Questioner: I would just like to ask why a God of love allows so much wickedness in the world today?
Huzoor (rh): The wickedness, the existence, the presence of wickedness you mean?
Questioner: Well the evil and the suffering of the innocent.
Huzoor (rh): Of course. I understand. Could you please stop your violence? The basic, the fundamental reason why we suffer is because we suffer at each other’s hands. The suffering is the creation of humans. It is not the creation of God. And whenever they deviate from the prescribed course of God, by God, then the suffering is born. Now it is a very complex question because some suffering we find is not a direct result of the person, person’s disregard to any divine order or injunction. Sometimes such sufferings are born because of the total social attitude to certain things. So you cannot say this man did not commit that crime, why must he suffer? Humanity as a whole becomes responsible. Like societies in everyday life are considered to be responsible for certain evils which befall some individual members of the societies. When you go to war, you cannot blame the person who is killed by a stray bullet or whose house is put to fire by bombardment or raised to ground. You can’t ask this question individually, addressing to each one, why did this happen to him and that to that? It is a law of totality. When the entire total society is responsible for certain disregards to human values, then the society suffers and the individuals make the society so some individuals would ultimately suffer. So this again is one area of understanding the suffering. Then those who are born with congenital defects, why should they suffer, what crime they have committed? Those who suffer out of disadvantages which they inherit from a social order or an economic order, like poor countries of the world, this question should be addressed in relation to them as well. Now as I said earlier, it’s a very complex issue, but I have attempted genuinely to answer these questions in relation to the points I have raised, plus many others, in a book which will be very soon published, or if not very soon, within the next 2-3 months I hope, it will be available. So if you leave your address here, we can send you a copy and I hope inshallah you will find the answers to some degree at least satisfactory.
