Description
Approaching the problem of evil from an alternative angle, Evil and the Problem of Jesus offers a Christ-centred approach as an antidote to traditional theodicy. Gary Commins’ discussion provides original insights into divine power, presence, and love, allowing readers to reengage with the God whom Jesus reveals and the evil that Jesus challenges. In this study, Jesus stands as a model for full humanity, crafting new ways to imagine personal relationships with God and with evil.
Evil and the Problem of Jesus draws on pastoral experiences of tragedy, suffering, and evil alongside philosophical and biblical insights and Jesus’ own complex interactions with evil. Commins offers thoughtful conceptual frameworks to help the reader live more faithfully, compassionately, wisely and justly in response to evils around us and within us.
About the Author
Gary Commins is a retired priest in the American Episcopal Church, whose work, blending scholarship with ministry in work, has received an honorary doctorate.
Contents
Preface
Acknowledgments
Introduction
1. The Case for Christodicy
2. Keeping It Real
Real Theodicy
Real Life
The Real World
3. God and Evil
Can Anything Good Come from Theodicy?
God Is Great. God Is Good: Theodicy without Jesus
For the Bible Tells Me So: Theodicy before Jesus
4. Jesus and Evil
Christianity without Jesus
He Shall Overcome
No Sympathy for the Devil
The Exorcist
The Do-Gooder
The Teacher
A Face in the Crowd
The City on a Hill
The Stone the Christians Rejected
5. Evil and Christian Faith
In the Beginning
Christ Was Born for This
Were You There?
He Is in Every Place
And in the End
A United Front
6. God, Jesus, Evil, and Us
Evil and the Problem of Jesus’ God
Jesus and the Troubles I’ve Seen
Bibliography
Names Index
Scripture Index
Endorsements and Reviews
In this time of mass shootings, climate catastrophe, rising authoritarianism, and racial terrorism, this book is a timely study of the overwhelming nature of the social forces that generate and perpetuate social injustice, held in tension with personal responsibility and agency critical to Christian thought. The God that emerges in these pages is a God Jews and Hindus would recognise, yet challenging for those of us who inhabit Christianity in twenty-first century America and equate God with power. Winnie Varghese, Rector, St. Luke’s Episcopal Church, Atlanta
Gary Commins has written a creative and innovative reflection on the nature of evil. Commins persuasively asserts that an appropriately Christian perspective begins with Jesus’ own engagement with evil, enlightened by the Hebrew Scriptures, Trinitarian doctrine, and insights from other religious traditions. Crafted in Commins’ unique and eminently readable style, the book offers a ‘Christodicy’ that honours Scripture and tradition but is resolutely contemporary. John L. Kater, Church Divinity School of the Pacific, Emeritus
With incisive research and penetrating insights, Commins exposes a Christian theological and philosophical tradition that has ignored Jesus when addressing the perplexing problem of evil. By taking seriously the ways in which Jesus navigated and responded to evil in his own day, Commins offers a thoughtful, faithful, and just pathway for responding to the complex ways in which evil impacts everyday lives, from the systemic to the personal. A must-read for scholars and pastors alike. Kelly Brown Douglas, Dean, Episcopal Divinity School at Union Theological Seminary
Evil and the Problem of Jesus asks: How can Christians live with daily mass shootings in America? How can they live with the evil within? As Commins states, ‘we forget to think as Christians. We forget to engage the mind of Christ as we respond to exploitation and injustice, misery and pain, and violence and death.’ This book, beautifully written, with Christodicy responds: ‘How do we justify our ways to Christ?’ Tim Vivian, California State University Bakersfield, Emeritus
