Saturday, September 11, 2004

Giving Socrates a run for his money...

I know there are some of you out there who are exclaiming, "Finally!"

Y'know, I am too.

thoughts on job

I must admit that this book is a little tedious to go through. Reading through it is fine, piecing together the arguments harder, but the greatest test of all is actually writing a reflection upon it.

Precisely why this entry is so late in coming.

All of us know the story of Job. Good and upright man, caught in the middle of the greatest wager of all time between God and Satan. The contingency which is being staked on? Whether or not Job will curse his Maker upon being deprived of his abudances and afflicted with disease.

The worst thing for Job is all his tragedy seems to have no explanation. After all, he was a righteous man, was he not?

Job doesn't waver from his faith. He can't explain his suffering, but refuses to blame God, even when goaded to do so from his wife (the only person whom Satan left with him, for obvious reasons).

Enter Job's three pals, Eliphaz, Bildad and Zophar. Seeing his pain, they shut up and sit in silence with him for a week. I believe Philip Yancey was right in saying that that was the most helpful thing they did for Job throughout the whole book.


Because after that Job opens his mouth...

(and bear in mind we're only at Chapter 3)

...and there's where the great debate begins. It's quite interesting that only us, the readers know about the great bet that has caused all that has happened. Job and his three friends, oblivious to the truth, try to puzzle out the rationale behind Job's misfortunes.

I tried to make a semi-organized summary of the entire thing, but like all verbal disputes, Job and company often follow the Rules of RhetoricĀ®:

  • ONE: begin by insulting one another (with flowery language too)
  • TWO: twist, turn and twirl their words
  • THREE: respond by bringing up something else instead of directly countering/rebutting/answering the opposing side's arguments
  • FOUR: contradict themselves

So in the end, what was meant to help me see the the connection between the individual speeches ended up convincing me of the lack of connection between the discourses. Each participant seemed more concerned about putting forward their point of view than answering the objections of the other party. It reminded me of bad 'Parlimentary-style' debates I've witnessed whereby each debater would go forward and ridicule their opponents with great viciousness but offer little explanation on why they thought the opposing side's arguments were leaky. They would then promptly move on and spit out the points they had prepared, which most of the time were only mildly related to what had been brought up by their opponents.

It's interesting however to note the style and content of each participator of this dialectic. Job, who speaks the most, rants and whines, and understandly so! He longs for death, questions whether God cares if men sins or is holy, and wishes for God to appear and answer his queries. During the second round, he feels that God and the world is conspiring against him, asks for a representative in heaven (if only he had Jesus) then calls for God to come to his defense. Suddenly during the third round he goes back on his theory that God leaves the wicked to prosper and proclaims God's sovereignity, and ends with a long ramble comparing his old life to his suffering at present. Throughout the whole thing Job maintains his innocence, but bounces back and forth between semi-optimism that he will be redeemed and negativity.

Eliphaz speaks like a old sage confident that he has attained knowledge of how the world ticks, and claims that he received a vision reminding him of God's superiority over mortal men. He dismisses fate as a mere excuse, and urges Job to repent and thank God for correcting his wrongdoings. His next salvo is that it is proven and sound theology that evil people reap the crap they sow and that Job is a fool to try and go against concrete lidah pendeta. Eliphaz is initially amicable, but becomes increasingly infuriated when Job continues to defend himself. Finally he lashes out at Job, accusing him of exploting the needy and sitting there while others suffered before ending with cries akin to "Repent, repent, ye sinner!"

Next is Bildad, who is a firm believer that mankind is the reason when anything becomes screwed up. He first suggests that Job's children must have sinned, or Job must've become worldly and forgot about God. His second attack is simply repeating the tired, old 'rule' that God rewards the good and whacks the bad. By round 3, Bildad only manages to muster a few lines with the underlying message being, "God is great! Man is crap!"

Speaker number 3 is Zophar. Zophar insinuates that Job has been secretly sinning for a while, and that he should have seen the meltdown coming. Most commentaries on Job say that Zophar feels that Job is wrong to claim purity before God, but the fact is that Zophar brings nothing new to the table, with the sovereignity of God being a central point even (to an extent) in Job's speeches. Zophar probably realises this as well and shuts up after two shots at Job, choosing to remain silent in round three.

Lastly appears Elihu, a younger guy who has had enough of the faulty arguments of the three stooges. In three speeches he attempts to dismantle what Job and his friends have said, first insisting that God always answers, maintaining that God is behind everything and that God is silent when we're unhappy because we forget about him during good times.

Of course, after reading all that, you're probably very tired and confused. I am too (to a even greater degree) after typing all that. But the thing I want to bring up here is if you were to look back at the arguments presented by each person, you would find that during some time in our life, we have probably acted and spoken like one of these people whenever someone we know is undergoing tough times.

I know of a person who went through a tough time when his wife was diagnosed with cancer. Members of his cell group, instead of encouraging him to be strong, instead whispered around and mumbled that he must have sinned in some way for this tragedy to have happened. Like Job, he became very discouraged.

How often do we offer simple answers to people that are having problems?

"You must have sinned. Or maybe a family member."

"Are you really sure you've kept pure without secret sin?"

At the end, God finally appears. But unfortunately for those of us looking for the answer, God chooses to follow Rule of RhetoricĀ® No. 3. He instead asks Job a whole barrage of questions that Job is unable to answer. The three stooges meanwhile are blasted for talking presumptously. Job realises that God is still ultimately in control and everything happens for a reason. God restores Job, and blesses him with twofold of everything he had before!

And all of that happened without God even mentioning about the cosmic wager.

In the end, we never really find out about why suffering happens to good people, or why evil people are allowed to prosper, except we are reminded that God is always in control, and that suffering doesn't always stem from sin.

I guess that's all we have to do when life around us looks grim. Grit our teeth and hold on to the fact that God is in control. It could be a test. It could be for God's glory (John 9:1-3?). But that's not for us to know until it's over.

To tell you the truth, not all my questions about suffering have been answered.

But I've emerged with a little more insight at least... and anyway...

That's not for me to know until everything's over, isn't it?



Now Playing: "Song of The Wretch" by Soo Tian performed live in front of the computer on my four-string classical guitar (2 strings broke). Dedicated to Tim.