the patience of Job?
There was once a man in the land of Uz whose name was Job. That man was blameless and upright, one who feared God and turned away from evil.
One day the heavenly beings came to present themselves before the Lord, and Satan also came among them to present himself before the Lord. The Lord said to Satan, “Where have you come from?” Satan answered the Lord, “From going to and fro on the earth, and from walking up and down on it.” The Lord said to Satan, “Have you considered my servant Job? There is no one like him on the earth, a blameless and upright man who fears God and turns away from evil. He still persists in his integrity, although you incited me against him, to destroy him for no reason.”
Then Satan answered the Lord, “Skin for skin! All that people have they will give to save their lives. But stretch out your hand now and touch his bone and his flesh, and he will curse you to your face.” The Lord said to Satan, “Very well, he is in your power; only spare his life.”
So Satan went out from the presence of the Lord, and inflicted loathsome sores on Job from the sole of his foot to the crown of his head. Job took a potsherd with which to scrape himself, and sat among the ashes.
Then his wife said to him, “Do you still persist in your integrity? Curse God, and die.” But he said to her, “You speak as any foolish woman would speak. Shall we receive the good at the hand of God, and not receive the bad?” In all this Job did not sin with his lips.
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Dilbert and Job, or Dilbert's companion Dogbert with his wretchedly wise if macabre (no, he's beyond eccentric and even a shade beyond weird) perception of reality and especially of humans, Dogbert may see things as they really are. This is our Old Testament reading for next Sunday, 3 October. If you know the story, you know that this is only the beginning of the senseless and unspeakably cruel torment of Job at the collusion of the heavenly beings God and Satan.
Whether you like it or not, torment with permission is collusion. Who is guilty? Not Job.
Thirty or more years ago, Bishop Charles Duvall came to visit us at Trinity, Apalachicola, and in the Bible story that he told the congregation (between services as his tale for that year), he told the story of Job. The bishop said that we are NOT meant to take Job as literal history, but as an ancient Jewish "stage play" with many lessons, many things to discern about our relationship with God, and about the tension between good and evil in human life.
And again like it or not, Job is a story of divine arrogance in retort to everyone who has ever asked the question, "Why is God allowing this to happen to me?"
This is not a tale for the pious who rationalize God out of every bad situation or, worse, worst, those who darken creation with the blasphemy, "It's the will of God, we just have to accept it".
In my naive theology, God's will for us is, lovingly, three "aitch-sounds": happiness, wholeness, holiness. But our human experience as the fact of life is that it is not God's practice to interfere with the workings of nature in order to ensure that each of us realizes those "aitches".
And the Book of Job, perhaps, suggesting that Father Nature is Satan himself, going to and fro upon the earth, because all that "happens" to Job is in the nature of human life. But nature as Satan, or Satan as nature?
The origins of creation are beautifully laid out by C S Lewis in "The Magician's Nephew" as, unfortunately but fatefully, evil is introduced into Narnia at its very dawning, as the children hear Aslan singing Narnia into existence. Polly and Digory have chanced upon the creation of Narnia, having escaped from a bad scene in downtown London, accidentally taking with them a London lamppost, and also, catastrophically for Narnia's destiny, bringing with them the witch from a different creation, who is evil personified. Now we Narnia lovers know, in this retrospective story, where both evil and the lamppost in the forest came from: we brought it.
So then, from C S Lewis, why is there evil in the world? people did it, we humans brought it ourselves.
Conversely, as I recall here from Time to Time, Carl Jung sees it differently: evil as of divine origin (Genesis 3:1), and the Passion, Suffering, Crucifixion and Death of Jesus Christ as God's penance for God's treatment of Job. Jung also sees God as having been astonishingly oblivious, childishly innocent, totally lacking in self-awareness or His own ability to do wrong in that, his early experience with humanity.
Depending on the nature of one's belief, faith, and trust, one might tread lightly here against the possibility of blaspheming the Holy Spirit.
Here's our responsive psalm for next Sunday:
Psalm 26
Judica me, Domine
1 Give judgment for me, O Lord,
for I have lived with integrity; *
I have trusted in the Lord and have not faltered.
2 Test me, O Lord, and try me; *
examine my heart and my mind.
3 For your love is before my eyes; *
I have walked faithfully with you.
4 I have not sat with the worthless, *
nor do I consort with the deceitful.
5 I have hated the company of evildoers; *
I will not sit down with the wicked.
6 I will wash my hands in innocence, O Lord, *
that I may go in procession round your altar,
7 Singing aloud a song of thanksgiving *
and recounting all your wonderful deeds.
8 Lord, I love the house in which you dwell *
and the place where your glory abides.
9 Do not sweep me away with sinners, *
nor my life with those who thirst for blood,
10 Whose hands are full of evil plots, *
and their right hand full of bribes.
11 As for me, I will live with integrity; *
redeem me, O Lord, and have pity on me.
12 My foot stands on level ground; *
in the full assembly I will bless the Lord.
