Book Review: The Doors of the Sea: Where was God in the Tsunami?

David Bentley Hart’s essay The Doors of the Sea: Where was God in the Tsunami? is a delightful little book in many ways. It is very well-written, and it has some provocative and often helpful things to say about theodicy. One of the things that is most interesting about this book is that Hart spends at least as much time (maybe even more time) speaking of what we might call “meta-theodicy” as he does in developing a theodicy proper. That is, he has as much to say about when, where, and in what circumstances theodicy is appropriate, and about what general approach the Christian should take to theodicy, as he does about the particular theodicy that he wishes to defend. This reviewer actually found these portions of the essay more engaging than much of Hart’s own theodicizing!