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writing/3/unknown-things/iyov/1-framing-devices.html

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 <p>These interpretations are doing a lot of heavy lifting, however. They accept at face value Job&rsquo;s capitulation in chapter 40, where, after being thoroughly excoriated by no less than God Himself, he says, &ldquo;Look, I am worthless. What can I say back to You?&rdquo; (Job 40:4, Alter) and &ldquo;I have spoken once, and I will not answer; twice, but will proceed no further.&rdquo; (Job 40:5, NRSV)<sup id="fnref:1versions"><a class="footnote-ref" href="#fn:1versions">8</a></sup></p>
 <p>Who can blame Job? God is quite frankly terrifying. No matter how strongly I might call God to account, I strongly suspect that I, too, would fall flat on my face and do what I could to have so terrible a gaze move away from me.</p>
 <p>But one must wonder just how much longer that desire to call God to account must have lingered in Job&rsquo;s heart afterwards. He lived another 140 years; did he forget his ten children? Did he forget those thousands of heads of livestock? For doubtless he had favorites! Did he still think of his great abundance of slaves? Did he think of these late at night even though he had ten new children, new favorite sheep, a new abundance of slaves? He must have. For our sakes, he must have.</p>
+<p>And yet, that&rsquo;s the thing. So many of these arguments for and against the validity and importance of this book center God. It is the bible, of course, and that is often what one must do in a sacred text.</p>
+<p>Our Job, though, our poor, ruined man, has he changed? Has he grown into something new? Has he integrated who he was during those weeks or months of grief with who he was before that? Has he built for himself a new identity? Has he become braver? More fearful?</p>
+<p>There is a saying that, with near-death experiences, there are two likely outcomes. One is that you become a braver, more vivacious person. You live your life all the fuller because you got so close to not living at all. After all, if you have been given a second chance, why not?</p>
+<p>But still, there&rsquo;s that second option: you become consumed by fear.</p>
+<p>This is no value judgement. To be consumed by fear after having your own mortality stand up before you, sneer down its nose, and give you a playful shove bears no shame. It is an honest acceptance of who you are in the face of the enormity of the universe.</p>
+<p>And sure, it might be a spectrum, and there&rsquo;s probably that absolute midpoint where there is no change. You make it through that brush with death and come out the other side precisely the same as you were before. There is terror in this prospect, that death might be so overwhelming that there is nothing you can do but wrap that experience up in butcher paper, tie it with twine, and set it up in the attic.</p>
+<p>Alter argues that the names that Job gives his new daughters points to a change. &ldquo;The writer may have wanted to intimate that after all Job&rsquo;s suffering, which included hideous disfigurement and violent loss, a principle of grace and beauty enters his life in the restoration of his fortunes.&rdquo; \parencite[579]{alter} This is indeed a beautiful take on it, too. Job comes out the other side and names his daughters after growing things, beautiful things. Dove and Cinnamon and Horn of Eyeshade, the most beautiful in the land and a sign of Job&rsquo;s joy in living.</p>
+<p>One worries, however, that this is not what happened. Folktales are folktales and there is only so much we can tease out of the text itself. That Job names his daughters and lives another 140 years before dying of old age provides little enough context as to his state of mind. We, of course, have other resources. The Anglicans have their three-legged stool &mdash; scripture, tradition, reason &mdash; and the Methodists their Wesleyan quadrilateral &mdash; which adds &lsquo;experience&rsquo; &mdash; and so we have at our disposal tradition, reason, and experience beyond just the scripture itself.</p>
+<p>So far, however, we have just looked at the framing device. Perhaps more lies in the poetic discourse sandwiched in the middle.</p>
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