When Bad Things Happen to Good People

Rating:
Summary: "There are better choices to understand the mind of God..."
Review: Dr. Kushner was well-intentioned in his authorship of this book to be sure. However, his basic conclusion is that God is either all-powerful or all-loving. Since bad things happen, God isn't all powerful.

The theology is faulty. As Christ was fully God, and still fully human, so God can be loving and powerful without losing either attribute. God's power never works outside His perfect will, and sometimes that will permits evil.

A much better book on endurance through adversity is "With Joseph in the University of Adversity". This book will answer most questions Kushner poses from a much more conservative and scriptural point of view.

Rating:
Summary: A wonderfully-written perspective on God, life and suffering
Review: In a time when so many people are striving for an explanation of why their lives turn out a certain way, or why things (good or bad) happen to them, the expressions "it's all part of God's plan," "everything happens for the best," or "it just wasn't meant to be," and so on, have became a little tiresome. In "When Bad Things Happen to Good People," Rabbi Harold S. Kushner offers a refreshing point of view that differs from those who think everything occurs on earth because God wants it that way, and at the same time provides a surprising comfort in the fact that events actually can, and do, take place for no reason at all.

I read the original version of this book in the early 80's (several times since), and what struck me was that Rabbi Kushner was able to reconcile a common Judeo-Christian view of God and causality with a perspective of life that holds a place for randomness and happenstance. Yes! Things happen in life that God has nothing to do with, and there is a way to find peace in accepting this. For those who enjoy contemplating and discussing the purpose of life, faith, and good & bad, you MUST read this book . . . then set aside some more time for thought and conversation.

If you've ever experienced the untimely loss of a loved one, or been through any traumatizing life experience, get this book. It is personal, thought-provoking, well-written, and very easy to understand. I am certain you will find comfort.

If you're just simply interested in learing about God and the meaning of things in your life from a wonderful man and a great writer, get this book. Without intending to write a best-seller (read his Preface), Rabbi Kushner was able to put into words what I had been trying to figure out (despite loads of "help" from others) concerning God, how we should relate to Him, and what to do about all the things that happen to us during our lives.

This book is important; I give it my highest recommendation.

Rating:
Summary: A stunning book
Review: I don't even know where to begin in my praise for this book. Perhaps I am so bowled over by this book's insights because many of the philosophical questions the author raises are, verbatim, the EXACT questions I was turning over and over in my mind for the past few months.

What good is prayer if God already "has a plan" as so many insist? How can there be a moral reason for natural distaster (e.g., the tsunami) when all the disaster is a action/reaction of nature? When the roof blows off a church in a tornado and the people hiding inside are safe and they say God was looking out for them, does that mean God was NOT lookng out for the people down the street, probably equally as devout, whose roof collapsed on them?

This book is helpful because it suggests that some of the ideas we have about God might be innacurate - that we are looking at God in such a way that is more self serving to US, instead of recognizing the reality of what God IS. (For those "blue staters" who think that Christianity and Judeaism is all about punishment and rigidity, you might do well to read this book - then find out what religion is REALLY all about, not what you FEAR it is all about.)

About 3/4 of the way through this book I burst into tears of relief, because this book provided the very answers I was searching for, and was reluctant to discuss with my friends who practice what I consider a contemporary, rock-musiced, chirpy McReligion, popular but deeply unsatisfing. (They could probably benefit from this book too!)

If you are looking for some very thoughtful answers to difficult philosophical questions about the nature of God, I don't think you'll be disappointed by this simple, easy-to-read little book.

Rating:
Summary: exercises in life
Review: A very good essay about life. A book that does not explain why things happen but ackowledges that for the most part, there is no logical explanation. I came away with the following: 'GOD HELPS THOSE WHO HELP THEMSELVES'

Rating:
Summary: Theology I can accept
Review: I have had many of the same objections that Kushner brings up to traditional answers to the question of theodicy. Kushner provides a well-reasoned, realistic, and yet still comforting answer. I'll let Kushner explain his theory, because in summary it doesn't sound as compelling as it does in detail, but suffice it to say that while many of the reviews here do provide a good summary, you're still not going to understand Kushner's argument unless you read the book in full.

I'm going to respond to the review entitled "There are better choices to understand the mind of God..." and hopefully, in the process, provide a better picture of what the book is and isn't:

First of all, I'm not sure that the analogy the reviewer makes about Christ being both God and human (therefore God can be both completely powerful and completely loving) makes sense in this context. Kushner is Jewish, and while his book is pretty universal (he is writing for a mixed audience and so assumes little about his readers' beliefs beyond their belief in God), the fact remains that he is writing from within the Jewish tradition, and he makes no attempt to disguise the fact. Jesus is more or less irrelevant to him. Judaism presupposes an absolute cleavage between man and God: man cannot become God (ala Hercules) and God does not become man (ala Jesus or Dionysus). Both are originally pagan concepts. So I think the argument is a little out of place in a review of this book.

Second, your assertion that God is both all-powerful and all-loving is addressed in the book, and found wanting. Simply saying, in essence, "Kushner is wrong, God can be both," does not explain why one should accept your unsupported assertion over his argument.

Third, the book you recommend does not address the same issues as this one and is therefore not a good suggestion for substitution. It may be a perfectly good book for Christian readers, but suggesting it here is like suggesting a book on yoga to someone who's looking for information on nutrition. There's a little overlap, but it's not going to answer most of the person's questions.

Finally, perhaps some of the reason for your disappointment is suggested in the title of your review. Kushner isn't out to "understand the mind of God," (chas v'shalom). He quotes Job to point out that the mind of God is essentially unknowable. Kushner's purpose is to come up with a humanly acceptable answer to how a loving God can allow terrible things to happen to good people.

Rating:
Summary: Left me wanting too much more info!!!
Review: I liked what was being said but.....This has to be the shortest (total playing time)book on tape I have ever purchased! I think more info. could have been recorded. I feel there must be alot that I missed from the book and I have never had that feeling before after listening to a book on tape. I do not expect to get the entire book via spoken word, but from such a well received /critically acclaimed book and based on such a moving &important topic more info should have been there.

Rating:
Summary: Very Enlightening
Review: Unfortunately, we all suffer in our lifetimes. As part of our pain, we try to rationalize why we are undergoing trauma. Harold Kushner takes a personal tragedy as a backdrop for his explanation of why bad things happen to good people.

Kushner left a grey area in this book, though I do not find it particularly objectionable. How much you get from this book may depend on where you stand on the issue of sovereignty. Does God control everything that happens to us? Or is everything determined by free will of man? Free will, of course, is very real. It is not God that causes a bullet to kill an innocent person. The free will of the shooter allows him to fire the gun killing the innocent man. God does not intervene. If God intervened everytime an innocent person were hurt, he would be interfering with free will. Occasionally, the bullet may miraculously miss and maybe it is the work of God. God has that power. As an issue of sovereignty, it is a combination between free will and God making things happen. It is the logical explanation.

Once this issue is surpassed, Kushner presents various scenarios that happen to good people. He uses the most famous story in the Bible as an example. The story of Job is the ultimate story of bad things happening to a good person. In the story, Job must get past that fact that he has not sinned to deserve this suffering. Suffering, and religion in general, is an opportunity for us to be comforted and see the good in others. When we see others suffering, it gives us the opportunity to comfort, showing our goodness. With disease, hunger, or suffering, God gives us the resources to use. Man has the free will to end suffering.

The easiest way to think about the big picture is the poem title "Footprints in the Sand". The moral of the story is that God has not abandoned us in times of suffering. If we turn to Him and ask for strength to make it through, we will not disappointed. There is not one set of footprints in the sand because God abandoned us, he is carrying us through our suffering. Pain and death will not end in this world. We can never make complete sense of our suffering, but the strength can make life easier when we seek Him.

Rating:
Summary: Extremely helpful and uplifting
Review: I bought this book nearly 9 years ago after I lost my mother to a devastating illness that September, and my daughter was delivered stillborn a week before my due date in January. My father went on to die from cancer the following September. None of it made sense, and it caused me to question all that I'd believed in.

Rabbi Kushner's message -- that things don't "happen for a reason" but that God gave us this world and nature and that sometimes bad things just happen, helped me better understand that my mom didn't do anything to cause her illness and my daughter didn't do anything to miss her chance at life. More importantly, the latter (and much more important) part of the message -- that God intervenes in our world by giving us each other -- has helped me live each day since, appreciating life and the gifts I've been given in my family, friends, colleagues and sometimes even strangers. I HIGHLY recommend this book, not only to those who are grieving, but to everyone.

Rating:
Summary: Mixed feelins
Review: This book talks about what tragedy and suffering do and do not mean in life. The main point is that people often overinterpret what it means when something tragic occurs to them, in that they seek to blame themselves or others, or want to find cause-and-effect in bigger forms that it might actually exist.


My family has gone through three major tragedies or traumatic experiences: I became a quadriplegic from a spinal cord injury at age 15, my brother passed away at age 50, and my father was in a serious automobile crash. My father was given this book well after my accident, but well before my brother's death. He has read it three times, and finds it very helpful. My mother and I read it once each and, while we do not argue with it, we did not find it helpful either. It was a null entity for the two of us.


For the solace and comfort it has granted my father, I give it four stars, and I thank the author.

Rating:
Summary: "There are better choices to understand the mind of God..."
Review: I must admit, I have not read this book yet, but aim to do so. I heard Mr. Kushner speak about his book on the God Squad and the message of his book .I found it extremely sincere and thoughtful. I think this book would put many people at rest with some of their un-answered question.