlative expressions of God’s power and glory (Job 38:24-37). The ad hoc nature of this argument is revealed when it is asked what the earth looked like before the fall, and how this can be reconciled with the earth’s own account of itself; there is no evidence for a post-fall renovation of the entire planet in the 4.5 billion years of the earth’s geological record.
Rather than post-fall defects, natural disasters are the direct products of laws which God instituted at the beginning of creation to govern the various dynamic features of the earth. The rain, the wind, and the actions of the sun on the earth are all ordained by God (Gen 8:22; Ps 74:16-17; 104:10-13, 19-23; Ecc 1:6-7; Isa 55:10); natural disasters are simply extraordinary demonstrations of these systems acting precisely as originally designed:
One must make room for the natural processes God has set in place. For the most part it would seem that He allows these processes to operate according to fixed patterns and laws (Jer. 33:25) that modern meteorology can identify and explain.[6]
This places such disasters in perspective; they are natural expressions of the way God has designed the earth to function, and are typically not referred to as ‘disasters’ except when they involve the loss of human and animal life, and destruction of human property.
The best of all possible worlds?
Could God have created a world without evil, or at least without natural disasters? A common evangelical response is that He did:
Couldn’t God have created a world without evil? The short answer is: yes, God could have created such a world. And in fact, we already know of such a world: it’s called Heaven. And we know the Bible says it is God’s will that every person join Him in Heaven.[7]
Such heaven-going is clearly incompatible with Scripture, and solves nothing. An alternative response, represented most famously in “Essais de Théodicée sur la bonté de Dieu, la liberté de l’homme et l’origine du mal”[8] (1710), by Gottfried Leibniz, has been to argue that since God is omnipotent He must necessarily have had unhindered capacity to create any world He chose, and that since God is perfect He must necessarily have created the best of all worlds from which He had to choose.
On what basis can this theory be advanced? Here Leibniz and his followers typically took refuge in an argument from the inscrutability of God’s infinite knowledge. God alone understands the basis of the choice He made, and He alone can see and comprehend the manner in which the evil of the world is balanced by the greater good. This approach finds no support from Scripture, and is completely without empirical evidence.
The solution advanced in this article is that natural disasters are the ‘cost of creation’; they are the price which God necessarily paid in order to create the world which was optimal for His purpose. This argument contradicts Leibniz by denying that God’s omnipotence gave Him a choice of an infinite number of worlds which could have been created. Rather, God’s own aims in creation restricted the number of possible created worlds to one specific form.
Additionally, this argument differs from Leibniz in that it does not view disasters only as sources of evil. On the contrary, it argues that these very events provide benefits which are essential to life on earth, despite the danger and destruction they also entail.
The cost of creation: God constrained by His aims
The concept of an omnipotent God being constrained in His choice of creation appears counter-intuitive until it is realized that God’s own purpose necessitated a specific kind of creation.
God intended the earth to be filled with life; Isaiah 45:18 says He ‘formed it to be inhabited’. In Gen 1:11-26, having filled the earth with plant and non-human animal life, God had not yet completed His work. It was only when man and woman were formed that God declared creation ‘very good’ (verse 31), and ceased.
Most importantly, Gen 1:26 tells us God formed a highly specific kind of life, a man and woman in His own image and likeness. The Hebrew here is typically understood as a reference to God deliberately creating individuals as His counterparts in some way; they correspond to Him at least in terms of their ability to reflect His thoughts and emotions, and communicate effectively with Him.
Many passages of Scripture (especially Heb 12:7-11), indicate God desired a parent-child relationship with these individuals, involving them learning through the natural process of hardships and discipline a father permits and exercises in order to develop optimally his children’s character. Adam and Eve’s testing in Genesis 3 supports this, also demonstrating God wished His children to be free moral agents developing their own consciences, as they chose to obey or disobey His commandments.
These passages identify the constraints operating on God’s choice of creation: a universe capable not only of supporting simple life, but of supporting complex, intelligent life; independent moral agents able to reflect His character, comprehend and communicate with Him, and develop their own conscience; children whose character would be developed by the challenge of struggle and discipline.
Such a form of life requires extremely specific environmental conditions, not only on a terrestrial scale, but on a cosmic scale. It has been argued by a number of scientists that intelligent life actually requires a universe with at least three dimensions, ordered as our universe is:
It seems clear that life, at least as we know it, can exist only in regions of space-time in which three space and one time dimension are not curled up small.[9]
Hence intelligent life can arise only if gravity has the l/r or l/r2 form, and so, if gravity and dimensionality connect as Kant claimed, intelligent life can exist only if space has two or three dimensions.[10]
More than three dimensions and gravitational forces would be inadequate for the solar systems necessary to support intelligent life.
If the universe were to hold more than three space dimensions, the gravitational force would not be such as to allow stable orbits of planets about a sun and the constant temperature required for life.[11]
Less than three dimensions, and the neural and circulatory systems necessary specifically for human life, could not exist:
The end result of this complex network is a nervous system that is sufficiently complex to support the existence of intelligent life. However, had space possessed only two spatial dimensions, these complex neural connections would have been impossible, because any two non-parallel connections would have automatically crossed each other, thereby ruining the connection.[12]
Three dimensions are also required for proper blood flow, for had space possessed only two dimensions, venous blood would invariably have become intermingled with arterial blood, with catastrophic results for the body. It is clear, then, that the existence of three spatial dimensions is absolutely mandatory for the proper functioning of both our minds and our bodies.[13]
Moving from the cosmological to the terrestrial scale, we find a significant range of additional factors necessary for the kind of intelligent life required by God’s purpose:
Complex, multicellular life relies on too many planetary factors – even after clearing all the chemical roadblocks – to be common. (For example, a large moon to stabilize the planetary axis tilt and hence the seasons, a magnetic field to shield off radiation, plate tectonics to remix surface and ocean chemistry that helps regulate CO2 levels, etc.).[14]
The Earth benefits from the presence of plate tectonics, a process that acts like a global thermostat by reprocessing greenhouse gasses. Life on Earth benefits dramatically from a single large moon that produces exceptional tides and helps to stabilize the tilt of the Earth and the length of its days.[15]
We must look beyond the mere presence of water to the presence of volcanoes, plate tectonics and oxygen.[16]
Note in particular the following requirements for complex multi-cellular life; a single large moon, a magnetic field, volcanoes, and plate tectonics. All of them are necessary for the specific form of life required by God’s purpose, and yet all of them are significantly responsible for the earth’s natural disasters.
The cost of creation: natural disasters essential to life
Leibniz was wrong; constrained by His own purpose, God had in fact little choice when He created the universe. The form of life He required to fulfill His purpose necessitated an earth with specific systems responsible for the disasters which threaten and even destroy life. The disasters they cause are the inevitable ‘cost’ of their benefits; they promote, protect, and maintain life on our planet:
The more we understand the process of the world scientifically, the more it seems to be a package deal in which processes interrelate in mutual entanglement. The idea that it would be possible to create a world with all the nice features of this one and none of the nasty ones seems more and more implausible (Polkinghorne 1989, Chapter 5; Ruse 2011, Chapter 7).[17]
Movement of the Earth’s liquid interior causes earthquakes and volcanoes, but also creates the magnetosphere, a magnetic field shielding life on Earth from destruction:
Were it not for the two natural barriers that stand between the Sun and the surface of the earth, life itself would soon disappear. These essential shields – the magnetosphere and just beneath it, the gaseous atmosphere of the Earth – protect us from the full fury of the highly variable star with which we live. [18]
Without the protection of the magnetosphere, ionizing radiation would destroy all life exposed at the earth’s surface.[19]
Volcanoes are part of the Earth’s carbon cycle, regulating temperature and carbon balance so life can survive and flourish:
“It is remarkable how exact the balance is between the carbon input from volcanoes and the output from rock weathering” said Dr Zeebe. “This suggests a natural thermostat which helps maintain climate stability.” The delicately balanced carbon thermostat has been a key factor in allowing liquid water, and life, to remain on Earth, he said.[20]
Volcanoes play a critical role in biogeochemical cycling. It is fair to say, in fact, that Earth’s life as we know it might not exist without volcanic activity.[21]
Movement of the Earth’s tectonic plates creates earthquakes and tsunamis, but is also essential to life:
It is not the mountains as such that are so important to life on Earth, but the process that creates them: plate tectonics.[22]
Thus, plate tectonics seems to be a crucial requirement for any planet on which life can thrive.[23]
In addition, it causes the weathering of rocks which removes CO2 from the atmosphere, maintaining a life-promoting climate:
Weathering of silicate minerals also removes CO2 from the atmosphere. Hence, carbon dioxide is “scrubbed” from the system.[24]
Tropical storms bring significant environmental benefits:
Increased rainfall in coastal areas from tropical cyclones, fixing of atmospheric nitrogen by thunderstorms, the germination of many native plant species resulting from bushfires and the maintenance of the fertility of the basin soils due to river flooding are some of the positive impact [sic] of extreme meteorological events.[25]
Like other hazards, tropical cyclones bring benefits as well as losses. For example, there is a tendency for tropical cyclones to end drought in Australia and elsewhere.[26]
Such storms also prevent large earthquakes by releasing plate tension in slow quakes:
The researchers speculate that the reason devastating earthquakes rarely occur in eastern Taiwan is because the slow quakes act as valves, frequently releasing the stress along small sections of the fault, eliminating the situation where a long segment sustains continuous high stresses until it ruptures in a single great earthquake.[27]
The moon’s tides play a vital role in the marine ecology, yet can combine with storm fronts or rain flooding to produce large scale floods. In 1988, 122,000 km2 in Bangladesh was flooded in less than 48 hours after the moon’s high tide combined with three to four days of rain.[28]
The value of this approach to theodicy is becoming increasingly recognized. During a British TV programme in 2005[29] former Dominican friar Mark Dowd asked Christian theologians to explain why God permits natural disasters. The answers used the argument from the ‘cost of creation’ principle discussed here. Comments made were the following:
If we didn’t have a crust that moved, ultimately, with erosion, the whole surface of the planet would be basically smooth. … And so you could have simple forms of life, but you certainly couldn’t have complex animals like us. …if there were no recycling of the crust, basically the whole planet would become infertile after a certain period of time. Nancey Murphy (Fuller Theological Seminary)
The hurricane that happened in New Orleans was absolutely necessary in order to have heat exchange … from one part of the continent to the other, otherwise the earth would not be habitable. Friar George Coyne (Vatican Observatory)
[Dowd: ‘But couldn’t a supreme intelligence have fashioned things according to entirely different laws of nature which would still allow for the evolution of complex human creatures with free will, like ourselves?’]
Even Dawkins, who is no friend of Christianity, would say there’s probably no other way by natural processes to have evolved creatures who have these capabilities. Robert Russell (Centre for Theology and Natural Sciences)
[1] D. R. Stoffer, “The Problem of Evil: An Historical Theological Approach” Ashland Theological Journal, 24 (1992): 55-75 (55). [All emphasis in quotes is mine.]
[2] [Ed AP]: Stoffer seems to identify a third approach here—that of natural disasters as ‘ambassadors’.
[3] “Moreover, it is also argued that the natural world was perfect until the Fall, which somehow threw nature off balance and made the earth vulnerable to disasters such as earthquakes and floods (cf. Rom 8:20-21)”, J. McKeown, Genesis, The Two Horizons Old Testament Commentary (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2008), 270.
[4] Editor, “Signs of the Times: ‘In the Whirlwind and in the Storm’”, The Christadelphian, 125/1492. (1988): 389.
[5] “The OT, however, does not specifically describe the sin of Adam and Eve as a Fall, and it does not link natural disasters to their first sin”, McKeown, Genesis, 270.
[6] R. B. Chisholm Jr., “How a Hermeneutical Virus Can Corrupt Theological Systems”, Bibliotheca Sacra, 166/662 (2009): 259-270 (256).
[7] T. Hines, “The Atheistic Explanation for Evil: Houston, We Have A Problem”, Conservative Theological Journal, 7 (2003): 326-327.
[8] “Essays of theodicy on the goodness of God, the freedom of man and the origin of evil”.
[9] S. Hawking, A Brief History of Time (New York: Bantam Books, 1998), 182.
[10] N. Huggett, Everywhere and Everywhen: Adventures in Physics and Philosophy (Oxford: New York: Oxford University Press, 2010.), 54; Huggett disputes this argument, which he cites from cosmologist Gerald Whitrow and theoretical physicist Stephen Hawking.
[11] R. K. Adair, The Great Design: Particles, Fields, and Creation (New York: Oxford University Press, 1989), 367.
[12] M. Corey, God and the New Cosmology: The Anthropic Design Argument (Lanham: Rowman & Littlefield, 1993), 94.
[13] Ibid., p. 94.
[14] M. Gleiser, “From Cosmos to Intelligent Life: The Four Ages of Astrobiology”, International Journal of Astrobiology 11/4 (2012): 345-350 (350).
[15] H. E. McCurdy, Space and the American Imagination (Baltimore: John Hopkins University Press, 2011), 146.
[16] N. Lane, Oxygen: The Molecule That Made the World (New York: Oxford University Press, 2004), 73.
[17] W. A. Dembski and M. Ruse, Debating Design: From Darwin to DNA, (New York: Cambridge University Press, 2004), 258-259.
[18] J. A. Eddy, The Sun, the Earth, and Near-Earth Space: A Guide to the Sun-Earth System (Washington, D.C.: National Aeronautics and Space Administration, 2009), 71.
[19] A. H. Strahler and A. N. Strahler, Modern Physical Geography (New York: Wiley, 1992), 28.
[20] BBC, “Nature’s carbon balance confirmed”, interviewing R. Zeebe, [Available online at http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/sci/tech/7363600.stm; cited 11 October 2012].
[21] J. Lockwood and R. W. Hazlett, Volcanoes: Global Perspectives (Hoboken: Wiley-Blackwell, 2010), 399.
[22] P. D. Ward and D. Brownlee, Rare Earth: Why complex life is uncommon in the universe (New York: Copernicus, 2000), 194.
[23] J. O. Bennett et al., The Cosmic Perspective (San Francisco: Pearson Addison-Wesley, 2004), 414.
[24] Lockwood and Hazlett, Volcanoes: Global Perspectives, 399.
[25] M. Datta, N. P. Singh, and D. Daschaudhuri, Climate Change & Food Security (New Delhi: New India Publishing Agency, 2008), 38.
[26] K. Smith and D. N. Petley, Environmental Hazards: assessing risk and reducing disaster (5th ed.; Abingdon: Routledge, 2009), 182.
[27] Academia Sinica, “Earth Scientists show Slow Earthquakes Triggered by Typhoons, Publish in Nature” [Cited 11th October 2012: Available online at http://newsletter.sinica.edu.tw/en/news/read_news.php?nid=1275.
[28] D. E. Alexander, Natural Disasters (Dordrecht: Kluwer Academic Publisher, 1999), 545-546.
[29] Transcript of “Tsunami: Where Was God?”, Channel 4, aired 25 January 2005.
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