Recently a friend and I discussed the Book of Job, found in the Hebrew Bible/Christian Old Testament, as it relates to the question of human suffering. Even if you’ve never read the book, you may have heard the name in cultural references to “the patience of Job”, as in “that mother doing her grocery shopping with 3 screaming toddlers has the patience of Job”. The Book of Job is about a man who lived a good life, loved God, and was financially prosperous. The story goes that Satan and God were chewing the fat one day when God pointed out the excellent qualities of his follower Job.
“Look at my guy down there,” God boasted (??) “not a spot on his character. My boy loves me.”
“Well of course he loves you,” said Satan. “You’ve given him a cushy life, a wonderful family, and perfect health. But I’d bet my pitchfork that if you took it all away from him, he’d turn on you faster than a Kardashian in divorce court.”
“Bet’s on!” said God. “I give you permission to zap him however you see fit. Just don’t kill the man.”
So Satan proceeded to kill all of Job’s children, burn his crops, and slaughter his livestock. As Job sat in the ashes, he was struck with “loathsome sores” from head to foot, his only comfort from a chunk of broken pottery used to scratch himself . In his misery, he cursed the day he was born but he never cursed God.
Unfortunately for Job, his wife survived the mayhem. She stood by, informing him he was an idiot for not cursing God, and for having bad breath. Four of Job’s friends showed up to offer comfort, but dialogue quickly devolved into argument with Job that he must have done something to tick God off to deserve such treatment. They go back and forth for 34 chapters of the book, accusing one another, giving their reasons why God does the things he does, until God himself shows up in chapter 38. God sets everyone straight. He asks how they dare to question or speak for him when he is the one who created the world and everything in it, none of which they can replicate or explain. Apologies and sacrifices are made, Job has his fortunes restored, his crabby wife gives birth to seven sons and three daughters (the same count that they lost), and Job lives to the ripe old age of 140, a contented man. The end.
It is important to note here that Biblical literalists assume Job to be a historical person based on the fact that he is spoken of as an actual person by the writers of Ezekiel and James. Aside from the larger question of human suffering, the Book of Job provides the basis for evangelical Christian tenets such as: the real personhood of Satan, God’s direct manipulation of natural forces and weather patterns, and the complete plausibility of the forces of good and evil dialoging over the details of a particular human life. This literalism alone opens up so many avenues for discussion: the neurology of belief, the evolution of American evangelicalism into a folk religion, the ethics of using a crop-duster to scatter anti-hallucinogens over church parking lots. But I digress …
My friend (a deist) and I (an atheist) hashed over the theology of a god who would set up a test of human endurance and faith. Whenever the question of the justice of God is raised in evangelical Christian circles, inevitably discussion turns to Job. The inscrutability of God is a favorite dodge used by believers to avoid answering to the ethical dilemma presented against their faith by irrational human suffering under the gaze of an all-powerful being. At a gut level (where all theologies originate) this worldview says to the wounded, “Sit down and shut up, please. God knows what he’s doing. God controls everything and knows everything. You’re not smarter than him, so don’t tell him your circumstances are unjust. It will all turn out in the end. We just have to trust.”
I am ashamed to admit that this, boiled down to essential form, summarized my beliefs for many years. I am further ashamed to say I called it my “christian” belief, because I know there are christians who are not so callous, and I am sorry to have lumped them in with the likes of me. In retrospect, I can say the “sit down and shut up” template works well when laid over certain complaints of wealthy westerners (“my 401K is not doing so well”, “tire blew out on the Honda again”). The template is harsh but utilitarian in tempering believers against their own sorrows (“only God knows why she had to die so young”, “I wish I could walk away from this bad marriage, but God knows what’s best for me and it makes me rely on him more”). But to lay this template on the heads of others is criminal and inhumane. I am thinking specifically of three political topics that are hot on the US presidential campaign scene this year (and in America, political and religious thought are virtually inseparable): abortion, contraception, and same-sex marriage.
In the world of Sit Down and Shut Up theology, abortion would not be necessary if people simply practiced the tenets of the Sit Down and Shut Up doctrine, which is no sex outside of monogamous heterosexual marriage. That includes rape. So if a woman finds herself pregnant as a result of rape, well, she wasn’t doing anything wrong but wrong things happened to her, and two wrongs don’t make a right so live with it. That’s not far from the teaching of another book in the Hebrew Bible that prescribes marriage as a resolution to the crime of rape.
The same goes for contraception. Sit Down and Shut Up theology believes it is immoral to use certain forms of birth control. It is therefore immoral to use tax dollars to provide contraception as a form of humanitarian relief to nations where women have no say over the use of their bodies, and economic conditions are adverse to bringing more children into a family. Schooled in the theology of the Book of Job, the best we can offer is, “Hey Africa, sorry about the genocide, famine, drought, AIDS, rape, mutilation, war and poverty. It shouldn’t be this way, but god is sovereign. By the way, whatever you do, don’t use birth control.”
To the Sit Down and Shut Up theologian, the question of same-sex marriage is simplest. No marriage. No partnership. No sex. In fact, don’t even call it “gay”, call it “same sex attraction”. You can choose. You have a number of choices, in fact. You can live alone for the rest of your life. Or you can marry someone of the opposite sex and pretend to like it. Sure, you may be really really sad and have screaming noises inside your head from trying to force your life to make sense. But read the Book of Job. He got close to god through his suffering. Just think how godly you’ll be after all that suffering.
So is the Book of Job a good and reliable source for learning about human suffering? It’s an interesting story, a valuable artifact of Bronze Age thought. But it’s a dangerous place to mine one’s ideas about god, and sheer poison when we use it to shape our thoughts and actions regarding actual people who hurt. Frankly, I’d rather get my ideas from people like this guy:
Excellent. I will not sit down. I will not shut up. I will love. I will be loveable. But then … what if I become a … ????
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Ruth, this is a marvelous piece of work. I appreciate your own honesty in analyzing this god of the book of Job,
I find it difficult to defend the story of Job and the human suffering is a portrait of divine comedy. What is absurd to me, is the Job suffers because god has a bet with his servant/slave satan. That god kills indiscriminately Job’s own children, his servants and countless animals. That nature is shown as the book of Job suggests, a grand theater for the gods, that satan and god both have control over natural elements, and humans simply are caught up in this divine comedy. It is absurd to suggests that god enjoys human suffering, that he prolongs it, that he gives no answer nor could he stop such. This is totally absurd to my once-upon-a-time evangelical mind.
It seems to me, that Job’s friends are entirely ideologues, that they had the notion that god blesses only the righteous, that only the wicked suffers. Totally none-sense, to me and also to Job. But god’s answer from the whirlwind makes little sense to me as well, it is the Ruth’s sit and and shut up version of divine answer. I cannot take that, So I am back to square one, this biblical answer fails to give significance of the multifaceted dimension of human suffering. Why do humans suffer and why do the divines seem to be standing by and allow it to be carried out. It is absurd to me, so I am a deist by default, due to his seemingly absence in what I can observe.
**corrected version.
Ruth, this is a marvelous piece of work. I appreciate your own honesty in analyzing this god of the book of Job,
I find it difficult to defend the story of Job and human suffering as a portrait of the divine comedy. What is absurd to me, is that Job suffers because god places a bet with his servant/slave satan. Thereafter, this murderous, vengeful god kills indiscriminately Job’s own children, his servants and countless animals. Nature is suggested as a grand theater for the gods, that satan and god both have control over natural elements, and humans simply are caught up in this divine comedy. It is absurd to suggests that god enjoys human suffering, that he prolongs it, that he gives no answer nor willing to stop such. This is totally absurd to my once-upon-a-time evangelical mind.
It seems to me, that Job’s friends are entirely ideologues, that they had the notion of a god who blesses only the righteous, that only the wicked suffers. Totally none-sense, to me and also to Job. But god’s answer from the whirlwind makes little sense to me as well, it is the Ruth’s ‘sit down and and shut up’ version of the divine answer. I cannot take that, So I am back to square one, this biblical answer fails to give a significant answer to our multifaceted dimension of human suffering. Why do humans suffer and why do the divines seem to be standing by and allow it to be carried out. It is absurd to me, so I am a deist by default, due to his seemingly absence.
One of the sacred teaching of St Paul is that all have sinned, and therefore since all are sinners and have fallen short of God’s glory, they need a saviour. Jesus is tat Saviour, that God-man whom inthe sacred theology to complete the circle of human salvation. For indeed, they quote often, “All have sinned,and fall short pf the glory of God,” and All our righteousness is like filthy rags.”
It cannot be. For this biblical figure, Job has not sinned. Read this for yourselves, It is a story, a myth, that before St Paul developed his theology of substitutionary atonement theory, that you need a saviour figure, Job did not sinned, in the entire story. He asserts that he is innocent, that he is blameless and upright, and God has vindicated him, and although he will die and yet in his flesh he shall see God. God boasts of him that there is no one like him, so blameless and upright, a fearer of God, That he is perfect, This z’adiq of Job is what vindicates him, he does not need a Saviour,. For his action actually saved him, if you read this,
This pokes holes in the atonement theory, that all have sinned. Job has not. He is not the only exception, Enoch has not sinned either, and he was also saved, more miraculously than Job, for God took him while he was alive as he is not on the earth no more. So, at least two blatant exception to the Psalmist claim that all sinned, and St Paul is wrong here,
What does that mean for the biblical inerrancy theory? It is contradictory, since the authors do not all agreed, they take what they want from texts to text to make a point. But as Job, the story is a complete unit, and it proposes differently about theodicy than St Paul,
Not all have sinned, Jo did not,. He is saved by his own righteousness, though he asserts that he willbe saved, even though his flesh will be no more, yet he shall see God in his flesh, God vindicates his theology, and rewards him, in the similar faith epics suggests bythe Book of Hebrew. Those who seek him, so do in faith, and shall be rewarded.
Did Job sin? Do every living human need salvation? Job does not, his story is unique. He has not sinned, his righteousness saved him, and in the same way, saved all of us from the tyranny of Evangelicals who assert they have righteousness by ‘faith’ alone. No they do not, they have faith merely, but not righteous in action, Perhaps they need a saviour, Perhaps they are in serious doubt for their own salvation, they have sinned through inaction, through ignorance, and their own willful ignorance will condemn them in the last days……….a story unlike the epic of Job.
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