Most of my conservative Christian friends, I believe, would say that the Bible always demonstrates God’s message to us in plain simple terms that we can understand. I take issue with anything resembling that statement. I and others could name a host of stories, parables, or accounts that don’t seem to be quite so clear and simple in their explanations of God’s message. The story of Job is just such an account.
In the Old Testament, the story of Job appears near the middle of the list, just before Psalms. According to many scholars, Job very well could be the first book of the OT to be written down. That would put it before Genesis, which is traditionally placed first. Job is the first book in the Bible where Satan is mentioned. Satan makes a deal with God about Job. Since Satan is a character believed to be taken from Zoroasterianism (Persian theology), this would probably place the story of Job near the end of, or after the Babylonian Captivity of the Hebrews.
The book is in three sections. In the first Satan is bargaining with God for the right to "test" his faithful servant Job, and wins God’s permission to do just that. The middle section is made up of long speeches by Job, then his "friends". Job is basically asking God, "Why me?". He states that he has been a good man and doesn’t understand why all these terrible things are happening to him. Job’s "friends" then proceed to tell him that he has to be wrong. There must be something dreadfully wrong in Job’s life for God to do these things to him (the conventional wisdom- bad things happen to bad people, good things to good people). Then comes the surprising conclusion.
In the last section, God intervenes in the situation, makes a long speech consisting of a myriad of questions, not answers or explanations to satiate the "friends" or the modern conservative readers of Job. The simple answers don’t come! The plain explanations of what God did, what he means and says aren’t there! For one thing, God does not explain this unusual deal he struck with the character Satan. Then, we find the pious, self-righteous speeches of his "friends" in the second part. All of what they say is basically false in relation to God. So was this middle section "inspired", as the conservatives would say, or is it not inspired by God at all, simply written by a man, or men.
There is no easy way to explain this book if you believe in the inspiration of all the Bible and that it is inerrant. This story isn’t simple and self-explanatory as it should be. Somehow, if we are to get anything from this unusual story, it must come from looking at the whole. We cannot take it piece by piece, verse by verse and expect a revelation to take place (as most conservative readers expect).
I am still trying to make sense of this famous story. I am still trying to understand the "God" of Job. Job’s God making deals with Satan doesn’t at all fit my own understanding of who God is. To say that Job was an historical character that really experienced all that the book says is something I cannot believe. If there is anything at all to be learned from this story, it has to be found at a deeper level of interpretation. There are no pat answers to be found here from God for the conservative interpreter of Job.
Never accept and be content with unanalyzed assumptions, assumptions about the work, about the people, about the church or Christianity. Never be afraid to ask questions about the work we have inherited or the work we are doing. There is no question that should not be asked or that is outlawed. The day we are completely satisfied with what we have been doing; the day we have found the perfect, unchangeable system of work, the perfect answer, never in need of being corrected again, on that day we will know that we are wrong, that we have made the greatest mistake of all.
-Vincent J. Donovan
I no longer believe that the Bible is inerrant. I no longer believe that it is the literal words of God. I no longer believe that Jesus was God incarnated as a human being. It has taken me six years to reach the place where I now stand.
When I look at Jesus, I no longer see God in human form. That to me is now a very inadequate, theistic understanding of what divinity means. Divinity does not make Jesus, or us, more than human, as Christianity has so often taught. Divinity is seen in the fullness of humanity when limits disappear and hatreds fade and a new creation emerges. In Jesus, we find a unique and solitary life in which humanity, because it was whole and complete, was open to the realm of spirit. There is the place where the human enters the life of the very Source of being, the very life of God. It must be recognized that even the word "divine" is a human word created to name a human experience. I look at Jesus and see a human open to the Source (God)- open to life, open to love and open to being.
This for sure is a new way to think about Jesus. But, as the theism of 3000 years continues its slow inexorable death, there is, on the horizon, a welcome alternative. It is the profoundly human Jesus that enables us to step into that new frontier where our humanity can be fully developed. Following his lead is still a good, a very good idea.
“God is a mean-spirited, pugnacious bully bent on revenge against His children for failing to live up to His impossible standards.”
I recently read this quote by Walt Whitman. The tenor of this quote shows plainly that people of his day had some of the same feelings as those of today; that they don’t want to be associated with a God like he describes. What Whitman says is NOT about God, it is about the God created by religion. It is NOT the Ground of all Being in which I believe.
* Update on "Mother’s Day" (See my May 6th post)
This from a student in a homiletics class at Harvard Divinity School in 2000……….Think about it:
"Christianity has given us a God who caused the death of his son, the damnation of unbelievers, the subordination of women, the bloody massacres of the Crusades, the terror of judgment, the wrath toward homosexuals and the justification of slavery. The Father God embodied in the creeds is a deity who chooses some of the world’s children while rejecting others. He is the father of wrath, the father of male ordination, and female submission, the father of literal and spiritual slavery."
Is this the kind of God we can love unconditionally or who can love us the same way? Can this kind of Christianity survive without change? Should it survive without change?
This Sunday, Mother’s Day, I will attend services at the church in which I was raised. I do this out of respect for my 89 year old mother, who faithfully attends most every Sunday. Afterward, I will be taking her out for lunch.
It has been quite a while (a year or more) since I have been to a service there (much longer elsewhere). I have been wondering what I will feel. I will attempt, in an addendum to this post, to describe my feelings about the service. Lots of things going through my mind at present.
*Quite interestingly, my Mother called me Sunday morning and stated that rather than going to church, she wanted to prepare lunch for us so as to avoid the crowds at the restaurants and have more time to visit. That was just fine for me. We had a good meal, and after lunch, I got to help her with some things which needed doing.
When I reflect on Mother’s Day, I see that it was exactly that. A day for my mother to be a mother once again. It made her very happy to prepare that meal (she rarely cooks much for herself). She was in a very good mood and we had a good visit!
The Buddha said that the origin of our suffering (suffering was a big topic with him) is our inability to let go; our clinging. Here is an example of what he meant:
In India, they widely use a monkey trap which consists of a small bamboo cage that is built with bars that are just wide enough for the monkey to slip his hand into the cage. Inside the cage is put some kind of food which the monkey cannot resist. The monkey grasps the food, but when he tries to withdraw his hand with the food inside, he cannot do it. He’s stuck! But, he will not release the food and regain his freedom. The hunters soon come and take him away. He was trapped by his own craving, his own inability to let go.
We are all trapped by our own cravings, and so often, we cannot let go of them. Therefore, we suffer as a result. We have to learn to let go.
What is it that you crave that you cannot release?
Stumble it!
