The Old Testament sees suffering as a punishment inflicted by an almighty and righteous God on unrighteous people; and as a corollary, it sees prosperity as a reward for the righteous. Thus in the Book of Genesis, in the introduction to the story of Noah, we read, “The Lord saw that the wickedness of humankind was great in the earth…And the Lord was sorry that he had made humankind on the earth, and it grieved him to his heart. So the Lord said, ‘I will blot out from the earth the human beings I have created…’ ” (NRSV, 6:5-7).

And that fate would have befallen Noah, only that, “…Noah was a righteous man, blameless in his generation; Noah walked with God” (NRSV, 6:9). So Noah was saved from the flood.

The New Testament, however, reveals that God is Love and in a way that revelation has made the problem of suffering more of a mystery than otherwise it might have been. But in another way, that revelation lifts the problem to a new and higher level where, although it remains a mystery, we see it in a new light altogether.