The blissful moonlight and soft midnight breeze would have lured any mortal into a peaceful doze in the open space of the compound, but not this man, for he was deeply saddened and troubled. He stared hard at the moonlit sky in the manner of a stargazer, but his swirling thoughts had nothing to do with astrology.
On his mind were the phenomena of life and death, and the role of God in them. About a month back, his 50-year-old spouse had suddenly gone down with an ailment diagnosed as “encephalitis,” and subsequently lost the battle for life after six nail-biting days at the Intensive Care Unit of the hospital, where the resident doctors and consultants had characteristically raised hopes of her survival as they continued reechoing the phrase: “We do our best, but it’s God that heals.”
Now, in a manner reminiscent of the marathon soliloquy of the old fisherman in Ernest Hemingway’s classical novel, “The Old Man and the Sea,” the bereaved man continued conversing with himself all through the night, whispering and talking aloud alternately, such that anyone listening to him would have been tempted to conclude that he was in the early stages of an incurable insanity. For, his mind was a vortex of confused thoughts reflecting his sad and troubled condition.
“If it is true that God created everything on earth, why did he create incurable diseases, and human beings that are prone to them?” the sad man asked himself, loudly. “And why did he create innumerable variants of the killer-diseases, to the extent that it is almost impossible for medical professionals to diagnose the particular variant afflicting a patient? Could it be that the all-knowing God failed to comprehend the ramifications of his creations?” On and on, the sad man soliloquized in the manner of a highly troubled soul.
“Stop questioning the role of God in the affairs of man and pray that he gives you the fortitude to bear your irreplaceable loss,” the sad man whispered to himself, although inwardly he considered the self-admonition an escapist gesture. Just then, harrowing images of his spouse at the Intensive Care Unit of the hospital floods his mind, prompting him to blurt out, loudly: “We are in a world of irreconcilable contradictions!
The scientific ingenuity of man, which occasioned the development of the medical life-support machine that keeps a brain-dead human being alive for days, months, and even years, also enabled the invention of weapons of mass destruction such as the apocalyptic hydrogen, neutron, and atomic bombs.” Relentlessly, he continued his soliloquy on the contradictions inherent in the coexistence of good and evil on earth.
At some point, the sad man recalled the “Riddle of Epicurus,” otherwise known as the “Epicurean Paradox,” wherein Epicurus, an ancient Greek philosopher who lived between 341 – 270 BCE, posited that God and his attributes of omnipotence, omnipresence, and omniscience are non-existent, otherwise evil would not be prevalent in the world.
According to the riddle, “If God is omnipotent, omnipresent, and omniscient, why is there evil in the world?” In other words, “Is God willing to prevent evil, but not able? then he is impotent; Is he able, but not willing? then he is malevolent; Is he both able and willing? then why is there evil?”
Concomitantly, Epicurus perceived death as the end of existence and sensation, which cannot be experienced by the living nor the dead. Hence, human beings should cease to fear death, since they cannot experience it while living and when dead.
Instead, all should focus on the good, pleasurable, and happy life that can be experienced as a living being. “Truly, Epicurus was a great philosopher,” said the sad man aloud, and went on to add: “He sought to banish ignorance from the face of the earth as he considered it the source of all evil and unhappiness on the planet.”
Prompted by his thoughts on Epicureanism, the sad man remembered the controversial utterances of the church pastor who presided over the “Service of Songs” organized in honour of his late spouse. The self-styled ‘Man of God’ had preached that all human beings die according to the wish of God, and that without his consent no one would ever die.
“My wife’s untimely death could not have been the wish of God,” said the sad man, shaking his head vigorously. “What is God’s purpose for terminating her life in such an untimely manner? Doesn’t the visit of death upon the young, rather than the old, portray God as a heartless divine being in the mould of Adolf Hitler, Pol Pot, Idi Amin, Macias Nguema, etc? Far from it! God is merciful,” he declared in a very loud voice even as he doubted the sincerity of that self-declaration.
“Hitler was a bloodthirsty maniacal tyrant,” said the sad man as he recalled his Holocaust and 2nd World War atrocities that occasioned the loss of an estimated 100 million lives. In the same vein, he remembered Pol Pot and the millions of citizens that perished in his bid to turn Cambodia into a utopian communist state.
“If only God had intervened and prevented the rise of Nazism in Germany and the Khmer Rouge in Cambodia, there is a high probability that those millions of lives would not have been lost,” the sad man lamented, being unequivocal in his belief that the merciless slaughter of the citizens of any country by bloodthirsty tyrannical rulers cannot be the wish of God.
Angrily, the sad man remembered how Idi Amin’s henchman, Isaac Lugonzo, who was nicknamed “Maliyamungu,” butchered a prominent politician in full glare of the public at a market square. He also recalled how Macias Nguema’s hitman, Amengol Ondo, smeared his victims with palm oil and buried them neck-deep in the soil with the intention of having them eaten alive by giant red ants. “Were those victims of the bloodthirstiness of African tyrants divinely destined to die such horrible death?” he asked himself, aloud. “Surely not!” he responded in the same loud voice.
About three weeks before his quinquagenarian spouse passed on, two octogenarian literary giants greatly admired by the sad man transited to the great beyond. On May 28, 2025, Ngugi wa Thiong’o, the great African novelist who was severally denied the Nobel Prize in Literature apparently due to his Marxian orientation, died at the age of 87 years. Also, on June 9, 2025, Frederick Forsyth, the renowned espionage thriller writer, died at the age of 86 years.
In both instances, the sad man barely expressed sorrow. Now, he realizes that the psychological pains of death are only truly felt when it hits close to home. Apparently, that explains why the international community often turns a blind eye and deaf ears to the mass slaughter of innocent people, especially women and children, in violent conflicts across the globe as is being witnessed in Sudan, Gaza, Ukraine, Myanmar, DRC., and even in Nigeria’s Middle Belt region.
“Copiously, you have written about the dangerous phenomenon of war,” said the sad man to himself as he moved to end his nightlong random musings and soliloquy. “The barbarity and cruelty of war encapsulated in the popular aphorism, ‘War is Hell,’ are illuminated in the writeups on the ongoing bloodletting in Sudan, Gaza, and Ukraine,” he continued.
“It’s most unfortunate that a lot of the world’s statesmen tend to believe in the superiority of force over diplomacy. To them, might is right, but little do they know that war, despite the concerted efforts to humanize its conduct, is characterized by death, destruction, and misery. Regrettably, man is often goaded into war by ignorance, arrogance, sadism, mindlessness, and much more,” he concluded.
It is early morning hours, and the sad man rises to his feet, wrings his hands, shakes his head ruefully, and stares into space. “Why did God refuse to answer my prayers and supplications concerning my late wife?” he queried. “What sins did either of us commit that led God to turn his back on us when his mercies were most needed?” he continued, and then added: “Is it that God can no longer distinguish between sinners and the righteous?”
“Who told you that God has turned his back on you?” responded a subconscious voice to the sad man. “And why do you consider yourself righteous? Don’t you know that when it comes to spiritual matters, things are not always what they seem? Have you not heard that it’s not all that glitters is gold? Also, are you not aware of the saying, ‘Half a story has never been told’? Why don’t you think that your situation could have been worse than what it is? Beware of your unguarded utterances, for God’s ways are unfathomable,” concluded the subconscious voice.
It’s a moment of contrition, and the sad man goes on his knees, bows his head, and tries to pray to God, but his thoughts swirl around and his words are jumbled like those of a thoroughly confused man. He rises to his feet and across his mind flashes images from the 1834 poetry of Samuel Taylor Coleridge, “The Rhyme of the Ancient Mariner,” which is famous for its lines of paradox: “Water, water, everywhere; Nor any drop to drink!” It was not those lines that were on his mind, but the following verse:
“He prays well, who loves well both man and bird, and beast
He prays best, who loves best all things great and small
For the dear God who loves us, He made and loves all.”
For the first time in many days, the sad man cheers up as he makes his way into the house and onto his bed. Even as a self-styled naturalist and vegetarian, he has never taken cognizance of that verse, and neither has it occurred to him that the display of love towards the birds of the air, the fishes of the sea, and the beasts of the fields contributes to the efficacy of man’s prayers and supplications to God. Thus, a sad but wiser man he was when he woke up from sleep at noonday.
Dennis Onakinor writes from Lagos, Nigeria. He can be reached via e-mail at dennisonakinor@yahoo.com