What if Job was right and God is wrong?

 

manhandstoheadThe Book of Job is one of the most puzzling books of the Hebrew Bible.   If we take Yahweh’s speeches from the whirlwind seriously, then there is no humanly comprehensible reason for the suffering of innocents and the righteous.  The good suffer, the bad flourish, and we must accept this without question.  Does this mean that Job was right and God is wrong?

One way out of this puzzle, generally called the problem of theodicy (if God is all good, all powerful, and all knowing, then why do the innocent suffer?), is to read the Book of Job from the perspective of the New Testament.  This is what G. K. Chesterton does, seeing the suffering of the most innocent and righteous of men as a preface to Christ.   

Though God rewards Job at the Book’s conclusion with seven new sons and three new daughters even more beautiful than before, as well as doubling his flocks and oxen, most scholars agree that the section, 42:10-17 was an addition by later redactors to encourage the faithful.  The Book really ends with Job despising himself for his arrogance in questioning God (42.6).  Or at least that is one translation. 

The patience of Job?

To read the Book of Job from the perspective of the New Testament is to miss what is so challenging about it.  Job’s harsh criticism of God is not answered by God, at least not in any way the pious reader might expect.  Says Job

The good and the guilty He destroys alike.  If some scourge brings sudden death, He mocks the guiltless for their melting hearts; some land falls under a tyrant’s sway—He veils its judges’ faces, if not He, then who?  (9:22-24)

Job goes on like this chapter after chapter.  Whoever wrote about the patience of Job was crazy.  Job wants to take God to court and find him guilty (9:32-10:5). 

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Why I pray

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Because I don’t believe in a God who intervenes in everyday life, I’m not sure why I pray to Him every night.  Yet I continue to pray, and there is still so much I don’t understand.  Why do we ask God’s blessings?  For those close to our hearts, as well as refugees and displaced individuals in distant places whom I may never encounter. Yet I continue to ask Him.

About asking God’s blessings.  If there were an interventionist God, why would He be more likely to intervene if I asked Him?  He doesn’t take recommendations from me.  One answer is that what I am really asking is for God to feel present in another person’s life, as well as my own.  Not that he change their journey, or mine, but that He accompany us along the way.  But, the problem remains.  Why would God be more likely to accompany someone on his or her perilous journey just because I ask Him to?  Or if a thousand people ask Him to?

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