God and Human Suffering: An Exercise in the Theology of the Cross

by Douglas John Hall

Professor Hall has written a major work on an agonizing subject, at once brilliant, comprehensive, and thought provoking. In contrast to many writers who gloss over one or the other, Dr. Hall is true both to the reality of suffering and to the affirmation that God creates, sustains, and redeems. Creative is his view that certain aspects of what we call suffering -- loneliness, experience of limits, temptation, anxiety -- are necessary parts of God's good creation. These he distinguishes from suffering after the fall, the tragic dimension of life. Unique is his creation-suffering as becoming the fall--suffering as a burden redemption--conquest from within. Professor Hall succeeds in moving the reader beyond the customary way of stating the "How can undeserved suffering coexist with a just and almighty God?" He also evaluates five popular, leading thinkers on Harold Kushner, C.S. Lewis, Diogenes Allen, George Buttrick, and Leslie Weatherhead.

Genres: Theology, Christianity, Nonfiction, Religion

223 pages, Hardcover

First published January 1, 1986

About the author

Douglas John Hall was an Canadian emeritus professor of theology at McGill University in Montreal, Quebec, and a minister of the United Church of Canada. Prior to joining the McGill Faculty of Religious Studies in 1975 he was MacDougald Professor of Systematic Theology at St Andrew's College in the University of Saskatchewan (1965–1975), Principal of St Paul's College in the University of Waterloo (1962–1965), and minister of St Andrew's Church in Blind River, Ontario (1960–1962).

Reviews

[JD Veer · Rating 4 out of 5]

A lot of compelling things. The most interesting is the defense of the presence of suffering before the fall: loneliness, limitations, temptations and anxiety. He also advocates that the reason we suffer as we do is because we try to escape the basic sufferings (see above) instead of facing the fact of it, as it's part of what it means to be human.

In his attempt to stay away from both liberals and conservatives (I understand he talks about being biblical), he seems to lean liberal though very critical of the liberals.

A worthy read overall.

[Ryan Ward · Rating 5 out of 5]

Hall has gifted us a moving and profound treatment of the relation of God to human suffering. Like Soelle's analysis, his is a theology that does not try to give answers, does not try to sugar-coat the reality and horror of suffering, does not try to push off redemption or resolution into the next life. Instead of trying to answer suffering like some existential problem to be cracked, or a puzzle to be solved, Hall instead affirms the presence of an Answerer. In the end, this presence, of the God revealed in Jesus that is with us in every particular of our suffering, is the answer. These are unique, creative, deeply empathetic, and transformative insights.

[Calvert Cormier · Rating 5 out of 5]

I came to this book in the middle of my own crisis, desperate for some clarity about how God could possibly allow so much pain in the world. What I found in Hall’s writing was not a simple solution but a profound reframing. The way he structures the book creation, fall, redemption feels almost like a journey. He invites us to see suffering not just as something to be “solved” but as something that must be carried in the presence of the cross. His chapter on suffering as “conquest from within” was particularly powerful. It reminded me of how Christ did not erase suffering by brute force, but instead entered into it and transformed it. That idea gave me a new sense of hope. I won’t say this book “answered all my questions,” because it didn’t, but it did something better: it helped me live with the questions in faith.

[Brittany]

Recommended by disappointment with god

[Chris Halverson · Rating 5 out of 5]

A perfect read for this week!

[Aimee Patterson · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book has staying power. I recommend this to anyone troubled by the fact that God seems absent in suffering.

[Annette Hill]

Read it when I was studying to preach through Job in 2021.

[Blake Callens · Rating 1 out of 5]

I found this book to be a prime example of existentialist eisegesis. Hall regularly poses wholly subjective suppositions, without Scriptural proof to back them up, then builds entire chapters around belief of how God works within the bounds of those suppositions.

[Jeffrey · Rating 5 out of 5]

Excellent book that bring to light the incarnational, intimate relationship God has established with God's creation...including human beings.

[Brian Sturtz]

Professor Hall offers some unique insights into the often felt dilemma of suffering and faith. One such insight that is offered is the suffering was part of the creation in Genesis. In the garden we see Adam suffering with loneliness, limitations, temptations and his own anxieties. Thus suffering is not a sign of God abandonment nor a tragic dimension of life. Suffering is not something that will be overcome with better information as if suffering could only be accounted for "scientifically". The best part of the book for me was the author's last chapter on The Church: Community of Suffering and Hope. Here the author offers some real hope in that suffering connects followers of Jesus to the cross. That suffering is one way that God brings about redemption into the world. That suffering has a redemptive quality in which God works within his creation to bring about his good.