Divine retribution

Divine retribution is supernatural punishment of a person, a group of people, or everyone by a deity in response to some action. Many cultures have a story about how a deity exacted punishment upon previous inhabitants of their land, causing their doom.

For the TV series, see Divine Retribution (TV series).
The End of the World, commonly known as The Great Day of His Wrath,[1] an 1851–1853 oil painting on canvas by the English painter John Martin.[2] According to Frances Carey, the painting shows the "destruction of Babylon and the material world by natural cataclysm". This painting, Carey holds, is a response to the emerging industrial scene of London as a metropolis in the early nineteenth century, and the original growth of the Babylon civilisation and its final destruction. According to the Tate, the painting depicts a portion of Revelation 16, a chapter from the New Testament.
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An example of divine retribution is the story found in many cultures about a great flood destroying all of humanity, as described in the Epic of Gilgamesh, the Hindu Vedas, or Book of Genesis (6:9–8:22), leaving one principal 'chosen' survivor. In the first example, it is Utnapishtim, and in the last example Noah. References in the New Testament and the Quran to a man named Nuh (Noah) who was commanded by God to build an ark also suggest that one man and his followers were saved in a great flood.

Other examples in Hebrew religious literature include the dispersion of the builders of the Tower of Babel (Genesis 11:1–9), the destruction of Sodom and Gomorrah (Genesis 18:20–21, 19:23–28) (Quran 7:80–84),[3] and the Ten Plagues visited upon the ancient Egyptians for persecuting the children of Israel (Exodus, Chapters 7–12).

In Greek mythology, the goddess Hera often became enraged when her husband, Zeus, would impregnate mortal women, and would exact divine retribution on the children born of such affairs. In some versions of the myth, Medusa was turned into her monstrous form as divine retribution for her vanity; in others it was a punishment for being raped by Poseidon.

The Bible refers to divine retribution as, in most cases, being delayed or "treasured up" to a future time.[4] Sight of God's supernatural works and retribution would militate against faith in God's Word.[5] William Lane Craig says, in Paul's view, God's properties, his eternal power and deity, are clearly revealed in creation, so that people who fail to believe in an eternal, powerful creator of the world are without excuse. Indeed, Paul says that they actually do know that God exists, but they suppress this truth because of their unrighteousness.[6]

Some religions or philosophical positions have no concept of divine retribution, nor posit a God being capable of or willing to express such human sentiments as jealousy, vengeance, or wrath. For example, in Deism and Pandeism, the creator does not intervene in our Universe at all, either for good or for ill, and therefore exhibits no such behavior. In Pantheism (as reflected in Pandeism as well), God is the Universe and encompasses everything within it, and so has no need for retribution, as all things against which retribution might be taken are simply within God. This view is reflected in some pantheistic or pandeistic forms of Hinduism, as well.

Buddhism

The concept of divine retribution is resolutely denied in Buddhism. Gautama Buddha did not endorse belief in a creator deity,[7][8] refused to express any views on creation[9] and stated that questions on the origin of the world are worthless.[10][11] The non-adherence[12] to the notion of an omnipotent creator deity or a prime mover is seen by many as a key distinction between Buddhism and other religions, though precise beliefs vary widely from sect to sect and "Buddhism" should not be taken as a single, holistic religious concept.

Buddhists do accept the existence of beings in higher realms (see Buddhist cosmology), known as devas, but they, like humans, are said to be suffering in samsara,[13] and are not necessarily wiser than us. The Buddha is often portrayed as a teacher of the gods,[14] and superior to them.[15] Despite this, there are believed to be enlightened devas.[16] But since there may also be unenlightened devas, there also may be godlike beings who engage in retributive acts, but if they do so, then they do so out of their own ignorance of a greater truth.

Despite this nontheism, Buddhism nevertheless fully accepts the theory of karma, which posits punishment-like effects, such as rebirths in realms of torment, as an invariable consequence of wrongful actions. Unlike in most Abrahamic monotheistic religions, these effects are not eternal, though they can last for a very long time. Even theistic religions do not necessarily see such effects as "punishment" imposed by a higher authority, rather than natural consequences of wrongful action.

Judaism and Christianity

"The wrath of God", an anthropomorphic expression for the attitude which some believe God has towards sin,[17] is mentioned many times in the Bible.

Hebrew Bible
The Destruction of Sodom And Gomorrah by John Martin, 1852

Divine retribution is often portrayed in the Tanak or Old Testament.

  • Genesis 3:14–24 – Curse upon Adam and Eve and expulsion from the Garden of Eden; Disobedience
  • Genesis 4:9–15 – Curse upon Cain after his slaying of his brother, Abel
  • Genesis 6–7 – The Great Flood; Rampant evil and Nephilim
  • Genesis 11:1–9 – The confusion of languages at the Tower of Babel; To scatter them over the Earth
  • Genesis 19:23–29 – Destruction of Sodom and Gomorrah; people of no redeeming value
  • Genesis 38:6–10 – Destruction of Er and Onan; wickedness in the Lord's sight
  • Exodus 7–14 – Plagues of Egypt; to establish his power over that of the gods of Egypt
  • Exodus 19:10–25 – Divine threatenings at Mount Sinai; warn that the mountain is off limits and holy
  • Exodus 32 – Plagues at the incident of the golden calf; disowning the people for breaking his covenant with them
  • Leviticus 10:1–2 – Nadab and Abihu are burned; offering unauthorised fire in their censers
  • Leviticus 26:14–39 – Curses upon the disobedient; divine warning
  • Numbers 11 – A plague accompanies the giving of manna in the wilderness; rejecting his gracious gift of heavenly food and failing his test of obedience
  • Numbers 16 – The rebellion of Korah, Dathan, and Abiram – Their supernatural deaths and the plague that followed; insolence and attempting self-promotion to roles they were unworthy of holding
  • Numbers 20:9–13 – Reprimand of Moses at the water of Meribah; disobeying the Lord's instruction, showing distrust and indifference in God's presence
  • Numbers 21 – Murmuring of the people and the plague of fiery flying serpent; spurning God's grace
  • Numbers 25 – Whoredom with the Moabites and resulting plague; breaching God's covenant through sexual immorality and worshipping other gods
  • Deuteronomy 28 – Curses pronounced upon the disobedient; another divine warning
  • 1 Samuel 6:19 – some/many men of Beth Shemesh killed; Looking into the Ark of the Covenant
  • 2 Samuel 6:1–7 – Uzzah struck dead; Touching the Ark of the Covenant
  • 1 Kings 11 – God promises to tear King Solomon's kingdom from his son except for a single tribe; Building altars to other gods for his wives
  • Job 14:13 – sending trials to the just man Job

New Testament
See also: Attributes of God in Christianity § Wrath

The New Testament associates the wrath of God particularly with imagery of the Last Day, described allegorically in Romans 2:5 as the "day of wrath", and the Book of Revelation. The wrath of God is mentioned in at least twenty verses of the New Testament. Examples are:

  • John 3:36 – John the Baptist declares that whoever believes in the Son has eternal life; whoever does not obey the Son shall not see life, but the wrath of God remains on him.[18]
  • Acts 5:1 – Ananias and his wife Sapphira struck dead, Holding back some of the proceeds after selling a piece of property
  • Romans 1:18 – For the wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men, who by their unrighteousness suppress the truth.
  • Romans 5:9 – Since, therefore, we have now been justified by his blood, much more shall we be saved by him from the wrath of God.
  • Romans 12:19 – Beloved, never avenge yourselves, but leave it to the wrath of God, for it is written, "Vengeance is mine, I will repay, says the Lord."
  • Ephesians 5:6 – Let no one deceive you with empty words, for because of these things the wrath of God comes upon the sons of disobedience.
  • Revelation 6:17 – For the great day of his wrath has come, and who is able to withstand?
  • Revelation 14:19 – So the angel swung his sickle across the earth and gathered the grape harvest of the earth and threw it into the great winepress of the wrath of God.
  • Revelation 15:1 – Then I saw another sign in heaven, great and marvelous: seven angels having the seven last plagues, for in them the wrath of God was finished.
  • Revelation 19:15 – From his mouth comes a sharp sword with which to strike down the nations, and he will rule them with a rod of iron. He will tread the winepress of the fury of the wrath of God the Almighty.

Alleged modern examples

Since the 1812 Caracas earthquake occurred on Maundy Thursday while the Venezuelan War of Independence was raging, it was explained by royalist authorities as divine punishment for the rebellion against the Spanish Crown. The archbishop of Caracas, Narciso Coll y Prat, referred to the event as "the terrifying but well-deserved earthquake" which "confirms in our days the prophecies revealed by God to men about the ancient impious and proud cities: Babylon, Jerusalem and the Tower of Babel".[19] This prompted the widely quoted answer of Simón Bolívar: "If Nature is against us, we shall fight Nature and make it obey".[20]

The 1953 Waco tornado outbreak was regarded by some people in the local African-American community as divine retribution for the lynching of Jesse Washington over thirty years prior.[21]

Various Christian, Jewish and Muslim religious leaders claimed that Hurricane Katrina was God's punishment on America, New Orleans or the world for any of a variety of alleged sins, including abortion, sexual immorality (including the gay pride event Southern Decadence), the policies of the American Empire, failure to support Israel, and failure of black people to study the Torah.[22][23][24]

The 2007 UK floods were claimed by Graham Dow to be God's punishment against homosexuals.[25]

Televangelist Pat Robertson stirred up controversy after claiming that the 2010 Haiti earthquake may have been God's belated punishment on Haitians for allegedly having made a "pact with the Devil" to overthrow the French during the Haitian Revolution.[26] Yehuda Levin, an Orthodox Jewish rabbi, linked the earthquake to gays in the military via an alleged Talmudic teaching that homosexuality causes earthquakes.[27] Levin posted a video onto YouTube the same day as 2011 Virginia earthquake in which he said, "The Talmud states, "You have shaken your male member in a place where it doesn’t belong. I too, will shake the Earth." He said that homosexuals shouldn't take it personally: "We don’t hate homosexuals. I feel bad for homosexuals. It’s a revolt against God and literally, there’s hell to pay."[27]

Chaplain John McTernan said that Hurricane Isaac, like Hurricane Katrina, was God's punishment on homosexuals.[25] Buster Wilson of the American Family Association concurred that statement.[27]

McTernan also said that Hurricane Sandy may have been God's punishment against homosexuals. In addition, WorldNetDaily columnist William Koenig, along with McTernan himself, suggested that American support for a two-state solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict led to the hurricane.[27]

Rebuttals

Orthodox rabbi Shmuley Boteach denounces such claims since they carry the implication of victim blaming,[28] writing that "For many of the faithful, the closer they come to God, the more they become enemies of man." He contrasts the Jewish tradition, which affords a special place to "arguing with God", with an approach to religion that "taught people not to challenge, but to submit. Not to question, but to obey. Not how to stand erect, but to be stooped and bent in the broken posture of the meek and pious".[28] Speaking about the COVID-19 pandemic, Boteach said "I utterly reject and find it sickening when people believe that this is some kind of punishment from God – that really upsets me."[29][30]

A Jesuit priest, James Martin, wrote on Twitter in response to Hurricane Sandy that "If any religious leaders say tomorrow that the hurricane is God's punishment against some group they're idiots. God's ways are not our ways."[31]

See also

References
  1. Michael Wheeler, Heaven, Hell, and the Victorians, Cambridge University Press, 1994, p.83
  2. "Web Gallery of Art, searchable fine arts image database". www.wga.hu.
  3. "Surah Al-A'raf [7:80–84]". Surah Al-A'raf [7:80–84].
  4. Luke 3:7; Romans 2:5
  5. For we are saved by hope: but hope that is seen is not hope...(Romans 8:24)
  6. Craig, William Lane. "Is Unbelief Culpable?". Reasonable Faith. Retrieved 19 May 2014.
  7. Thera, Nyanaponika. "Buddhism and the God-idea". The Vision of the Dhamma. Kandy, Sri Lanka: Buddhist Publication Society. In Buddhist literature, the belief in a creator god (issara-nimmana-vada) is frequently mentioned and rejected, along with other causes wrongly adduced to explain the origin of the world; as, for instance, world-soul, time, nature, etc. God-belief, however, is placed in the same category as those morally destructive wrong views which deny the kammic results of action, assume a fortuitous origin of man and nature, or teach absolute determinism. These views are said to be altogether pernicious, having definite bad results due to their effect on ethical conduct.
  8. Approaching the Dhamma: Buddhist Texts and Practices in South and Southeast Asia by Anne M. Blackburn (editor), Jeffrey Samuels (editor). Pariyatti Publishing: 2003 ISBN 1-928706-19-3 p. 129
  9. Bhikku Bodhi (2007). "III.1, III.2, III.5". In Access To Insight (ed.). The All Embracing Net of Views: Brahmajala Sutta. Kandy, Sri Lanka: Buddhist Publication Society.
  10. Thanissaro Bhikku (1997). "Acintita Sutta: Unconjecturable". AN 4.77. Access To Insight. Conjecture about [the origin, etc., of] the world is an unconjecturable that is not to be conjectured about, that would bring madness & vexation to anyone who conjectured about it.
  11. Thanissaro Bhikku (1998). "Cula-Malunkyovada Sutta: The Shorter Instructions to Malunkya". Access To Insight. It's just as if a man were wounded with an arrow thickly smeared with poison. His friends & companions, kinsmen & relatives would provide him with a surgeon, and the man would say, 'I won't have this arrow removed until I know whether the man who wounded me was a noble warrior, a priest, a merchant, or a worker.' He would say, 'I won't have this arrow removed until I know the given name & clan name of the man who wounded me... until I know whether he was tall, medium, or short... The man would die and those things would still remain unknown to him. In the same way, if anyone were to say, 'I won't live the holy life under the Blessed One as long as he does not declare to me that 'The cosmos is eternal,'... or that 'After death a Tathagata neither exists nor does not exist,' the man would die and those things would still remain undeclared by the Tathagata.
  12. Bhikku, Thanissaro (1997). Tittha Sutta: Sectarians. Then in that case, a person is a killer of living beings because of a supreme being's act of creation... When one falls back on lack of cause and lack of condition as being essential, monks, there is no desire, no effort [at the thought], 'This should be done. This shouldn't be done.' When one can't pin down as a truth or reality what should & shouldn't be done, one dwells bewildered & unprotected. One cannot righteously refer to oneself as a contemplative.
  13. John T Bullitt (2005). "The Thirty-one planes of Existence". Access To Insight. Retrieved May 26, 2010. The suttas describe thirty-one distinct "planes" or "realms" of existence into which beings can be reborn during this long wandering through samsara. These range from the extraordinarily dark, grim, and painful hell realms to the most sublime, refined, and exquisitely blissful heaven realms. Existence in every realm is impermanent; in Buddhist cosmology there is no eternal heaven or hell. Beings are born into a particular realm according to both their past kamma and their kamma at the moment of death. When the kammic force that propelled them to that realm is finally exhausted, they pass away, taking rebirth once again elsewhere, according to their kamma. And so the wearisome cycle continues.
  14. Susan Elbaum Jootla (1997). "II. The Buddha Teaches Deities". In Access To Insight (ed.). Teacher of the Devas. Kandy, Sri Lanka: Buddhist Publication Society. Many people worship Maha Brahma as the supreme and eternal creator God, but for the Buddha he is merely a powerful deity still caught within the cycle of repeated existence. In point of fact, "Maha Brahma" is a role or office filled by different individuals at different periods." "His proof included the fact that "many thousands of deities have gone for refuge for life to the recluse Gotama" (MN 95.9). Devas, like humans, develop faith in the Buddha by practicing his teachings." "A second deva concerned with liberation spoke a verse which is partly praise of the Buddha and partly a request for teaching. Using various similes from the animal world, this god showed his admiration and reverence for the Exalted One.", "A discourse called Sakka's Questions (DN 21) took place after he had been a serious disciple of the Buddha for some time. The sutta records a long audience he had with the Blessed One which culminated in his attainment of stream-entry. Their conversation is an excellent example of the Buddha as "teacher of devas," and shows all beings how to work for Nibbana.
  15. Bhikku, Thanissaro (1997). Kevaddha Sutta. Access To Insight. When this was said, the Great Brahma said to the monk, 'I, monk, am Brahma, the Great Brahma, the Conqueror, the Unconquered, the All-Seeing, All-Powerful, the Sovereign Lord, the Maker, Creator, Chief, Appointer and Ruler, Father of All That Have Been and Shall Be... That is why I did not say in their presence that I, too, don't know where the four great elements... cease without remainder. So you have acted wrongly, acted incorrectly, in bypassing the Blessed One in search of an answer to this question elsewhere. Go right back to the Blessed One and, on arrival, ask him this question. However he answers it, you should take it to heart.
  16. "Yidams". www.himalayanart.org.
  17. Oxford Dictionary of the Christian Church (Oxford University Press 2005 ISBN 978-0-19-280290-3), article wrath of God, the
  18. John 3:36: English Standard Version
  19. "Nacimiento de una nación; Terremoto de 1812" (in Spanish). Archived from the original on August 20, 2006.
  20. "Birth of a World: Bolivar in Terms of His Peoples". Book by Waldo David Frank, p. 55, 1951.
  21. Carrigan, William D. (2006). The Making of a Lynching Culture: Violence and Vigilantism in Central Texas, 1836–1916. Champaign: University of Illinois Press. p. 198. ISBN 978-0-252-07430-1.
  22. Alush, Zvi (7 September 2005). "Rabbi: Hurricane punishment for pullout". Ynetnews.
  23. NPR: Pastor John Hagee on Christian Zionism. September 18, 2006.
  24. "Some say natural catastrophe was 'divine judgment'". 4 September 2005.
  25. Dowling, Tim (October 30, 2012). "Superstorm Sandy and many more disasters that have been blamed on the gay community". The Guardian. London.
  26. "Pat Robertson: Haiti "Cursed" After "Pact to the Devil"". Archived from the original on September 6, 2012.
  27. "Fear the almighty wrath: Five natural disasters "caused" by gays". 30 October 2012.
  28. "The Defiant Man of Faith". www.beliefnet.com.
  29. Rodney Pratt and Jenny Ky (April 20, 2020). "How to reignite your sexual chemistry during the COVID-19 lockdown". 7News.com.au.
  30. Beckerman, Jim (April 6, 2020). "The Passover story has new relevance in the age of coronavirus". North Jersey Media Group.
  31. Menzie, Nicola; Reporter, Christian Post (October 29, 2012). "Hurricane Sandy God's Punishment? Priest Shuts Down Claims as Twitter Users Mock Pat Robertson". The Christian Post.
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