The Book of Job

Shawn

I have studied in small part the book of Job in the past and would be interested to hear interpretations from Rabbinic or other perspectives on the power of belief in one's own righteousness and piety in face of gratuitous suffering by the hand of God through the will of Satan.

My early readings, which have been strongly influenced by Jung's interpretation point towards a person who's unshakable belief in oneself was so great that God became troubled by such infinitesimally small yet profound belief. Such was Job's conviction that God appeared before him to show all His might and glory, to which Job's response is of the ineffability of God even with respect to his gratuitous suffering caused unto him.

There are many interesting aspects to the book of Job in of itself. Namely, that belief itself was presented as a fickle tool to understanding the will of God. One one hand, Job's friends tell him, that he must have sinned to warrant the suffering and loss that has been bestowed upon him. Yet, Job remains patient and steadfast in his belief about his innocence. These contradictory beliefs are held in each instance as true, for God is all knowing and the limits of human understanding of God's will and sense of justice are never to be entirely known.

Doubt never enters Job's mind, and perhaps this is in my interpretation the moral of the story. That one ought not doubt in God (or otherwise, to trust in God) for whatever reason or amount of suffering. Job's conviction is vindicated in the end, when God restores his former wealth, status, and family.

What impressed me the most is the amount of patience and piety that Job shows in face of such evil from Satan, allowed to be inflicted upon him by God. One cannot help but draw parallels to books like Augustine's Confessions or Marcus Aurelius' Meditations.

René Descartes

[Delete] @Baden

René Descartes

[Delete] @Baden

Noble Dust

↪Posty McPostface

It’s a remarkably existential book, in my view. I take the main theme to be that suffering comes to the righteous and unrighteousness alike. His friends insist he sinned, which is why he is suffering. On the other hand, God’s epic screed at the end questioning Job (and saying “I will ask and you will answer”; the irony!) about whether he controls the leviathan, the weather, is all a metaphor for the mindless, unconditional nature of suffering. Like a wild beast or an unexpected storm, suffering is uncontrollable and inevitable; suffering is existential and has no correlation with morality. the question is what to do with suffering, and this is the only point at which Jobs righteousness comes into the picture. He didn’t curse God and die, but endured his suffering, without knowledge of why he was suffering. The message here essentially renders the old half baked question “ if God is all powerful, why does he allow suffering?” Essentially meaningless. And of course God doesn’t answer. The fact that he doesn’t is in line with the Rabbinic teaching of asking the right questions, rather than providing basic answers.

BC

Archibald Macleish wrote a play based on the book of Job, JB.

Plot summary

The play opens in "a corner inside an enormous circus tent". Two vendors, Mr. Zuss (evoking the chief Greek god Zeus; zuss is also German for "sweet") and Nickles (i.e. "Old Nick," a folk name for the Devil) [1] begin the play-within-a-play by assuming the roles of God and Satan, respectively. They overhear J.B., a wealthy New York banker, describe his prosperity as a just reward for his faithfulness to God. Scorning him, Nickles wagers that J.B. will curse God if his life is ruined. Nickles and Zuss then watch as J.B.'s children are killed and his property is ruined and the former millionaire is left to the streets. J.B. is then visited by three Comforters (representing History, Science, and Religion) who each offer a different explanation for his plight. J.B. declines to believe any of them, instead asking God himself to explain. Instead he encounters Zuss and Nickles. Nickles urges him to commit suicide in order to spite God; Zuss offers him his old life back if he will promise to obey God. J.B. rejects them both, and instead finds comfort in the person of his wife Sarah. The play ends with the two building a new life together.

Noble Dust

↪Bitter Crank

Ain’t that Ecclesiastes?

Noble Dust

↪Mr Phil O'Sophy

Thanks.

BC

↪Noble Dust

What is???

charleton

So God asks his servant Satan to play a trick on this poor bloke called Job to prove what how mighty and powerful is god.
Nice!
Not the sort of deity worthy of any respect.

charleton

He didn’t curse God and die, but endured his suffering, — Noble Dust

Proving humans are greater beings than gods, which accords with Homer so well.
Man being moral having everything to loose suffers in dignity, whilst the tardy, arrogant and capricious gods torture taunt and dish out arbitrary punishments on humans.

charleton

I love the book of Job. It's personally my favourite book of the bible. — René Descartes

If I ever need reminding how confused and contradictory is the Bible then I remind myself of Job.
Satan is the servant of God, or is he the evil fallen angel the sworn enemy of god?
Is god kind and beneficent, or is he mean minded and capricious?

Shawn

Just a fantastic exemplification of Job and human suffering presented below. Well, worth the short hour to listen to this gem:

Noble Dust

↪Bitter Crank

Lol sneaky!

Noble Dust

Proving humans are greater beings than gods, which accords with Homer so well. — charleton

How does that particular interpretation of a scripture prove that idea? I’m guessing you don’t actually place that much stock in scripture to give it so much power.

Man being moral having everything to loose suffers in dignity, whilst the tardy, arrogant and capricious gods torture taunt and dish out arbitrary punishments on humans. — charleton

Is this a metaphor? I’m assuming you don’t actually believe that.

charleton

How does that particular interpretation of a scripture prove that idea? I’m guessing you don’t actually place that much stock in scripture to give it so much power. — Noble Dust

What did not throw down on Lot FOR A BET with Satan? It's like you've not understood the most basic fact of the story!

charleton

↪charleton you’ve completely misunderstood the entire point. — Mr Phil O'Sophy

I'm still waiting for your claim of objective morality to be substantiated.
Do you think it was moral of God to give Lot a lifetime of torture just to win a bet with Satan?

Noble Dust

↪charleton

I read the text metaphorically. It’s a human story about human experience; of course the Old Testament depiction of God is barbaric; it was a barbaric time. To the contrary, the Israelite God was revolutionarily different to competing gods of the time. Today stories about God are told differently, based on the cultural milieu. The fact that you place so much significance on the Old Testament God in your arguments against the existence of a deity is ironically solely dependent on an Evangelical interpretation of scripture that considers it inspired and innerant, and most of all, unchanging, positioning the Old Testament God as something still valid to a modern milieu. It’s such an old and uninteresting argument, to be honest with you.

charleton

Your flaw is that you talk in terms of God acting as though he is in need of something. — Mr Phil O'Sophy

No - that's the Bible doing that. Read it again!
More evidence that atheists know their Bible with more detail than the believer.

charleton

God is barbaric — Noble Dust

Well you got that right at least.

Shawn

↪charleton

I still prefer the God of the Old Testament. You know keeping it real and all?

charleton

It’s such an old and uninteresting argument, to be honest with you. — Noble Dust

Only because you have failed to see its importance.
What God would allow millions of believers for thousands of years to follow those writing and the examples within in His name?
How would you characterise such a God?
And if we cannot learn about God from the Bible why read it at all?

charleton

I still prefer the God of the Old Testament. You know keeping it real and all? — Posty McPostface

Misogynism, Terroism and Genocide perfect examples for the world of the devout.

Noble Dust

↪charleton

Respond to my counter argument that you’re interpreting scripture literally rather than metaphorically just like the Christians you critique, and I’ll then respond to your points.

charleton

Your flaw is that you talk in terms of God acting as though he is in need of something.
— Mr Phil O'Sophy — charleton

↪charleton very presumptuous of you. I’m not a Christian. I have read it and you’re twisting the words to suit your argument. It doesn’t make sense to claim that an all knowing all powerful God would make a bet because that presupposes that there is a prize for God to win if the bet comes in his favour. But God is the creator of all things, all things come from him and return to him. There is nothing to win that doesn’t already belong to God. Satan challenges God out of arrogance and pride and he fails. Can hardly call it a bet if you already know the outcome and have full control over its results. — Mr Phil O'Sophy

Please read the top quote!! I sometimes despair of the treacle I have to wade through to get some sense in here. YOU, accused ME of a flaw, when what I said is an accurate account of what it says in the Bible. If anything is flawed it is, then, the Bible's absurd story of Job, the writers having fallen into the same error. OR those that wrote this section of the book did not share your view of God! God wagers with Satan, who oddly in this book is not his enemy, but his 'servant', exhorted to do God's dirty work and bring down suffering upon an innocent man.

At no point did I say you were a Christian. But if this is your god either way you can keep him.

charleton

Respond to my counter argument that you’re interpreting scripture literally rather than metaphorically just like the Christians you critique, and I’ll then respond to your points. — Noble Dust

It's not a counter argument of any strength, since millions have taken the Bible as their example for thousands of years.

charleton

So every devout person is guilty of these crimes? — Mr Phil O'Sophy

That is not what I said. You love to put words into another's mouth. They call that a straw man.
But they are guilty by association if they continue to promote Scripture, yes.

Noble Dust

↪charleton

Millions misinterpreting scripture says nothing about my argument, and the argument isn’t original either; it’s well known. Try again.

charleton

Millions misinterpreting scripture says nothing about my argument, and the argument isn’t original either; it’s well known. Try again. — Noble Dust

What that you find it boring?? What sort of argument is that?

Noble Dust

↪charleton

Again, respond to my argument with at least a fraction of the effort I put into responding to yours, and I’ll be happy to continue the discussion.

Shawn

Misogynism, Terroism and Genocide perfect examples for the world of the devout. — charleton

I don't believe God should be all loving if you've seen suffering. The cognitive dissonance gets too real. A more cold and aloof God always made better sense to me. Even a spiteful one at that.

charleton

You just confirmed and denied my claim with the same quote lol — Mr Phil O'Sophy

You are not paying attention.

The Book of Job

Welcome to The Philosophy Forum!

Categories

More Discussions