Job's response to the latest commentary from his friends is a lecture on God's wisdom and power and against those who would presume to know the mind of God (laced with entertaining sarcasm). The most powerful statement comes near the middle of the reading:
Are you defending God with lies?Job is saying that God does not need the defense of humans. Furthermore, God finds testimony that, by human terms, is in his favor to be just as indefensible as false testimony against him.
Do you make your dishonest arguments for his sake?
Will you slant your testimony in his favor?
Will you argue God’s case for him?
What will happen when he finds out what you are doing?
Can you fool him as easily as you fool people?
No, you will be in trouble with him
if you secretly slant your testimony in his favor.
Doesn’t his majesty terrify you?
Doesn’t your fear of him overwhelm you?
Your platitudes are as valuable as ashes.
Your defense is as fragile as a clay pot.
I like this passage. I have always been annoyed that the attitude that it is better to have a view of God that is naive, ignorant, and clearly ignores reality than it is to have what is, if there is a God, an equally wrong view of God that asserts that he does not exist. Is God so petty that would prefer someone who spreads hatred and intolerance in the names of God and Jesus rather than doing good with no belief in God? The opinion of the author of Job is that those who misrepresent God will be in trouble with God, whether that misrepresentation is positive or negative.
After Job finishes, Eliphaz responds a second time. He unfairly accuses Job of having no fear or reverence of God despite the fact that one of Job's key points revolved around proper respect for God's majesty. I think, perhaps, that Eliphaz is actually projecting his own feelings onto God. Eliphaz resents that Job is not accepting his opinion.
Eliphaz again tries to give the easy answers: God brings pain and ruin to the wicked. The wicked will constantly feel terror, will be ruined, will be cut down in the prime of life, will lose their homes. The problem with this feeble defense, as the author of Job clearly knows, is that none of this is true. Those who are not godly live long, successful, and probably often happy lives. There are truly bad people who are never brought to justice, who never even have their evil discovered. As before, Eliphaz's easy answers are tempting, but ultimately the data does not support them.
New Testament
Discussion of the post-resurrection body. I don't particularly care. The only interesting fragment is this verse which could be used in making a case that Paul believed that Jesus would return soon:
But let me reveal to you a wonderful secret. We will not all die, but we will all be transformed!
Psalms and Proverbs
No human wisdom or understanding or planSeems appropriate given our reading in Job. I think that one could make a compelling Biblical case that, if there is a God, any human knowledge of him is incomplete and approximate, even knowledge gained from the Bible itself.
can stand against the Lord.
Well schucks...
ReplyDeleteI'm a Lutheran pastor who goes through the Bible in a Year (it appears to be a different one, however) as well and I JUST NOW stumbled on your blog.
And being an atheist, I'm doubtful you'll go for a second year, but I'll follow you via RSS, your comments are really insightful and it's always good to see the other side of the coin. Thanks for having the courage to take this on....and of course, I really desperately hope you give up the "atheist" moniker after this project...but even if not, I really appreciate this work. Thanks.
in Christ,
jW
"I think that one could make a compelling Biblical case that, if there is a God, any human knowledge of him is incomplete and approximate, even knowledge gained from the Bible itself."
ReplyDeleteIncomplete and approximate does not mean inaccurate. Some knowledge is possible.
@JWinters, weclome!
ReplyDelete@J.K. Jones: Incomplete and approximate does not mean inaccurate. Some knowledge is possible.
Oh, but it is so often and obviously inaccurate much of the time. How are you to judge which parts are inaccurate, which parts are incomplete, which parts are approximate, and which parts are right?
Ever since the Bible has existed, interpretations of it have changed based on external knowledge and current cultural norms. Reading it, it hardly seems like a better source of knowledge than almost any other work.
Good analysis.
ReplyDeleteOften the idea that "His ways are higher," or "His ways are not our ways," is an easy cop-out to a lot of these difficult questions. It has always been frustrating, because it absolutely begs the question..."Well, who's fault is that?!"
One would expect a perfect and irresistable being to do a better job of showing how perfect and irresistable He is. But...like you beautifully pointed out, the data does not support this.
Keep up the good work.
Tusk