Essay writer's block....Tips?

God and Evil or Good and Evil?

I know why you’re bumming – too much fluther. I get that all the time. Get your bum off the internet and onto the essay itself.

But there have been interesting discussion on the subject here on fluther recently (there was one just this morning about Abraham’s sacrifice for example). A lot of the biblical questions here might help you.

Can you start from where you are? That is to say, can you writeabout why it is a sensitive subject for you?

@Jack79 God and Evil… How can there be a wholly good and wholly powerful God with all the evil in the world… Can’t really use anything that comes from the bible generally because it’s more of a logical discussion rather than one based on a presumption that the Bible is true…

@Marina I’m not sure, I think that would be a bit too personal.. I think part of my problem is that I’m probably going to use the essay to have a bit of a shout at Chirstianity..and I think that might be clouding my judgement..

but yes I should get off here and just go and do it

<sigh>

Have a look here

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Writer's_block#Strategies_for_overcoming_writer.27s_block

Oh I think I might lurve you @mattbrowne x

Imagine, rather than having to write an essay, you are writing a letter to your best friend. Start off with, “I have to write this essay on God and Evil. Let me tell you some of the main points that come to mind. First…”

Just let it flow. Organize later.

It sounds like you’re avoiding writing because you don’t want to “have a bit of a shout” and write a rant instead of an essay. I suggest writing the rantish thing first. Then take what you can of it and use it to turn it into an essay. Clip out anything with a rude tone, etc.

It’ll be a start, and hopefully it’ll push you forward with enough momentum to finish the rest.

write when you are most vunerable, or write stories when you are most vunerable.

Narrow the question. Consider what position you want to take on the subject. You don’t have to pose an answer to the question itself, do you? Surely the intent is not for your class in its little essays (not even a full-fledged term paper) to resolve the question of the ages, one that has preoccupied great minds since man invented religion. Instead you could focus on a smaller ancillary topic, such as one (just one) of these:

— Why the question is an important question to so many people
— How the answer might depend on the definitions of the terms
— Whether it would make any difference to know the answer
— What it would mean (to you, to people of a given religion, to the world) if the answer turned out to be a, b, or c
— What the answer would be if God were not in the question

These are just intended to be thought-starters for taking a specific slant on the topic instead of embracing all of Western and Eastern theology in ten pages.

Thumbing through Milton’s Paradise Lost might give you some great ideas. It’s one of the seminal works on God and Evil.

have some tea and toast…sleep on it…

oh crap!! it’s my question..

:-p

@lynneblundell lol :D

The idea that there might be no such thing as ‘Evil’ might figure in your eventual outcome.
Night Night….....

Epicurus? Either God can abolish evil, but but chooses not to, or God wants to abolish evil, but can’t.

If you would like, I could send you all my course work from my religion and philosophy course, one of our major units was The Problem of Evil and Suffering. It’s Year 12 Highschool level but it might be of some use to you? PM me your e-mail address if you want.

@lloydbird I’m so glad you said that…because I was actually leaning towards that view but thought I might be thought of as completely bonkers!! Will press on with that theory!! I’ve got 1200 words so far anyway so all your suggestions have helped everyone xxx

@PandoraBoxx If I was taking that line of thought (that there is such a thing as Evil) then I would go down the God does not want to abolish evil even though he can route….all good stuff…

@shrubbery thanks that would be great!! will do xx

It is kind of like Newton’s Third Law of motion:
Whenever a particle A exerts a force on another particle B, B simultaneously exerts a force on A with the same magnitude in the opposite direction. The strong form of the law further postulates that these two forces act along the same line. This law is often simplified into the sentence, “To every action there is an equal and opposite reaction.” Maybe evil exists to show us how different God is? That above explanation of Newton’s 3rd law is taken from here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Newton%27s_laws_of_motion

So…did you finally get to finish the essay? Only one more day to go, right?

This is very true. I finished it yesterday and asked my tutor if he would have a quick look over it (that is…before I submit it properly) as I was a bit unsure whether my arguments were entirely valid and sound… So he could point me in the right direction if need be. He replied to me this morning and part of what he said was this:

I’ve read through your draft and I am very impressed. I think you said before how interested you are in the topic and mentioned how much effort you have put in to this TMA. It certainly shows and I can assure you that there is no doubt about it receiving an A band mark. I shall still have a fair number of ‘blue-ink’ comments to make on it – but they will all be of the ‘joining in’ or ‘responding to your discussion’ type of remarks.

Not that I’m feeling smug or anything… :-)

But thank you everyone for your help xxxx

wow! Good job cutie! :)

Hurray for you, @lynneblundell! Good job.

Thank you xxxx