Reading through Job as research for the next book and y'all, it's rough. First time going through it in like fifteen years. I can't remember if it was Apocrypals or Bible For Normal People, but hearing a story of people struggling with their faith after reading it no longer surprises me c.c
So, what role does this play in Christianity? Is it a demonstration of God's power or position over man or something?
Raised atheist, so I feel like I'm missing something important on a cultural level.
Fred Clark essentially posits Jonah as a response to Job, basically “god is actually good and forgiving and not a jackass who thinks mass murder pranks are a good time”
The point of Job is the ending, really. We can't even discuss theodicy because we aren't the ones who can see the whole picture and know what is evil and what is justified.
Here's what I get out of it: it's a story, probably the oldest part of the Bible, that says sometimes bad shit happens to good people, and if there's a reason for it we may never know. There's no pat moral answer in it, but there's a degree of comfort in knowing that doubt and anger at God aren't new.
One interpretation I've seen more than once focuses on Job's friends and how they insist he must have done something wrong he needs to repent for, but they're all wrong. Job did nothing wrong, and he is justifiably upset with God at the end, but he does not get a real answer, and neither do we.
Another way I think about it is, if god exists outside of time and can perceive all time at once, the interventions they choose may be largely unrelated to the immediate perceived needs of humans, and more about a bigger picture we can't perceive because it is too far beyond us. Butterfly chaos theory on a universal space-time level.
That's precisely what I've always loved about Job, is God showing up in a whirlwind and going “you don't have and can never have literally any idea what you're talking about”—and then telling the other guys Job was the only person present who said what was right. The sense of intrusion from another plane is as bizarre as anything in Ezekiel, it just involves fewer eyes
Daniel Lawrence O'Keefe, a sociologist, wrote a general theory of magic, Stolen Lightning, that (in opposition to George Frazer) described magic as a series of individual acts that take elements of their society's existing religious structure and turn those elements to personal benefit. Kabbalah is definitely in that tradition.
(O'Keefe, an editor at Reader's Digest for 30 years, is probably best known for inventing the holiday of Festivus; his son was a writer on Seinfeld and ported the family rituals into the show.)
Something, going back to the discussion about Job right quick
I remember, growing up in a Christian household under a mother who had remarkably super progressive ideas on how to teach and live it, that I also had trouble with Job at times. I understood that the point of the story was "sometimes bad things happen to good people, and we can't always understand the reason why, but if they happen, it's not some punishment for some secret sin." But it still would linger in my mind.
Two things helped me see Job in a different light though. First was The Job Suite, by Christian musician Michael Scott Card. I remember, as a young tween, dealing with the trauma, the sorrow and the PTSD I had gained from being moved from my native Austria to the States, then facing constant, vicious bullying at all times at 5th & 6th grade public school before being homeschooled
I remember listening on repeat, over and over, the part of the Job Suite sung from Job's perspective. The expression of sorrow and pain comforted me, validated how I was feeling, and I drew comfort from this particular set of lyrics:
'''
If I've been untrue, if I've robbed the poor
If I'm without guilt, what am I suffering for?
God would not crush me for some secret sin
And though He slay me still I'll trust in Him
'''
The song is explicitly a Christian perspective on the story, with explicit references to not just Jesus, but the idea of what he represents as "God Among Us." I came to view part of the moral of Job as being "Though bad things might happen to you, unexplainably and seemingly for no reason, have trust and faith that God is in control, and even if he might have allowed these things to happen, for whatever result of causal links you have no bird's eye view of seeing, he recognizes your pain, suffering and sorrow, and stands with you in comfort over it."
The second thing that changed my view on Job, was a book I found a few years after. I cannot for the life of me remember its title nor its author, but its argument was that, when Job had made his complaint towards God, it was effectively a court summons for grievances against God. And when God appeared to Job, and asked him "Who is it that darkens my counsel / Who speaks empty words without knowledge? / Brace yourself up like a man / And answer me now if you can," critically GOD DID NOT DISMISS THE COURT SUMMONS
The book argued that Job, standing in for humanity, had called God to account over why "bad things happen to innocent people." God's explanations over how He is responsible for EVERYTHING in creation meant that there was a far greater picture going on that we, as humans, could not understand IN OUR MORTAL LIFETIME. And the author argued that Job's acceptance of this wasn't an acquittal of God so much as a "Okay, I will have faith in you and wait and see." The court summons Job initiated still stands, and whether God faces acquittal or not will depend on the day we are reunited with Him and can see, from His perspective, ALL the causal chain of events that have gone down through the ages, like a mind melting series of dominoes
That fundamentally changed my outlook on The Book of Job at the time, when I was in my almost 20s. Now that I'm in my 30s, I accept that things that happen, good and bad, are so easily the result of chains of choices and their consequences I have no awareness of. And God allows them to happen because they might be either expressions of the laws of nature, or the free will of people. But just because he allows these things to happen in a causal universe, does not mean He has abandoned me. It does not mean He has stopped loving me. He is there in my suffering, sharing in it and comforting me, and I choose to trust and have faith that in the end, for all the bad that might happen, ultimately it will be leagues and bounds outweighed by the good.
Apocrypals: 101: The Apocrypals Solve Theodicy (The Book of Job)
Have you ever wondered why bad things happen to good people, Theophiloi? Well, we've found the answer in the Book of Job, a literary classic and/or utter failure, and it's pretty simple: God's indifference is indistinguishable from God's wrath. That's... kind of a weird idea to show up in Bible, though, so join us as we spend an hour unpacking i...
Image
I think you all will like this one
**DandyMan — 04/21/2022**
huzzah!
**Brad Ulfhrokr — 04/21/2022**
**Madison — 04/21/2022**
Hecka excited
Graupel? The ice granules?
**benitocereno — 04/21/2022**
Yeah, that one
**Chris (He) — 04/21/2022**
I AM THE SCHOLAR NOW
**Madison — 04/21/2022**
Old 'man-uel! Was pretty dang good haha
**Madison — 04/21/2022**
Fuckin Bildud
**Madison — 04/21/2022**
Job 13:17
BibleBot
BOT
— 04/21/2022
Job 13:17 - New Revised Standard Version (NRSV)
<17> Listen carefully to my words, and let my declaration be in your ears.
BibleBot v9.2-beta by Kerygma Digital
**Madison — 04/21/2022**
Whoops. Job 13:17-19 HCSB
BibleBot
BOT
— 04/21/2022
Job 13:17-19 - Holman Christian Standard Bible (HCSB)
<17> Pay close attention to my words; let my declaration ring in your ears. <18> Now then, I have prepared my case; I know that I am right. <19> Can anyone indict me? If so, I will be silent and die.
BibleBot v9.2-beta by Kerygma Digital
**AndrewOBT — 04/21/2022**
Ugh, I didn't make sure it downloaded before I left the house
**Madison — 04/21/2022**
https://apocrypals.wiki/The_Apocrypals_Solve_Theodicy Getting wiki page up.
Apocrypals Apocrypha
The Apocrypals Solve Theodicy
Have you ever wondered why bad things happen to good people, Theophiloi? Well, we've found the answer in the Book of Job, a literary classic and/or utter failure, and it's pretty simple: God's indifference is indistinguishable from God's wrath. That's... kind of a weird idea to show up in Bible, though, so join us as we spend an hour unpacking i...
**Tim "The Tool Man" Taylor — 04/21/2022**
Heads up
That "Genesis" drop is actually solo Phil Collins
0/10 I can't believe you've done this
For future ones might I suggest "Invisible Touch"?
**samwise (no pronouns pls) — 04/21/2022**
10/10 legal strategy
I will be starting all letters to the government at my work this way
**Madison — 04/21/2022**
I think my thing about Job is that, taking the book on its own, there's a lot of really good stuff, and even the cruddy stuff is at least interesting to think about - his friends are terrible, his complaints are legit, the language is beautiful, God's answer is frustrating (though I'm curious about Žižek's interpretation brought up on Twitter) - but so much of the modern Christian and especially evangelical interpretation of the book makes it really unpalatable. In the context of the theology of the time, it's way more interesting than the ✨God works in mysterious ways ✨ stuff that we get now.
**DandyMan — 04/21/2022**
Personally I think the most useful part of Job is the characterization of Satan
he's not cool, he's not tragic
he's not dark or mysterious or brooding
he's just an asshole lawyer
just this nebbynose bureaucrat pushing his glasses up his nose and going "well actually"
**aualdrich — 04/21/2022**
So, I used to be a part of a "prosperity gospel" church. They had a very specific theology about Job because the book really threw their theology out of sorts. They taught that Job had a "hedge of protection" that he had around him. When Job lost his faith, God removed the hedge and Satan was free to attack him. We were literally taught the same thing could happen to us. Wild stuff!
**DandyMan — 04/21/2022**
"hedge of protection" is definitely from the druid spell list
**Brad Ulfhrokr — 04/21/2022**
So, the exact opposite of what the text actually says.
**aualdrich — 04/21/2022**
You have to recast it every 5 minutes or you're facing certain destruction.
**Beriah — 04/21/2022**
Yeah the lesson of Job is that God gets bored easily and will F up your life on a dare.
**DandyMan — 04/21/2022**
Job is also, I find, a case study in people making things more difficult than they need to
Twisting themselves up in knots, trying to make the myth make sense
instead of, you know
making a new myth'
**Beriah — 04/21/2022**
Fred Clark positions Jonah as an opposition statement against Job, where the take is, actually god is abundant in mercy and endlessly willing to receive the truly repentant, and most of the really awful that happens to people is because of people
**Brad Ulfhrokr — 04/21/2022**
My thought on "you don't put the best argument against the thing in the thing" is that no, of course you do, if you want to engage in good faith. Job's a primitive and inconclusive attempt at grappling with the reality that good people suffer, and much of the rest of the library it's in is books wrestling with the same questions it asks. As in Fred Clark's reading of Jonah.
As literature, I think it's unimpeachable, and the lack of resolution is central to its effectiveness.
**Chris (He) — 04/21/2022**
No. You might not.
**Tim "The Tool Man" Taylor — 04/21/2022**
Oh, okay...
**Beriah — 04/21/2022**
I vote “House by the Sea” for a spooky episode
**Tim "The Tool Man" Taylor — 04/21/2022**
Home By the Sea?
**Beriah — 04/21/2022**
Maybe so
**Tim "The Tool Man" Taylor — 04/21/2022**
Good song
**Beriah — 04/21/2022**
Yes
Definite highlight of seeing them earlier this year, along with Land of Confusion, and Domino
**Madison — 04/21/2022**
I think I'm with this, yeah. I kind of love the book, but I kind of hate a lot of the fallout of it being in a doctrinal setting.
**Beriah — 04/21/2022**
As Douglas Adams wrote, “People are a problem.”
**dancassino — 04/21/2022**
I’ve always found Job to be very similar to the conception of the Trinity I grew up with. It doesn’t make sense, and it’s not supposed to, so you’re just supposed to sit with the mystery of it as an exercise in humility slash appreciation of the ineffable nature of God.
“Why do bad things happen to good people?” / “How can God be three separate things simultaneously?” Because shut up, you can’t comprehend the divine,
**Brad Ulfhrokr — 04/21/2022**
**Beriah — 04/21/2022**
If god were so great they could make sense of the whole thing for us
**Chris (He) — 04/21/2022**
I would suggest that ending the argument against it with "shut up, I made the hippopotamus" is not what I would consider arguing in good faith, but I get what you're saying.
Because listen, saying you made the hippopotamus, the most dangerous land animal, is an implicit threat.
**Our Dear Mod Lucas — 04/21/2022**
“Look at this stupid, dangerous thing I made? Do you want to test me?”
Also;
Image
**Chris (He) — 04/21/2022**
This is good.
**Brad Ulfhrokr — 04/21/2022**
They are relentless unstoppable killing machines.
I think if you take the book of Job as a conversation between a man and God about some things God did, it's extremely unsatisfying.
But I, a believer who tries not to be a jerk about it, read it as a work of drama written by someone who really wanted to scream these questions at God, and imagined what kind of answers might come back. And the answers aren't satisfactory, because if there actually are any answers then they're part of this cosmic perspective we can barely begin to comprehend, but Job at least stands his ground, pleads his case, and makes the Almighty stand in the dock and listen. It's an essential passage in a long, winding conversation about who this God person is, and it speaks to me as a cynic who's also a mystic in a way few things ever have.
**Our Dear Mod Lucas — 04/21/2022**
Also, in listening to this episode I realised I had, in my memory, conflated the Book of Job with that story (that I have just looked for and am unable to find) of god and the devil trying to get a man to take off his coat, and the devil using wind and cold and failing but then god using gentle sun and succeeding. Like I imagined lots of that back and forth within Job.
Come to think of it, I don’t even know if that was an actual Bible story or just some made up stuff for Sunday school.
**Madison — 04/21/2022**
That's the North Wind and the Sun, which I think is Aesop?
**Brad Ulfhrokr — 04/21/2022**
Yep.
**Madison — 04/21/2022**
But I can see it being recast for Sunday school
**Our Dear Mod Lucas — 04/21/2022**
A-Ha! That explains it. Thanks y’all.
**Madison — 04/21/2022**
It's one of the sample texts (alongside the Babel passage) used most for demonstrating language features, which is the only reason I know it, hah c.c
**Our Dear Mod Lucas — 04/21/2022**
Also,
God:
Image
**benitocereno — 04/21/2022**
Shout out to @Our Dear Mod Lucas for editing this episode btw. The only reason this episode came out as soon as it did is because of him
**Our Dear Mod Lucas — 04/21/2022**
Happy to help!
**Madison — 04/21/2022**
:shofar:
**samwise (no pronouns pls) — 04/21/2022**
If we're made in the image and likeness of God, why is he so bad at explaining things in a way we understand? Seems like God needs to do Toastmasters
**Madison — 04/21/2022**
I know that I am thousand percent terrible at explaining things
**samwise (no pronouns pls) — 04/21/2022**
This makes you closer to God according to Job
**Madison — 04/21/2022**
God's a trans polyam furry got it
**Beriah — 04/21/2022**
Makes sense
**nick — 04/21/2022**
Just started listening to the ep, (this is a great one so far btw).
I'm not sure if this comes up later: I wonder if one meaning of all of Job's neighbors demanding he confess is supposed to be a lesson about not judging someone based on their circumstances.
Like, in that reading the message isn't directed at someone like Job, someone who's misfortune might cause him to question God's ways.
Instead, the message is directed at the community. The Book of Job says dont attempt to interpret God's ways, because then you'll try to preempt God's place as the supreme judge.
**Brad Ulfhrokr — 04/21/2022**
Certainly a critical takeaway from the story is that sometimes bad things happen to good people, and suffering doesn't have to be someone's fault (except for the Satan, and God, who's presumably where the buck stops). Sometimes shit just happens.
**Centipede Damascus — 04/21/2022**
Which, for Christians, is repeated later in Jesus' teaching about the man born blind.
**TricornKing — 04/21/2022**
I'm listening to the episode at work, and I have to say, I've missed listening to you two, @benitocereno and @Chris (He) Y'all are one of my cornerstones of religious study now
I also have to say, as much as I am a believer, I have to agree with you Chris, Job is a very bad sell for just religion in general. You made a lot of good points, and I appreciate that, as justifiably salty as you are about it, you weren't as much of a "jerk" as you could have been about it, and I appreciate that
**taps they/xe — 04/21/2022**
episode is very good!! it made me write a poem, kinda job pov? ill throw it artworks
also like, i wasn't raised christian, and my mom left the catholic church for its conservatism not so much her beliefs, listening to this is so very reasonable and i can see myself going in a crisis of faith to this and coming to the same conclusion chris did and i think y'all both were so eloquent in this one! thank you for doing something so challenging
**gsc — 04/22/2022**
I think the point of Job is not to answer Job’s questions, but to acknowledge that they are unanswerable. And also to teach you that if you hear yourself starting to sound like one of Job’s neighbours, you should shut the F up.
**Jemaleddin — 04/22/2022**
Just want to hop in and say that the reason God's answers to Job at the end are unsatisfactory is that God realizes that the real answer, "my buddy goaded me into it by preying on what a petty bully I am," was not going to satisfy Job, the person whose life he has ruined by acting like the worst High School bully ever. "You're not my mom! You don't understand me!"
**RyRyJK — 04/22/2022**
Yeah that is my take on it as well. I've read Job a few times in my life during different spiritual seasons (good catholic boy, not going to church at all catholic boy, recovering catholic attending a bible-based christian church) and it always read that way to me.
**TricornKing — 04/22/2022**
Thinking on it, I do think that there definitely needs to be a Job 2.0, like a rewrite
**Brad Ulfhrokr — 04/22/2022**
Well, there is. They mentioned J. B. a couple of times in the episode.
**TricornKing — 04/22/2022**
Or maybe, if Job is legitimately one of the oldest books of the Bible, maybe the entire Bible, Torah and New Testament, is just multiple generations' trying to address how unsatisfactory Job is
**TricornKing — 04/22/2022**
I mean like, one that's actually a good sell for what the rest of the Bible is trying to sell
**Beriah — 04/22/2022**
Well, the very oldest parts are the song of the sea and Deborah’s song
**TricornKing — 04/22/2022**
Based on how Job features a pre-Zoroastrian-encounter cosmology I mean
**Jemaleddin — 04/22/2022**
Just saying, like Billy Bragg says: If you wanna make the weather, then you have to take the blame.
**TricornKing — 04/22/2022**
I will admit, the Zoroastrian cosmology of "There's an UberGod, who is the source of all good, but there's also Ahriman, who is a secondary not-as-omnipotent-but-still-comparatively-omnipotent-evil-god who is the source of all evil" does do a better job of dealing with theodicy
**Jemaleddin — 04/22/2022**
I kinda like the pantheon answer: these fuckers are up to some hijinks but what can you do?
**Brad Ulfhrokr — 04/22/2022**
A lot of problems with theodicy get resolved pretty quick if you abandon the idea of omnipotence.
**Jemaleddin — 04/22/2022**
(Atheism helps too!)
**nick — 04/22/2022**
Lmao
**Jemaleddin — 04/22/2022**
This is why I stopped being welcome in my dad's church.
**nick — 04/22/2022**
After finishing the ep, Benito's context on cosmology helps me make sense of Job a little better.
The emphasis on God slaying chaos beast works when you're a tribe in the Levant who mainly just want God to bring timely rain and victory in war. God brings cosmic justice to worthy communities.
Contrast that with the petty justice of an individuals good or ill luck. I'm given to understand that ancients wouldn't have viewed luck as random chance but as more significant signs of fate/divine/demons. (Not sure if that's a valid assumption for Hebrews in this time period, but ill go with it.)
So the book of Job says dont try to determine the significance of these things. And the unspoken conclusion is then: whether you are prosperous or suffering, stay pious, listen to your priests, respect the words of the prophets... or else God will use his cosmic powers to unleash the ostriches of ruination upon your tribe.
Less God is just and benevolent for all individuals, and more God is the only one holding the ostriches at bay
**Carl — 04/22/2022**
I am angry that this episode didn’t tell us who the shortest person in the Bible is
Obvs it’s Bildad the Shoe-Height
**benitocereno — 04/22/2022**
Boo this
**Centipede Damascus — 04/22/2022**
Boooo
**DandyMan — 04/22/2022**
@TricornKing I actually thought of one yesterday. Job goes to God and asks why all his family is dead, God wordlessly picks up a shovel and starts digging graves. Job keeps asking, getting increasingly angry at why God has only stepped in now, God eventually responds "What I have set in motion is too great to stop without destroying it. It was easy, in the beginning, to say to myself that the cost was acceptable. I miscalculated. I thought that Death would come to heel, but Death serves no master, and never shall."
(I really like deities capable of character development. Makes for better myths)
**jared — 04/22/2022**
one of the parts of Job I’ve always found most interesting is that after God yells at Job for getting a little uppity, he turns right around and says to Job’s friends “he’s right and you’re not only wrong, you’re so wrong that you’d better sacrifice some animals right tf now”
**Corn — 04/22/2022**
can be right n still speak out of order i think is the idea there
jobs a mess
**Beriah — 04/22/2022**
I usually imagine a being who exists outside of our space and time and can perceive and interact with all of it at once, but is aware that all interactions with our universe carry implications for what happens later in our timeline. The things an entity might choose to do or not do under those circumstances would probably not make a lot of sense to beings trapped in physical space and linear time and with very limited perception of the universe in which they reside.
One can imagine Shatan as another entity looking over their shoulder-equivalent and making suggestions without having any emotional investment, like a roommate who wants you to keep summoning Godzilla to mess up your SimCity
**Jemaleddin — 04/22/2022**
You know, when I think about the relationship between humans and insects and how an ant can't understand nuanced ethics or why a human needs to bulldoze and pave vast tracts of land to build a k-mart or whatever, it doesn't make me feel like people are better than ants, it makes me wonder if those tibetan monks are onto something. 🤷
**Zackfig — 04/22/2022**
I mentioned in the past that I’m a naytheist— Job’s lack of a meaningful answer is one of the reasons for that
**Chris (He) — 04/22/2022**
If I'm right and also ten of my children are dead then I'll speak whenever I darn well please no matter who's on the other end of the line.
As St. Paul wrote in his letter to the Galatians, "Have I now become your enemy by telling you the truth?"
**Corn — 04/22/2022**
no yeah I 200% agree w that, but the text might not in that specific instance is what I meant
**Neuro — 04/22/2022**
So I was only recently introduced to Edward Greenstein's translation by this article, and it's honestly the most cohesive way I've ever seen anyone wrap up the end of the book: https://slate.com/human-interest/2022/03/job-torah-story-despair-alternative-war-democracy-climate-apocalypse.html
I've attached the relevant section as well for anyone that doesn't have time to click through to the article. I wonder if anyone has actually read Greenstein's work and if this is a fair representation of it?
Edward L. Greenstein’s astounding recent translation taught me that Job’s suffering is only half the story. It’s not even the most important half. Greenstein’s version does not rob readers of the comfort that comes from sympathizing with Job. But it also exhorts us to rebellion against power and received wisdom. Greenstein points out that a huge portion of what looks like Job praising God throughout the text may be meant as the opposite: Job sarcastically riffing on existing Bible passages, using God’s words to point out how much He has to answer for. Most importantly, Greenstein argues, there’s something revolutionary in the mysterious final words Job lobs at God, something that was buried in mistranslation. In the professor’s eyes, various words were misunderstood, and the “dust and ashes” phrase was intended as a direct quote from a source no less venerable than Abraham, in the Genesis story of Sodom and Gomorrah. In that one, Abraham has the audacity to argue with God on behalf
That is why I am fed up: I take pity on “dust and ashes” [humanity]! Remember, for this statement, God praises Job’s honesty. The deity does not give any logic for mortal suffering. Indeed, He denounces Job’s friends who say there is any logic that a human could understand. God is not praising Job’s ability to suffer and repent. He’s praising him for speaking the truth about how awful life is. Maybe the moral of Job is this: If God won’t create just circumstances, then we have to. As we do, Job’s honesty—in the face of both a harsh, collapsing world and the kinds of ignorant devotion that worsen it—must be our guiding force.
Slate Magazine
A Religious Fable That Confounded Scholars for Millennia Finally Ma...
The story is perfect for our harrowing times. But we’ve been reading it all wrong.
A Religious Fable That Confounded Scholars for Millennia Finally Ma...
**Jon M — 04/22/2022**
The best interpretation of Job I know of is JG Chesterton. In his view, when God comes down and starts listing off all the stuff he did, it's not bragging. God's sort of commiserating with Job, he's like, "Yeah man, it's crazy out there. I had to fight this colossal sea dragon! How f\*cked up is that?!"
God's actually just as beleaguered and stressed out by the universe as we are. And now he's gotta come down and deal with this guy's problems? In person? Come on man. He's barely holding it all together here.
This for me is absolutely perfect.
**Neuro — 04/22/2022**
I like this too but it really swings hard at that omnipotence peg reducing God to just, "Dude, I just work here."
**DandyMan — 04/22/2022**
Honestly of the pegs to remove I think omnipotence is probably the best one
**Our Dear Mod Lucas — 04/22/2022**
Fuck em up, Paul
**Zackfig — 04/22/2022**
As @Neuro points out -- that reading just minimizes God. Can God, in all his supposed omnipotence, find fighting with a giant chaos alligator exhausting?
**Brad Ulfhrokr — 04/22/2022**
I reckon the author of Job might have been pretty surprised to hear God's supposed to be omnipotent.
**Beriah — 04/22/2022**
Omnipotence, omniscience, and omnibenevolence of a single deity are def latter day ideas
**Zackfig — 04/22/2022**
Certainly Leviathan feels like a version of Tiamat, which would mean the God in Job would be Marduk using the same logic -- and while certainly powerful, obviously not omnipotent
I mean, it kinda feels like it was written at a time when monolatry was a thing, rather than monotheism
But I'm just a dum dum
**Brad Ulfhrokr — 04/22/2022**
Image
**Neuro — 04/22/2022**
"Look, I'm still tied up tying up all the Old Gods"
**Zackfig — 04/22/2022**
Well, god himself admitted to being busy at one point with behemoth and leviathan
**Neuro — 04/22/2022**
Exactly, but the wordplay occurred to me and I had to indulge.
**AcetyleneLamp — 04/22/2022**
(D&D cartoon Tiamat)
**benitocereno — 04/22/2022**
The earliest portions probably date to the earliest institution of monolatry among the Jews under the reforms of Josiah, so we’re talking within living memory of Canaanite polytheism
**Robbo — 04/22/2022**
Great episode. Loved it.
**Robbo — 04/22/2022**
Did anyone else check the Jewish Encyclopedia on Job? It has a whole theory on why the story seems to contradict itself.
halfway done reading it -- gotta say the doctrine of retribution section reads like victim blaming
**Robbo — 04/22/2022**
Yeah, that's the part that jumped out to me, that the story may have been an early theological development -- and a reaction to what the author(s) viewed as an outmoded theology.
And people kept adding to it and tweaking it to perhaps reflect later theological changes.
**Zackfig — 04/22/2022**
Elihu's speeches are basically an excuse for "i'm hitting you because i love you"
> Elihu, however, assumes that suffering may be decreed for the righteous for pedagogic reasons, as a protection against greater sin, and for moral betterment
**Robbo — 04/22/2022**
Yeah, I gotta admit I didn't pick up on that in my reading.
The one thing I might add to the episode's discussion is that I always interpreted the ending of the story to be saying that the beginning of the story (the court of heaven and all that) isn't the real reason for what happens to Job.
Unrelated, but what @benitocereno said about there being no concept eternal reward when Job was written ... that was an intellectual gut-punch.
**benitocereno — 04/22/2022**
The Jewish Encyclopedia is a fabulous resource, and if you’ve ever read my articles for Grunge you probably know I reference it A LOT, but also keep in mind that text is over 100 years old, so not always the cutting edge on the state of scholarship
**Robbo — 04/22/2022**
So that interpretation is no longer the consensus I take it?
If Job (and the authors) did not expect to be rewarded for their fidelity to God, there seems to be no reason for Job to ... do whatever exactly it is he does (or doesn't do). God can't punish him with anything worse. And Job absolutely does not believe that anything good will happen to him again as a result.
**Madison — 04/22/2022**
I think that the book can still inspire this much discussion is part of why I'm still drawn to it. Like, my feelings on the text are complicated, but ditto the countless interpretations
**Robbo — 04/22/2022**
So he's sort of like "If You're not going to kill me, then explain Yourself. I demand an audience."
**Zackfig — 04/22/2022**
my views align a lot with chris' in regards to this book
**Robbo — 04/22/2022**
Like, what I think the story is going for is that God isn't exactly berating Job at the end—not in a "how dare you" sense. It's more like God is saying "I can't describe my actual relationship with my creation in words that won't damage your mind beyond repair."
Granted, it's not a satisfying explanation, for the reasons Chris gave toward the end. But it is of a piece with the version of God whose terrific countenance cannot be gazed upon.
**Robbo — 04/22/2022**
Yeah, that's how I feel too. I have no need to find the book "true" in any sense, so it is more fascinating than frustrating to me.
**Zackfig — 04/22/2022**
I just think @Jon M 's mention of Chesterton's interpretation can basically summed up as this
Image
**Robbo — 04/22/2022**
It's like, "You think YOU got problems? Brother..."
**Zackfig — 04/22/2022**
Well, if Chesterton's interpretation is that God is not bragging about how they had a hand in creation and fighting chaos beasts... but just dealing with crap, some beyond their control, just like anyone else (just on a larger scale)... well...
**Robbo — 04/22/2022**
Yep. In which case, we're still in a situation where God is good but not omnipotent. And that may very well have been how the intended audience saw things. An omnipotent being does not "fight" anyone. It wills its own victory into existence, instantaneously.
**Zackfig — 04/22/2022**
but given that he thought the accuser had a point... well...
**Madison — 04/22/2022**
Its desire to fight God is a gift from God, I guess.
**Robbo — 04/22/2022**
Yeah, I can't make any sense of that aspect of the story. I feel like Job really does curse God in the most meaningful sense, by pointing out that world God created is kind of shitty and random. So the divine contest thing doesn't really work even on its own terms.
**Zackfig — 04/22/2022**
well, evangelicals push this idea that jesus is basically the public defender assigned to you precisely because of Job and satan being your accusser before god
as a response to Job going "well, who's gonna speak on my behalf" thing
**Robbo — 04/22/2022**
I know people think the happy ending was tacked on, and I can't really challenge them. But it would make a lot of sense to me if the original story was just Satan betting against Job and losing, and God rewarding Job for his good performance. But the injustice of that situation kept nagging at people, and they kept tweaking the story, trying to find some deeper meaning in it.
**Zackfig — 04/22/2022**
**Zackfig — 04/22/2022**
in a weird way, this discussion, including god being basically over his head from all the stuff they need to do, based on a certain interpretation reminded me of this scene
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=trEHvnwkxY0
YouTube
Yoboi thalegend
Youjo Senki-Wheel of Reincarnation
Image
**Robbo — 04/22/2022**
haha
**Margot — 04/22/2022**
I... think Job is gorgeous and I think it's meant to be troubling and frankly unpleasant and I think it's a bit unfair to expect Judaism to solve theodicy, haha! Because like, if we knew why bad things happened to us we would have done better historically lol
I'm sorry to hear that Chris had unpleasant relationships with the book, I can understand why that would lead to a pretty angry reaction
But I mean, I think the rabbis were pretty unhappy with this text too!
I'm not convinced it's a bug and not a feature
I think it is meant to be a parable of sorts Though.
I mean IDK, Chris said that Job posits a universe in which it is impossible to distinguish between God's wrath and God's indifference? I mean, yeah, that just feels like a Jewish worldview to me
I don't think anyone ever said our religion was especially satisfying lol
**Madison — 04/22/2022**
Huh! Yeah, I think that makes sense. It's one of those things where a lot of folks view it from within the context of the protestant or evangelical bubble, making it hard to separate from the contexts in which it's been used.
**Margot — 04/22/2022**
It's just a fundamental of Judaism post-70 CE that there is a being of omnipotent power that is capable of really fucking us over idk
IDK I have a lot less trouble with that then I think a Christian reader might
But to be fair I am a very atheist Jew
**Beriah — 04/22/2022**
Also plenty of historically fucking over prior to that
**Margot — 04/22/2022**
Oh well sure
But it is codified somewhat differently after the Temple's destruction I think you would agree
**Beriah — 04/22/2022**
Sure
**Margot — 04/22/2022**
but yeah I mean Job is not a fun one no
but Judaism gets hella existentialist sometimes
**TricornKing — Yesterday at 1:10 AM**
I wonder if the Book of Job in some way helped inspire this memorable quote from Terry Pratchett's Unseen Academicals book:
Vetinari: 'And that’s when I first learned about evil. It is built in to the very nature of the universe. Every world spins in pain. If there is any kind of supreme being, I told myself, it is up to all of us to become his moral superior.’
**extrantice — Yesterday at 4:11 AM**
really good episode
**Zackfig — Yesterday at 4:40 AM**
Well, christianity certainly sells God in a very particular way that seems contradictory to how he's portrayed in the Book of Job
**TricornKing — Yesterday at 7:16 AM**
I mean...to be fair, Christianity as it "sells God" is very different in America as compared to how it was even 200 years ago in America, as compared to how it was 1000 years ago, as compared to when the Council of Nicea came up with the Nicene Creed, as compared to how the first 5 generations of Jewish and Gentile Christians "sold God" as compared to how Second Temple Judaism sold God as compared to First Temple Judaism sold God as compared to...whatever came before the First Temple as compared to whatever tradition the original storyteller of what would become The Book of Job came from
Like, we are dealing with a story that if not pre-Bronze Age, is at the very least as old if not older than the First Temple
**Zackfig — Yesterday at 7:18 AM**
but even so, the idea that god is omnicient, omnipotent and omnipresent is not something that came to be in the last 50 years
**TricornKing — Yesterday at 7:20 AM**
True, but I'm not sure that it's a uniquely Christian idea either? Like, the idea was already present well before Jesus ever appeared?
**Zackfig — Yesterday at 7:21 AM**
but that was part of chris' argument -- that even in the early days of christianity, it was a bad idea to keep the book of job, because it contradicts what it's trying to sell
so, while that idea was present prior to jesus (prolly started around the hasmonean period), christianity magnified the issues that arise from job
**TricornKing — Yesterday at 7:27 AM**
Oh I'm absolutely not disputing Chris' argument, I absolutely would either delete the Book of Job or do a complete rewrite where the framing device of "Satan makes a bet with God" is either removed or HEAVILY changed.
Like I think of Goethe's Faust, where Mephistopheles goes to visit God, and they talk about Faust, and Mephistopheles asks for permission to tempt Faust. Which God allows, but there's the general implication that God will also actively step in here and there
**Zackfig — Yesterday at 7:30 AM**
I honestly find more comfort in the idea that job thought life was all there was -- because at least there's an end
although it's also upsetting in the sense that, well... the wicked won't get comeuppance, but at least, at a personal level there will be an end to suffering in life
my more religious relatives objected to me reading mark twain at my mom's funeral -- after I cited an excerpt from Letters from the Earth
> “Life was not a valuable gift, but death was. Life was a fever-dream made up of joys embittered by sorrows, pleasure poisoned by pain; a dream that was a nightmare-confusion of spasmodic and fleeting delights, ecstasies, exultations, happinesses, interspersed with long-drawn miseries, griefs, perils, horrors, disappointments, defeats,humiliations, and despairs--the heaviest curse devisable by divine ingenuity; but death was sweet, death was gentle, death was kind; death healed the bruised spirit and the broken heart, and gave them rest and forgetfulness; death was man's best friend; when man could endure life no longer, death came and set him free.”
**Neuro — Yesterday at 8:09 AM**
This is one of the best summaries of the felix culpa view I've read.
**TricornKing — Yesterday at 8:25 AM**
Funny thing, that quote reminds me of Tolkien's concept of "the gift of death" in Middle-Earth
**Neuro — Yesterday at 8:28 AM**
Oh Tolkien was all about those felix culpae/eucatasrophies.
**Zackfig — Yesterday at 8:36 AM**
but seriously, the only reason how I could see the Book of Job as hopeful is without the concept of eternal reward/afterlife
because with the cesation of existence upon death, how could you care about your enemies going unpunished and the wicked prospering under the eyes of god.
**Margot — Yesterday at 9:55 AM**
I guess I just don't see why morality needs reward contingent upon it
It's not that Judaism doesn't always premise this idea but like fundamentally it's not as necessary
**Beriah — Yesterday at 10:03 AM**
It’s kind of more treated as an obligation of god’s, like of course if there are righteous people, god would be obligated to care for them in the world to come.
**Zackfig — Yesterday at 10:18 AM**
It’s the other way around — that those without morals somehow prosper
**Margot — Yesterday at 10:19 AM**
Like I don't know I have a lot of time for the writers of Job imagining that God would agree with Job's criticisms of divine unfairness
**Margot — Yesterday at 10:20 AM**
I'm just not shocked by this idea is all
i am not a believer at all. but i'm not convinced that job is meant to create believers?
**Zackfig — Yesterday at 10:24 AM**
I just have a lot of issues with the problem of evil, and actually rather than why bad things happen to good people, it’s the perspective flip of it: why bad people prosper — hence me being a naytheist
**Margot — Yesterday at 10:24 AM**
it's meant to say 'yeah shit sucks as a jew, but you just keep living your life'
**Zackfig — Yesterday at 10:26 AM**
Bad people prospering has done more damage to my faith (or rejection of) than anything else
It’s not that I don’t have faith, I reject it.
**Tim "The Tool Man" Taylor — Yesterday at 12:29 PM**
Oh by the way the dunk on HP and the Sacred Text made me laugh
What an awful show
**Jon M — Yesterday at 12:31 PM**
The main reason Job is in bible, I think, is to show that a person who's never really grappled with suffering and come within a millimetre of cursing God has zero place counselling anyone about their faith.
Struggles with God and theodicy are a crucial (heh) part of faith. Any faith that doesn't acknowledge this is, frankly, ridiculous.
**Our Dear Mod Lucas — Yesterday at 1:49 PM**
…so it’s a the Impression That I Get by the Mighty Mighty Bosstones?
**Tom (any) — Yesterday at 2:02 PM**
God is the Rascal King of Kings
**Our Dear Mod Lucas — Yesterday at 2:03 PM**
The rascal king behind the bars? Or the one in front of them?
**Tom (any) — Yesterday at 2:03 PM**
Both, of course
**Our Dear Mod Lucas — Yesterday at 2:03 PM**
At once
Ska-mnipresent
**Tom (any) — Yesterday at 2:04 PM**
When you saw only one set of footprints, it was because God picked you up picked you up picked you up
**Chris (He) — Yesterday at 2:22 PM**
I like the show, despite the unfortunate developments in their subject matter.
**FrozenTrout [he/him] — Yesterday at 2:33 PM**
Show?
**Neuro — Yesterday at 4:03 PM**
What's behind the bars and what's in front of the bars depends on which side of them you're on. Or at least that's what LeGuin would say.
**Future's so bright... — Yesterday at 5:56 PM**
Maybe I missed @benitocereno mentioning this, because I was making dinner an not 100% focused on bible study, but isn't there a theory that the prologue in heaven was added later by another writer? Like Chris said, it does seem to undermine the thesis of the book a bit.
Even when I was a believer I thought it felt like it didn't belong and seemed like a less sophisticated answer to the problem than presented at the end of the book.
"It's a mystery, and you just have to trust that God has his reasons you can't understand" is unsatisfying, but at least intellectually honest.
"Everything bad that happens to you, or to other people, is just testing you to see if you will still go to church," is bad on so many levels.
**Beriah — Yesterday at 6:03 PM**
“Sometimes a jerk just talks God into messing with you to see what you’ll do.”
**benitocereno — Yesterday at 6:04 PM**
I’m sure someone theorizes that the frame sequence is a later addition but basically everything I’ve read says the frame is the oldest part and the poem was the addition
The poem, yeah. Its so out of place I expect to see it in a different font with slightly different formating from the rest of the document.
**Jon M — Yesterday at 6:08 PM**
I'm not familiar. My apologies, I listen to ska, not pop 😝
**FrozenTrout [he/him] — Yesterday at 6:12 PM**
Shame about Dicky
**Future's so bright... — Yesterday at 6:21 PM**
So if the framing sequence is the oldest part what we are likely looking at is someone using a dumb old myth as the inspiration for and prologue of their philosophical dialogue about the problem of theodicy (and then someone thought it would be a good idea to squeeze a musical interlude in there).
**benitocereno — Yesterday at 6:28 PM**
Correct
**Our Dear Mod Lucas — Yesterday at 7:38 PM**
“Anyway, here’s Job-derwall.”
**TricornKing — Today at 3:27 AM**
I still remember this one book on Job that I found what feels like another lifetime ago, that posited that Job called God to the witness stand to be put on trial. And the author made the claim that God, rather than shutting the trial down with "shut up because I'm God," instead the trial is still ongoing. The author's interpretation of God's examples of how and why creation work was that God was saying "I will give a full account of myself, but in order for you to be able to see the whole picture, we have to let 'the story of creation' play itself out. Only then can I give all the evidence that I need for my case." So the "trial of God" is still ongoing, there just has been a stay placed on it until "the story" is finished, so that we can fairly give God a fair chance
That stuck with me. It mixed in with what my own beloved mother has taught me all my life, that while God isn't going to be a magic Genie that changes things with a snap of a finger, God does promise to walk with us and comfort us. Accepts the love AND the anger, doesn't hold our anger and hurt against us.
If I were to write my own Job, it would focus on that. It would involve God showing Job what we know now, about how the weather in one part of the world can cause changes in another, how the actions of one nation affects another thousands of miles away. That to stop it all, just for the sake of one person, no matter how righteous, would lead to such catastrophic destruction that no life could be sustained afterwards, at least not for eons. But God works within the constraints of the machine He has built, and while bad things can and do happen to good people, God will stand by us and comfort us as much as we need
It's not much, but if I get anything out of Job, it's that it's the first draft pass on those ideas
**DandyMan — Today at 8:26 AM**
@TricornKing that sounds like a very good way to have the flood actually effect subsequent narratives
**TricornKing — Today at 8:31 AM**
Noah's Flood you mean? In what way?
**DandyMan — Today at 8:32 AM**
God citing it as "this is what happens when I get directly involved"
God portrayed as omnipotent, but most definitely not omniprecise
**TricornKing — Today at 8:33 AM**
Aaaaaah, gotcha. Like "Remember the Nephilim? I had to get directly involved with that, and it almost reset the whole world, do you have any idea how many other people besides Noah I had to find?"
Maybe, if the Flood is an ancient memory of the Atlantic Ocean breaking into the valley plain that became the Mediterranean Sea, God showing Job that would be a good example of why God directly stepping in is like a human stepping their foot in an ant hill
**DandyMan — Today at 8:38 AM**
That's the sort of mythic thinking I jive with
also good to add "power is an abhorrent, worthless thing"
**TricornKing — Today at 8:44 AM**
See I disagree with power on its own being abhorrent and worthless, it is the intentions and use of it that can make it abhorrent
God creating life, the universe and everything? That's power being used for good. Demons and fell spirits using their powers for evil? That's bad
**DandyMan — Today at 8:45 AM**
Power in the strict sense of having power over others
**TricornKing — Today at 10:44 AM**
Ah gotcha. Even then, I choose to hope that there is a way where, if you do have power over others, then there is a way to use it responsibly and compassionately
**Elissa, Mistress of The Dark — Today at 12:25 PM**
Y’all were talking about J.B. as a modern version of Job, I’ve never heard of thatand I’m also familiar with the Neil Simon play God’s Favorite which I performed a slightly sanitized version of for a production between several local UMC churches. I was David, the drunk son.
Poking through the Alter translation and boy, he does not like Elihu.
AT this point, in the original text, the Lord would have spoken out from the whirlwind, but a lapse in judgment by an ancient editor postponed that brilliant consummation for six chapters in which the tedious Elihu is allowed to hold forth.
**DandyMan — 04/24/2022**
roasted
**Corn — 04/24/2022**
to be fair its apparently six damn chapters of the dude talkin shit
**Madison — 04/24/2022**
Yeah, and not even done well like the rest of the book as a later interpolation.
**Mr. Destructicity — 04/24/2022**
To me it feels less like Marduk v. Tiamat and more like Ba'al Hadad v. Yamm, the Insatiable Sea (though both stories appear to be related)
**Mr. Destructicity — 04/24/2022**
Theodicy really only arises when there is a God who is omnipotent, omniscient/omnipresent, and omnibenevolent. Take away any of those aspects and there is no problem.
(Yeah, I realize I'm like two days late to the convo. Great episode, though. One of my absolute favorites.)
**Kivutar — 04/24/2022**
I am with you here
I'm not too bothered because gods in my conception are 0/3
From my perspective all the various arguments that keep an o/o/o god just feel gaslighty
But on the other hand I'm not that bothered by the idea of eldritch cosmic forces that don't care
Mainly because those objectively exist, even if you're a hard materialist there are tsunamis and plate tectonics and the sun
And we're all fine accepting that the sun giveth and the sun taketh away, that's just common sense
Why would gods be different?
/oblig
**Madison — 04/24/2022**
Is the omniscient/omnipotent/omnibenevolent triad a Christian thing? It feels very, like...500s CE to me, for some reason.
**Kivutar — 04/24/2022**
Yes
I think?
Obviously I don't know if all christians adhere to it
**Brad Ulfhrokr — 04/24/2022**
Yeah, you get that starting in early Christianity, reflecting the influence of Platonism, and now it's a feature of most Christian orthodoxies.
**Beriah — 04/24/2022**
It’s a shift, I think, toward having to justify why a deity should be worshipped. In the older times, people found a cosmic protection racket (nice village you got here… shame if something were to happen to it) very sensible. If you get to a point where it’s clear that even doing all possible propitiating, sometimes/often bad stuff happens to good worshippers, well, it gets harder to have religion without making a total Mary Sue out of your deity.
I think most modern people would agree that a god who is powerful and knowledgeable but doesn’t act in the interest of their believers isn’t worth the time to worship, likewise one who’s good but can’t help, or good and strong but doesn’t know what you need
**Kivutar — 04/24/2022**
That depends on what you're getting out of worship
**Mr. Destructicity — 04/24/2022**
It may be also a matter of scale. Once your religion starts getting powerful and widespread you just start elbowing other gods out of the way or assimilating them
**Beriah — 04/24/2022**
Though, actually, the “blind watchmaker” line of thought does lean toward a deity who absolutely could help if they actually knew what you needed and chose to intervene
**Kivutar — 04/24/2022**
If worship was purely utilitarian it wouldn't exist
**Beriah — 04/24/2022**
True, and at that point marketing becomes a big deal
Sure. I pray with no expectation of divine awareness or reciprocity, because I need to express gratitude for and amazement at the things in this world worthy of praise
But I think the success of antichrist prosperity gospel preachers is evidence that many people feel a strong need for a higher power who can be reliably propitiated on their behalf.
**Kivutar — 04/24/2022**
More or less the same for me, I think any good that comes to me from worship is ultimately placebo in nature
And yet placebos work
Which is enough for me
**Madison — 04/24/2022**
Comfort is important, too, I figure, and if it comes through prayer/worship/etc, well, hey bonus.
**samwise (no pronouns pls) — 04/24/2022**
& being part of a community with common values
**Madison — 04/24/2022**
Agreed, yeah
**Kivutar — 04/24/2022**
sigh
People ™️ generally ruin those though
**samwise (no pronouns pls) — 04/24/2022**
Community that knows it's not going to be perfect and is ready to correct course and have hard conversations >> community that thinks it can do no wrong bc it's blessed by god
**Kivutar — 04/24/2022**
Fact
But I would ascribe a lot of that to the idea of an o/o/o god that's morally perfect even if we don't understand it
If you start out thinking that the gods favour is fickle and mysterious and not based on some moral yardstick it's harder to use god-said-so as an excuse for whatever the leaders want
**Kivutar — 04/24/2022**
I expect plenty have managed it though
**samwise (no pronouns pls) — 04/24/2022**
I think it also has to do with whether people think followers of God/saved people can sin
Thinking alive humans can do no wrong, or that doing wrong means one was never following God/saved, seems dangerous to me
**Mr. Destructicity — 04/24/2022**
There are, sadly, plenty of Christian denominations that think the saved/elect cannot commit sin. (Which almost always winds up with post hoc justifications that recidivist sinners were never really saved/elect)
**Madison — 04/24/2022**
Which also leads to a bunch of salvation anxiety in a lot of those movements. Hearing about people getting baptized several times over because they're anxious they just weren't sincere enough the first time or whatever stresses me the hell out.
(Just finished I Pray You Put This Journal Away and ooof)
**Mr. Destructicity — 04/24/2022**
I don't know what's worse, that, or just thinking your shirt don't stink because you got dunked twice
Just finished the Job ep and I am having a lot of feelings. Generally I am with Chris - as an atheist, I'd rather believe in a random universe than a God capable of this much deliberate cruelty
Now, if God is cruel because gods are just capricious and ineffable, then I'm actually less mad about it? If gods were an explanation for the random forces of nature, or capricious and human like the Greek gods who mess with humans just for lols, then you can't expect justice or fairness from them. I think the problem of Job is that we have this tradition of God as always just and loving, and putting that next to a very old story of "sometimes life sucks and then you die" just. There is a lot of cognitive dissonance there and it's very unsatisfying.
When I read Job, I pictured his friends sitting down in the ashes with him, which made them seem a little more empathetic. This depiction seems more true though.
