Copyright © 2006 Ramsey Wilson

CRIMES, MISDEMEANORS & INJUSTICE

H

is evidence

“We live in a vast and awesome universe in which, daily, suns are made and worlds destroyed,
where humanity clings to an obscure clod of rock. The significance of our lives and our fragile
realm derives from our own wisdom and courage. We are the custodians of life’s meaning.”  
                                                                                                       - Carl Sagan

The universe is empty of meaning.  Nature, if it says anything about life’s purpose, declares harshly,
“There is none.”  Only the human heart – “our own wisdom and courage,” as Sagan put it – can infuse life
with meaning and purpose.  

This existential view of the world – that life is what we make it – is not uncommon.  One high-profile
endorsement can be found in Woody Allen’s 1989 film Crimes and Misdemeanors.  In the concluding
scene, Professor Louis Levy, the revered and recently deceased (by his own hand) documentary subject of
our quirky lead man, Cliff Stern (Allen), delivers an authoritative explanation of how the world works:

“Events unfold so unpredictably, so unfairly, human happiness does not seem to have been
included in the design of creation.  It is only we, with our capacity to love, that give meaning to
the indifferent universe, and yet, most human beings seem to have the ability to keep trying and
even to find joy from simple things like their family, their work and from the hope that future
generations might understand more.”

Throughout the film, this conclusion is foreshadowed.  Allen’s clearest clues come from Ben (Sam
Waterston), a rabbi who is going blind.  Portraying the voice of faith through a blind rabbi suggests that
God (if He even exists) does not watch and care for us as the course of human events unfolds.  Rather,
according to this portrayal, He has left human beings to struggle alone in darkness and confusion.

Crimes builds its case in favor of an indifferent universe by focusing on a problem with which most of us
have struggled at one time or another – namely, if there is a God who is all-good and all-powerful, why is
there so much injustice in the world?  This is a story in which the wicked seemingly prosper without
retribution and the righteous (according to Allen’s definition) go unrewarded.  Based on these outcomes,
the film would have the viewer conclude that there is no just and moral order in the universe, and hence,
no divine sovereign, at least as conceived by the Judeo-Christian tradition.  After a brief review of the film’s
plot, this essay examines why the fact of injustice does not negate the existence of God, as Christianly
conceived.

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