I was always struck by the idea that Job lost his family and later God replaced them and everything was fine again. Obviously the writer has never lost anyone close to him. There's always a hole in your heart.
Not true....there are 40 chapters of pain....the issue is perspective....the finite meets the infinite. This is the perspective most people miss since they cannot comprehend it. Job personally met it.
In ancient times infant mortality was very common. It was not difficult to come up with the idea of having more children to make up for the lost ones. Regardless, it was a very easy way of ending the narrative and not entering into complications.
Spare a thought for Mrs Job. All the pregnancies and natural births. She was bereaved of her children like Job was. When, in the immeasurable grief and desolation she asked why Job didn't curse God to get things over with, she was called a fool. And when Job's fortunes and family were restored she had to go through all the pregnancies and births again. Just because God and Satan had a little wager about a man's loyalty. To me, that is pretty bloody callous...
Jobs wife was one of the people I used to look forward to meeting in Heaven. I’m no longer convinced there is such a place, so I’ll just have to invent our conversation I guess.
@@1bengrubb We usually perceive pregnancy in ancient times through the patriarchal male perspective. I'm sure that, just like today, pregnancy back then occurred in a wide variety of circumstances: in some of them, it would be viewed as a blessing; in others, it would be viewed as very burdensome and unfortunate.
@@1bengrubb Try going through 20 pregnancies as fast as humanly possible and see what a blessing you think it is. I expect some of the children came from concubines or slaves though.
@@lawsonj39 no...family was just more important in that culture than ours. A big family was status---for the woman as well---she viewed the world through the patriarchal male perspective.. Replacement rate was something like 6 kids. A big family was a fortress, an economic engine, source of connections, the commenter is just ignorant of the culture. All through the bible children are a blessing never a burden. Happy is the man his quiver full. The first command "be fruitful and multiply" defines the culture.
I wouldn't go that far, but I do love it. In a world of culture wars, genocides, and ecological destruction, it is such a treasure to find a small space for intelligent discussion between two respectful and empathetic people.
@@tryme3969 I would say there's a good case for thinking that our knowledge that we are mortal (and the subsequent repression of that realisation) is indeed the major driver of our beliefs and perhaps the reason why we developed culture in the first place. In that sense death has shaped all our lives. It's a complicated story though...
JOB is not giving us the full story. He said "The thing which I greatly feared has come upon me." What did Job before Satan came? "In the days of my youth, when the SECRET OF GOD was upon my Tabernacle." Job is the oldest book in the Bible, and it's mysteries are very deep. Job 31:35 (31+35=66 book bible) "If my adversary had written a book, I would surely bind it as a crown to me." There is a lot more to say, but people respect a scholar, they don't respect an Esotericist.
Why? Suffering is a part of life, and the book of Job helps teach us that not everything seems just all the time, but we have to trust in the process, and everything does have a purpose.
@@jacksonray3596 if you went through what job went through and you knew the petty reason God killed your entire family, would you still believe in a just God?
@@jacksonray3596 Apart from the story of Job and other killings ordered by God in the old testament, the most difficult part for me to believe in a just God is hell.
I appreciated Bart's honest and accurate show of anger against - and disapproval of - God in his assessment here of the Book of Job. This is one of the first times I have seen Mr. Ehrman come flatly out in a revealed display of anger against God, and this is helpful and emboldening for me to do the same.
There’s a very funny episode in the second season of the wonderful show Good Omens that depicts the Job story, including angels perplexed that Job doesn’t seem too thrilled to hear God will be replacing his dead children with more children as a “reward.”
I just saw that for the first time last night. Funny, witty and intelligent. Then this afternoon I get this video in my You tube feed. Coincidence, or AI algorithm at work? I'm convinced it's the latter.
Not being a theist that was my attitude to Job. But then I'm thankful to Christianity because at age of 15 I went to a church for the first time and I became an atheist before the end of the service.
Putting aside the theological implications of God killing Job's choldren and then giving him new ones like it's all good, the sociological inference is really disturbing. There was a time when wives and children were resources.
God replacing Jobs wife and children sound harsh (which it is) however, if you see them as possessions, non people, minor slaves, it changes the perspective.
@@anthonycraig274 Except that's not how the Bible treats losing children elsewhere. When Jacob believes Joseph was killed, he grieves bitterly and later on it's said that losing Benjamin would outright kill him. So no, children were not treated like mere possessions. I mean, if they were then God wouldn't even bothered with the whole "sacrifice Isaac" thing.
This is rarely sufficient, especially on people who were raised as children to believe their Bible is both (1) always wise, (2) full of mysteries. It creates a mindset of excessive generosity and provides a backup plan that makes it very impervious, even to contradictions, inconsistancies or obscurity. This is why sound epistemology or actual bible criticism is needed and more efficient. Not saying deconversion / deconstruction never happens by just reading the Bible, but it's rare, and usually requires a prior "breach", and "tools".
@@ackbooh9032 - it is extremely rare that they read it like a regular book, cover to cover, even if it takes a month or two. A couple of people calling themselves Christian have said they did (out of a thousand that I've asked) but weren't convincing as they could recall nothing beyond sunday school stories when asked.
As an agnostic, reading Job commands more of my respect for the Ancient Hebrew outlook, not less. It distills more reality than your average atheist tract. It's interested in life unmediated by human all too human defence mechanisms.
I'm not a bible scholar. I do have a doctorate in clinical psychology, so that's the lens through which I look. After hearing and reading the views of non-apologist bible scholars for the last several years, here is what I personally believe. Given the people who came to power around the time of the bronze age collapse were most probably the most violent of warlords, they were probably akin to what we'd think of today as narcissists and psychopaths. We know sometimes humans were deified in the cultures of that time... and I suspect violent narcissists would have loved being deified. And if, as a lower status person, you had such a powerful warlord on your side, protecting you from other warlords, you probably became enmeshed with your own warlord's views and desires. If you didn't acquiesce to his demands, you'd either face his violent and capricious whims, or possibly lose his protection against other warlords. Over time, I suspect these types of power dynamics just became cultural norms. At some point we could use the modern construct of Stockholm Syndrome as a model for how lower status peoples would interact with their local strongman. To my way of thinking, this bronze age and post bronze age way of life was the context in which we happened to inherit our idea of who God is. So yes, when trying to contemplate why there is suffering in the world, and why we might lose control to outsiders, etc, at that time, they would have to reason based on these cultural memes and dynamics. Why do we suffer? Because we didn't do a good enough job of appeasing capricious warlords/gods. That's why. 🦋🧡🦋
@@jasonnelson316 - definitely, and don't forget drunken stepfather. Who else would create the cosmos and every creature within it but not build a fence around his two favorite trees and then blame the kids?
I suggest reading Domination and the Arts of Resistance: Hidden Transcripts by James C. Scott. Contrary to the Marxist insistence on "false consciousness", or convenient recapitulation of the life of a people in the culture bound frame of psychoanalysis, the empirical evidence suggests most subalterns are aware of their interests, and are not "gaslighted", "enmeshed" , or "fused" with respect to their self. Job is unlikely to be a moral homily devised by the elite of the time since it deals with an elite man in context. Rather, it deals with reality; unmediated, existential reality 21st century life experiences - to borrow from your argot- only as reaction formation.
Job’s original children were *replaced* as if people are fungible. Some people think the author is unusually callous, but it seems that the biblical view, and maybe the most of the culture’s view, of children was like this.
I really struggle with this book of the bible. Job is destroyed with God's consent...basically in a deal with Satan...and when Job wants to know why, he's treated abysmally. How can you not be absolutely terrified by a God like that? How can a person honestly love a God like that? He terrifies me.
I think it’s important to start with an all loving god created a Very Good creation out of his love and created humans as sharers, helpers, and participaters in this divine creation. God gifts humans with free will. We are immature and fall. As we fall god grants us grace to save us. Suffering from illuminates and intensifies as we fall further from grace to keep us from losing ourselves completely. That’s not to say “kids with illness is to glorify god”. I would say that is a tragic consequence of the fall and we are able to recognize that as awful bc we inherently know they good in which things should be.
@@tookie36 - "The fall"? I'd say that it is Christianity that fell. Even in a legend like this, how can anybody else possibly be culpable for some perceived fault of Adam & Eve? What a terrible religion these tales spawned!
22:00 Bart "... its really a troubling view of sufferings" aaaaaahhhh now we can feel the leftovers of Bart's personal frustrations, anger, confusion with suffering. Great struggle!
So we have more faith in God than he has in us. And instead of giving us reasons for testing us, it's just a bunch of hot air and bullshit and threats. Pretty weak stuff, God
JOB is not giving us the full story. He said "The thing which I greatly feared has come upon me." What did Job before Satan came? "In the days of my youth, when the SECRET OF GOD was upon my Tabernacle." Job is the oldest book in the Bible, and it's mysteries are very deep. Job 31:35 (31+35=66 book bible) "If my adversary had written a book, I would surely bind it as a crown to me." There is a lot more to say, but people respect a scholar, they don't respect an Esotericist.
_I form the light, and create darkness: I make peace, and create evil: I the Lord do all these things._ Isaiah 45:7 This thing about the children - I also find it deeply disturbing. Job is an ancient text; could this be before the Israelites thought of God as being able to raise the dead?
totally agree. I don't think job had the concept of life beyond this one....making the death that much more tragic.. once he met the infinite death takes a different perspective
Arguably the Hebrew Bible doesn't include an afterlife, or the idea of resurrection except under very special circumstances. This was a later development and only really one or two of the most recent books (e.g. Daniel) include any reference to these ideas.
30:50 Bart "....god will bring horrible suffering on you in order to see if you remain faithful.." is there worse suffering than the death of your child? Is there a worse god that would give permission for your children to be killed? What if that god told you to kill your only child that you have prayed and waited for? What kind of God is this? Gen 22:2 And he said, Take now thy son, thine only son Isaac, whom you love, and get thee into the land of Moriah; and offer him there for a burnt offering upon one of the mountains which I will tell thee of. From this Jesus said Jn8:56 Your father Abraham rejoiced to see my day: and he saw it, and was glad.... what in the world is god doing to our minds???
I remember reading this Bible book and thinking that Satan actually won the bet. Job ultimately lost hope and basically accused God of wrongdoing and upheld his own innocence. Maybe that's not exactly "cursing God to his face" but it's pretty close. And then God's only response is a tirade about how powerful he is and how that makes Job automatically wrong, which is the behavior of a child or narcissist who is losing an argument. I don't believe the writer ever stated that God won the bet. I don't know that God is necessarily even supposed to be the good guy in this book, given that it has almost nothing to do with the rest of the OT or the Hebrew religion anything is possible.
God brought suffering for a bet, didn't tell Job then has a "Who are you to question me? I will answer none of your questions" Classic gaslighting manipulator. Why couldn't he just say "I was testing you to see your faithfulness" which...he should know...because he's All Knowing... And then his wrath burns against the friends who've been fed the party line and spout it but he's angry bc they said what he says happens after you sin? The book of Job has never made sense to me
Because is hard for us to accept that this is not God but a very evil I would say satanic entity. Not God hence it makes no sense. But it makes sense if job is speaking to the devil.
I don't think it's to be taken so literally. It's about how God/unbound-mind is NOT meta-conscious enough to reflect back to us like that; it does what it does because it is what it is. And that's, ultimately, okay. It leads to great suffering from our dissociated POV, but there is a bigger picture.
The book of Job works fine as a meditation on why good people suffer in a seemingly uncaring world. It works very differently when apologetics start getting tied into it because it paints god as as a sociopath who will kill your family to prove you really love him.
Job seems to me to be a reflection of ourselves when it comes to suffering. Was there something i did to cause it? Can i remain a good person in the face of tragedy? We can do all the right things but still be struck down by the randomness of life. If we continue to uphold our principles through hardship, we have the possibility to regain what we've lost as long as we don't lose sight of who we are. People turn to substance abuse, for example, when life beats them down. By doing that, they spiral into a bottomless pit and end up in a hell of their own making. Holding tight to your morality may, at the very least, keep you from making things worse and possibly coming out a better person on the other side. That is my takeaway.
I agree its about handling pain and suffering with an outlook to hope. To be a parable it has to be the most extreme example. I dont think job is happy his kids are dead but there is chance for light on the other side of the tunnel. Kids died all the time back then, it was in humanities interest to mourn but then hope and try again
Without a God, we see things as random- life just happens. This book is literally saying the opposite, that bad things are happening intentionally. Suffering because someone wills it against you is different than a random tragedy striking.
@amyrenee1361 You are right. The intentional suffering we bring upon each other is the most evil of all. People conspire with the dark side of themselves to bring tragedy to others.
Some people don't even notice these materials are not a continuous story. They read like robots, not paying attention. I noticed the book was discontinuous, like a collection of writings on Job, the very first time I read this book as a young adult (I had not read it in my childhood).
Is this the same God that's omniscient? And the devil knows that he cannot lie. So they don't have to perform the experiment. God can just tell him-- No actually if we did that he wouldn't curse me so we're done. Oh by the way, I think things are going to be getting a bit warmer for you this Fall. Job is the oldest book in the Bible. It sounds like this is back when El was still just one of the Elohim and not yet quite so all pervasive. Honestly, I think the Elohim were never the same after they replaced God with that headbanger Al-Baqarah. And the solo stuff he did afterwards always just rubbed me the wrong way.
One of the reasons among many that I'm an atheist, and if there is a god, it's a cruel being, and i want nothing to do with it. Like he knows Job did absolutely nothing wrong. And then comes down on him for questioning his actions of cruelty. It's literally a story of an all powerful being gaslighting someone. Just to prove a point.
But if there is an All powerful cruel God. What does you not wanting anything to do with it even mean? If that being really is cruel it can force you to be with it for a literal eternity and not wanting to do anything with it means absolutely nothing in every sense of the word
@@Malik-lf6zj I totally agree with this sentiment, you would worship it out of pure self interest. I do think the Bible and the Quran depict this deity as evil, but if an evil deity is our god, then it would be in our best interest to worship it. Clearly the injunctions in both mandate believers to commit evil deeds by any normative definition. The atheist is not someone who says I do not want to worship evil, the atheist is one who says that natural error and contradictions within both the Bible and Quran clearly demonstrate that those who wrote these texts were neither omnipotent nor omniscient and therefore cannot be inspired or dictated by a deity with these qualities. The god of the Bible and the god of the Quran cannot exist.
@@1bengrubb well yes. you keep inserting "infinite" into your arguments but you don't seem to realize that this is also negates all of your arguments. if your God is infinite than it's no issue for him to "stop everything to respond to job". if your God is infinite then he already knows the outcome of this petty, disgusting game he's playing. it's a faulty argument.
Reminds me of Lincolns second inaugural address where he attempts to find meaning in the Civil War: "Fondly do we hope, fervently do we pray, that this mighty scourge of war may speedily pass away. Yet, if God wills that it continue until all the wealth piled by the bondsman's two hundred and fifty years of unrequited toil shall be sunk, and until every drop of blood drawn with the lash shall be paid by another drawn with the sword, as was said three thousand years ago, so still it must be said "the judgments of the Lord are true and righteous altogether."
~19 minutes - The conversation about God testing Job, and Jews and Christians as an answer to suffering. If God is all-knowing, why would he need to test anyone? He already knows the outcome. If he knows the outcome, and inflicts suffering on someone he knows will be faithful anyway, isn't that cruelty?
The way Job gets new kids to replace the old ones makes me think it's a clue that the writer was not a parent, like maybe he was some kind of celibate priest or similar, because he didn't comprehend how horrifying a compromise that would be in actual reality.
@@JamesDirette no what I'm saying is you have to take in so much information to really understand what's going on. Job 29 tells us how much he loved his kids.... And at the very beginning of the book they are adults and he's still watching out for them. Job is exactly the same as we are today and the story is presenting all that....
@@russellmiles2861 no no you have to think beyond this life. Death is not the end of existence and that's what Job learns in his exchange with God. His kids are not dead he'll see them again. Job in his mortality gains the perspective of eternal life. His whole perspective shifts. The pain of his loss is still there but now he knows it's temporary
The story of Job's is often criticized because it ignores his emotional attachment to his children, as though they were objects (like a tent) that could be replaced. There is another theological side of the Job story that I have never seen discussed. Job is a worthy human being in God & Satan's sight but his children are disposable objects. Are his children not also God's creations who deserve to have a relationship with God as much as Job?
If you read any modern commentary on it, or even just read the introduction to it in an academic annotated Bible (say the Oxford Annotated Bible, or the Oxford Jewish Study Bible) it's one of the very first things that it will mention.
It seems like the introduction is chronically overlooked. It starts with Job presuming the guilt of his sons and explicitly without any actual knowledge of it. Eventually, Job is confronted with being inescapably on the receiving end of that thinking, he handles it badly, and eventually claims to know the real whole truth even better than God. So, God slaps him down with how Job has never had all that knowledge he thinks he has and never will. Job repents for his presumptive thinking, confesses that he himself shares the deficiency he accuses of others, and repents. The whole gift of kids as restoration does seem weird to us today, but remembering conversations about family size with my rural ancestors while they still lived convinces me that it was not so strange not so long ago.
Hell, it does not stop there: The New Testament has another sociopath torturing and murdering his begotten son to expel the sins of man. HOW BLOODY CRUEL and EVIL the father is. Even Abraham did not kill his son. The NT is based on a blood lust that has poisoned mankind for 2000 years.
I think Job is the greatest book in the Bible. I understood it to say that we can never understand God or do anything to affect him so why try? Who or what God is or isn't, wants or doesn't want, isn't our business or concern; just be the best you, stick to your ideals. That was my takeaway as a teen and I still like it. Especially useful with pesky born-again types.
Nothing in the book of Job indicates that it's by or about an Israelite (or Judahite). It's almost certainly a story picked up (with minimal editing and adaptation) from Mesopotamian or Persian sources during the Babylonian exile. THAT's why it seems so out of place in the Tanakh...
Job and Ecclesiastes are the two books of the Bible that come the closest to "telling it like it is." That's the reason you'll rarely hear priests and pastors and rabbis quoting scripture from them.
I would never believe as someone who doesn’t believe in god, the stories of the bible, etc would be listening to this. However, seeing it as classical literature, it changes everything. I may even consider buying Bart’s book about memory.
Does the Book of Job say that God is omnipotent or does it merely say that he is extremely powerful? Not having actually read it, a fortiori memorized it, I can’t say, but I’d wager it does not call him omnipotent-if only because omnipotence is an abstract, philosophical idea, and the story is concrete and particular.
He "use" a world wind because it is not a real story. Is just a literate piece to convey certain ideas of God, suffering and so forth. Job did not exist either. Is a character in a drama. Just it. Is amazing how several critiques speaks as the story was true... Is a piece of writing that try to convey certain ideas (god or bad)
The four noble truths provide a solution to the problem of suffering. The reason why we suffer is because the universe is constantly changing, and our attachment to things can not keep up. There are things we can do as humans to lessen suffering, and this is to live compassionately towards self and others. To live compassionately we must cultivate our mind by overcoming harmful thoughts, habits, and behaviors. This should be the point of all religions.
Thanks & as a Christian who's studied & learned much from Buddhism, the 2 systems have much in common & can complement each other IMHO. For more, see Sermon on the Mount & Thich Nhat Hanh's book, Living Buddha, Living Christ
Indeed, this is the point of the Book of Job. At the start, Job has no compassion. He admitted that he only did good in order to maximize his riches and reputation. He mocked people behind their backs and covered it up when people called him out so that no one would believe the accusers. He put homeless employees out on the street because he thought they were too dirty. He emotionally abused his children, and did not respect his daughters on the same level as his sons. At the end of the book, he gives his daughters an inheritance on the same level as his sons, even though he is not duty-bound to. He does it out of love.
I think there is also a societal intent in the Job narrative. It's saying, in effect, that if someone is down on their luck or inflicted by a disease, they aren't necessarily on God's bad side, or guilty of some sin. Only God knows. It is a sin however to think that you know that someone else has sinned in the eyes of the God just because of someone's personal circumstances. So, in the day to day workings of a society you're allowed to think kindly and support those who are in pain or in need. Their suffering doesn't mean they are cursed by God, by default. It might simply be a test (or even a whim) of the deity. However, if you judge them harshly that can raise the ire of the deity. So don't do that.
The lesson I learned from Bart ehrman and other theologians is never ask ANY question if you want to to keep your faith. Don't ask how bible came about, don't ask history of christianity, don't ask origin of trinity etc. You'll do pretty well.
Maybe Job should be understood as a thought experiment exploring the nature of free will as it relates to faith. Then it all culminates by juxtaposing a temporal perspective with an eternal one, giving a final evaluation of the merits of faith vs nihilism.
Yes, one way to escape from all the evil in the bible is to "understand" it as something different. Believing what the bible actually says would be absurd. "Blessed is the one who grasps your infants and smashes them against the rock" (Book of psalms 137:9)
Job's wife is the book's most intriguing character in my opinion. She had to be affected as well, especially losing all of their children, but she basically leaves it to Job and his friends to hash out why all this is happening. "Curse God and die" she says before leaving the scene. She seems alienated from Job's God; she's not involved in the cycle of debates, she doesn't even seem interested in the subject. Is it because she knows she has no place in all this because she is a woman? It's all God and Job and I suspect it always has been even before these events. So, denied the ability to participate, she goes about her own way. While Job and his friends are sitting and arguing on the ash heap, there is work to be done. The damaged house needs repair, the crops need replanting, animals need to be replaced, food has to be cooked, clothes need washing and mending, and the men certainly aren't doing any of this. I can see her heading for the storm cellar when the Tornado God shows up; she knows that it is a waste of time to argue with it because all it does is go round and round and destroy things. She is a lot like Benjamin the Donkey in Animal Farm: life goes on, regardless--badly. I think it is interesting that the Lord "gives" Job ten more children to replace the ones he lost--children do not just pop out of nowhere, so where did they come from? Was she a willing participant in the process of creating new children or was this just one more thing she had to put up with? Or did Job start over with a new wife (or wives) as well? I also think it is interesting that Christian apologists who defend how Job's friends responded to him completely miss the verse where the Tornado God tells them, "I am very angry with you because you have not spoken the truth about me the way my servant Job has." So he is agreeing with Job that he is everything that Job has said about him. The authors of the Book of Job knew exactly what they were doing when they made God appear as a tornado; it's not a random choice. Quite frankly, I am surprised that the book made it into the canon of either the Jewish or Christian Bibles; it's a really subversive text that does not portray God in a flattering light. I once challenged a Christian friend to show me where in the Book of Job it says that God loves him. Oh, but God does, he loves everyone, she said. Then show me where it says that. Show me where the word love appears. I'll get back with you, she said. I'm still waiting.
She really doesn’t appear in the book at all. I mean you can say you as a feminist find the lack of her presence to be a very interesting topic, but she is not the most interesting character, she can’t be when she’s barely alluded to
@@HkFinn83 First of all, you are making the assumption that I am a feminist. You don't know that. You are basing this assumption on my being a woman and sympathizing with this character. Secondly, why shouldn't her absence from the story be significant? Sometimes it is what is not there that may be the most important detail--I believe there is a famous Sherlock Holmes story that is built around this concept.
I was thinking about this story recently. The story of Job seems to me to be a Jewish take on what the Greeks do with bad things happening to well off people. Usually the gods get jealous or ruin that person because they desire them. In Job it seems that a prosecutorial being does that job and god welcomes it in weirdly boastful attitude.
why I love Neil Gaiman's version in Good Omens season 2... oh, yeah... these are totally NEW children. They're not the original children, those are gone for sure!
When i first read the bible in my early 20's i went into it knowing nothing other than it's "The good book" I wasn't religious but i wasn't really opposed to religion or considered it a negative pox on society and critical thinking like I do now. I was of course utterly horrified with the bible's contents and The Book of Job really stood out as one of the most particularly diagnostic stories for me forming my impression of the character of God as a malignant narcissistic psychopath devoid of any empathy whatsoever who views humanity as ants who exist for no reason other than to be sycophants for him, give him adoration and labor for him. Flash forward to today, i'm a professional artist and working on a 10 book graphic novel that allegories some of the most famous stories of the bible to try to get people to see it from my perspective, in part skewing the perspective it's told from from god and his chosen people but instead telling the story from the perspective of God's victims, most of whom are utterly devoted to him and just trying their best. The book of job is by far the most important story to this graphic novel and sorta mirror's the main character's story throughout it. WHen i was writing the part of the script where i really hit home on this point I reread the book of job and the whole bible as it had been awhile (I've read the thing four times.) and even moreso today I found the book of job to be just one of the most horrifically indicting stories of god's character. The main character is of course faced with the same dilemma as Job as to how to view god after he's done this or allowed this to be done to him. Do you love god even more and submit and possibly accept great rewards or do you set out to destroy him so he can never do this to anybody else?
I wonder if the writers/compiler of Job weren't trying to refute the theory of karma or fate or something like that which may have existed contemporaneously
Question: what happens when one adds an eternal perspective to the authors? The apocalyptic perspective may not have developed for a few centuries more after this was written, yet the poetry contains one of the clearest references to resurrection in the Bible. And the imputation of righteousness to his children from Job's faith exercised through sacrifices, although that is neither endorsed nor criticized, what is that? From a perspective that is not solely temporal, if Job expected to see his children after he was resurrected, wouldn't it be a blessing that he was granted more? In effect, his children were doubled in eternity, just as his cattle were doubled on earth -- a point that appears to be deliberate by the "miscount" of blessings.
The book of Job seems similar to the movie 'Trading Places' where the the rich brothers bet a dollar on how one guy will respond to sudden adversity and another to sudden fortune.
25:00 This always made me think that the message is people are replaceable, which I also found disturbing. I grew up hearing this story a lot, and it never made sense to me and always made me uncomfortable.
Job knows the truth, that he has not sinned, that he is devoted to God, and is not deserving of his mistreatment, and God says, who are you to say that? So, man cannot know truth?
The Book of Job , and the God therein , are both abominations, imho. As is just about everything in the Old Testament…..btw, Bart’s book “God’s Problem” is so great….all about suffering and how it’s not possible to understand why there’s so much of it on this planet…cannot be reconciled with Christianity or the Jewish God of the Old Testament.
at 32'53".....we see something extremely rare: Bart's true feelings of exasperation at religious dogma; he's the consummate professional and balanced academic 99% of the time but I LOVED it when he asked rhetorically (of the person who lives blissfully without ever questioning the proposition that suffering is the will of G@d and that we shouldn't engage our faculties on the matter) "how human are you?" This was a brilliant episode that really got to the heart of the matter!
I could not wait for this discussion. I feel that Job is the most profound book in the old testament. When I was a freshman in college, my humanities prof said that Job was a contest between god and satin. I was appalled. After listening to Bart's analysis, I have a better understanding of this book after 50 years. The one thing that keeps coming to mind is whether the Jews of Europe fell back on this book during their persecution under the Nazis. I somehow wish that this was brought into Bart's discussion and analysis of Job.
Anyone who has lost a child knows that having another child does not ease the pain of loss. This book of Job conveys a cruel god who uses horrific pain to prove a point.
no....god personally appears to job to ease the pain of his loss....this is an incredible story of god meeting a man in his pain....you have to dig a little deeper than just the words---there is sooo much going on here
@@1bengrubb But God caused jobs pain and suffering by making a wager with his own special enforcer. Almost like an abusive spouse. I love you so much I have to hurt you to help you be strong. God is the ultimate gaslighter. I’m sure the authors of job did not intend for the reader to get caught up in the duplicity and seeming sadism of god in the narrative, it was a different time but for this reader it stands out quite clearly.
I see four distinct sections and worldviews in Job, not just two. Chapters 1 and 2 say at the outset that it was satan, not God, that caused all the problems (albeit at God's prompting). But then chapters 3 through 37 ignore all that and present the argument under the maintained hypothesis that it was just God who caused everything. Then chapters 38-41 depict God as showing up to defend his honor, leaning heavily on the "might makes right" principle. Finally, someone tacked on chapter 42 at some point, figuring that we can't just end the narrative with Job being beaten down and God left looking like an ass; gotta restore Job's honor and fortunes (as though the loss of his kids in chapter 1 was inconsequential!) and make God look good again - and notice that it never explains in what way(s) Jobs friends were wrong in their arguments. No, I'm not a trained Bible scholar, but - as Garry Nolan has said when acknowledging that he's not a metallurgist - I can read.
From an "analytic idealist" point-of-view, I'd argue that the Book of Job is showing us how unbound mind (God, in religious symbolism) is not a meta-conscious agent but rather an instinctual one, behaving how it does because it is what it is. That makes it unique in major religious canon, as far as I'm aware. Great stuff as always, thank you Bart and Megan!
JOB is not giving us the full story. He said "The thing which I greatly feared has come upon me." What did Job before Satan came? "In the days of my youth, when the SECRET OF GOD was upon my Tabernacle." Job is the oldest book in the Bible, and it's mysteries are very deep. Job 31:35 (31+35=66 book bible) "If my adversary had written a book, I would surely bind it as a crown to me." There is a lot more to say, but people respect a scholar, they don't respect an Esotericist.
Bro what does any of that Yap even mean 😂😂 tf is a meta conscious agent?? What is an instinctual one??? And what is an unbound mind?? There’s nothing instinctual about God ( your unbound mind) making a decision to fuck with Job. When anything acts instinctually there is no conscious decision been made. Instinct isn’t a thought. It’s an action. God was either testing job or punishing job so how is that an instinctual conscious mind? Please help me understand stand
@@Malik-lf6zj - God keeps saying how incomprehensible he is to a human mind like that of Job, how much beyond understanding and definitely not to be controlled or held accountable in any way. Lukas reflects that in common modern idiom, nonsensical as it may seem. But who are we to say what makes sense to a creature such as God?
Sometimes the point of a story is what is not said, or what is not asked. Job demands evidence of his sins/wrong doings from God, which is the same as demanding evidence of God's existence. God confronts and speaks to Job after this inquiry. God is displeased, but that is irrelevant to Job, Job still got what he desired from his original demand, which is proof of God's existence. The point of the story of Job is not given directly in Job, the point comes down to one's own inner view. The point of Job is to consider: If everything was taken away from Job and Job demanded evidence of his sins from God, but God did not respond to Job. Ask yourself: What would Job have done then? Would he remain pious and praise God? Would he stop believing in God? Would he curse God? Would he believe in God but think God is faulty or not completely righteous? Would he do as his three friends suggested and strive to find sins in his own behaviour, no matter how small or seemingly insignificant? Whatever ones' view of how Job would behave through God ignoring Job's demand is the point of the story of Job.
I mean what you're saying isn't accurate at all. Job does not ruminate on his doubts of the existence of god. He is ruminating on his doubts on the morality of god's seeming judgement of him. Job rightfully has to assume god is judging him for something and job wants to have counsel with him to plead his case that he doesn't deserve this. So what does god do? God shows up and basically shows what a monster he is and how little he cares for job or anybody else beyond what job or anybody else can do for him in worshipping him and praising him. God then rewards job for his utter submission in the face of his horrible cruelty. It's an awful story.
@@nunyabusiness9056 I never said Job runinates on his doubts of the existence of God. BECAUSE as you said, God shows up. You missed the point entirely. The question is: What would Job have done if God hadn't showed up?
It's all rhetorical...none of the events happened in real life, it's a manufactured story... Job had to repent because it was necessary for the plot of the story...
@@DarwinsStepChildren I didn't miss anything haha. Demanding evidence of ones sins isn't demanding evidence of the existence of god. You're just flat out making garbage up lol. If i get interrogated by the police and they suggest i did something wrong, i might ask them for evidence i did some wrong doing. I"m not doubting the existence of god. You're twisting yourself in knots here to be an apologist for this story lol.
@@nunyabusiness9056 You still haven't answered the question: What would Job have done if God hadn't shown up? If you wish to say mentioning the police and stating someone is twisting themselves in knots answers this question, then you didn't miss anything.
It's funny, I was 7, at religion school, and asked the exact same question to my cathecist about Job's children, as if the deaths of the original set was even meaningful. :D My cathecist didn't know how to answer, by the way.
Either God was right and Job did NOTHING wrong, meaning that his true reward for obedience should have been being left alone OR Satan was correct, making God imperfect. Satan WAS right to the extent that God felt the need to reprimand Job towards the end of the book. EDIT: It's all ridiculous from the start anyway. A bet to see what will happen? God is...GOD. He ALREADY KNOWS what will happen.
Today when I hear stories like this one, God seems more like an insecure human fabrication than the almighty creator. The devil tricks God into letting him kill 10 innocent people without incident by playing on his obsession for unwavering loyalty. This is supposedly the almighty God?
I played one of the counselors in a production of "J.B." by Archibald MacLeish. The play doesn't (as I remember it) do anything to resolve the troubling aspects of the book. I'm afraid I missed a few that you described here in my re-readings of the book itself. What a cluster! Yes, a very disturbing set of ideas. But what awful friends the "counselors" were...
Ironically, had Bart understood Job from a non -Christian perspective, I strongly believe he'd still be a Christian today. The least interesting part of the story for me is that it can be argued from the names of the new children and the fact that unlike all other possessions, they weren't doubled in number, that God had restored the souls taken by Satan. He doubles Jobs joy to compensate for the suffering, not as a reward. God did all that to tell us a story about his system of justice. Job is the first and still best treatment of theodicy. God sets this all up for the sake of the book, for this lesson to the rest of humanity. Satan is God's angel. At his service. His job is to bring calamity, to advise evil plans. See, it's all about free will. If God forces us into an action, he gets the reward not us. You don't pay a man you have a gun to his head. We cannot get to heaven without freely choosing to do Godly actions. And heaven is the goal of life. We have God and the angels doing their best to protect people, to teach morality, it's like pushing people to make a choice. They need a counter force for balance, to give us a higher merit for doing a good deed. And they need the chaos of nature to hide the divine order. You can't tell if God stopped a tsunami and saved a million people. If he stopped a nuclear apocalypse. But you can tell there are tsunamis, and atomic bombs, and bad people who want to use them. If bad people didn't exist, if science told us there should be tsunamis but in reality God stopped all harmful ones, would we not be compelled to believe, would we be able to choose evil? So God asks Satan where he's been. Dah God, walking around earth enjoying the view. Oh wow, did you see my favorite innocent guy? He is soooo good don't you think? God is clearly goading Satan to suggest harming Job. But God won't suggest it Himself because He does not want to speak evil. That's Satan's job. Satan takes the bait and tells God to deprive Job of what he gave him. God refuses and tells Satan to do as he wills. Again nothing specific about harming a man, except something specific to not take Jobs life. Job will be instrumental in the teaching. Job loses everything he has, kids included, and he knows it's from God. He trusts God still that He was righteous. If this was a bet, Satan lost. Job didn't love God because of his blessings, rather because of who he is. Satan comes back and again God goals him. Look how great Job is. Well, says Satan, he is still healthy. Job knows God took his health. Rleative health is something that is taken for granted by others, not something God has to give. Job has every right to file for grievance now. What kind of bet is this? What is the point? The point of course is that God wants to face Job and explain the world to him. Satan's job is done. He no longer appears in the book. Not to settle any bets, not to claim victory or admit defeat. Jobs friends come and the poetry starts. It must have replaced some less satisfying prose, but the theme is the same, not different. The friends cheer Job up by telling him if only he repented he could be restored. Job promises he did nothing wrong. As a righteous man he won't lie even to ingratitude himself to a capricious God. The friends now get angrier, how dare Job impune God's reputation even by suggestion. He must have been a wicked sinner. Job replies: look around and face reality. There is no justice for anyone. Job was the most righteous man. Helped the widow, fed the homeless. Had he rejoiced at his own success or even his enemies misfortune he would not accuse God. As it is, God cares not about justice or mankind. Job wishes he were never born. This is worse than cursing God. If this was a bet, Satan won. By no means should Job be rewarded by God for this. Job also doesn't demand God justifies Himself to him. He prayed to him a lot, but he only states his bitter disappointment of reality and expectations from a just God, whose existence he does not doubt. God appears to Job, not to scare him, rather that's His form when talking to men. Part 1: God details miracles he made to create a wonderful world. And here is the first answer. Job's experiences and observations are anecdotal. But God's actions transcend space and time. He did far more than man can know to bring truelly appreciable beauty. Should God be judged as uncaring because of anecdotal evidence and should we dismiss all he's done? Is that truthful? Or is it possible God setup the world so bad things can happen so that we have free will? God does not tell Job about Satan. Job truly does not know why these troubles afflicted him. But Satan would have afflicted trouble on some one. God had just redirected him to Job for this lesson in this book. Part 2. God created fearsome creatures, Satan, nature. Cruel, unyielding, unforgiving. There is no sympathy, no mercy there. And He can control them when it is necessary, but he won't always do it. God doesn't explain the free will cause to our ancient forefathers, but it should appear clear to us. God turns to Jobs friends and tells them they were wicked to accuse Job and Job was right. He had a right to grieve, to hurt, to seek justice and complain when he didn't find it. He has a right and obligation to question God and seek the answers for his faith. His friends should have supported him in that quest. Job is rewarded for accusing God of injustice, not for pretending the world is already divine and refusing to curse God. God gives a timeless answer to an ancient man. He may not be able to explain His reasons to a man lacking advance philosophical and scientific underpinnings, but God can point to the things beyond our understanding and say, though they can cause suffering and injustice,, He created them for the overall benefit of mankind. He can ask for our faith on that matter. He earned that.
It’s an odd God that’s portrayed in Job. He’s not an attractive character at all, he’s neither reasonable, nor kind nor even good in any way that we would think of nowadays.
To me, the authors forgot god was supposed to be all knowing so for god to wager with Satan on whether job would stay faithful comes off as cruel and sadistic. The question of suffering that this narrative is supposed to answer ends up being an indictment against god. All nonsense anyway.
18:40 BART "god is testing him.. he's seeing if job will remain faithful even if there is suffering"...wrong --that is Satan's test----there is a lot of things god is accomplishing but "discovering" if job will remain faithful is not one of them. SATAN'S question of "will job remain faithful" is just coincident to what god wants to accomplish in job.
I always enjoy your videos. However, this one on Job does not sit comfortably with me. There are subtle nuances in the Book of Job that you do not take into account. After the dialogue between Job and his friends, God blames the friends for not speaking right of God as Job did. God did not dismiss Job's position entirely. In the great poem of God's speech, the principle of causality is undermined - making room for mystery and paradox. In logic and traditional theology, the principle of causality and its theological equivalent retribution are seen as the foundation of 'meaning'. Here and in the book of Ecclesiastes this view is challenged. However, the world is not surrendered to total chaos. The central motives in God's speech are procreation and nourishment, indicating that God is trustworthy although He is not predictable.
For those who don't bother to read all the nonsense in the Book of Job, here are some highlights: God makes a bet with his son, Satan. God tells Satan to do nasty things to Job to see if he can get him to curse God to his face. 1:6-12 God gives Satan power over all that Job possesses. 1:12 God kills (or allows Satan to kill) Job's children, but Job doesn't "foolishly" blame God. Since God was responsible, why would it be foolish to blame God? 1:20-22 The sons of God came to present themselves before the Lord, and Satan came also among them." Satan is the son of God -- the only one that God ever seems to talk to. 1:6, 2:1 God and Satan play a little game with Job. God allows Satan to torment Job, just to see how he will react. 2:3-7 "So went Satan forth from the presence of the LORD, and smote Job with sore boils from the sole of his foot unto his crown." 2:7 "They rent every one his mantle, and sprinkled dust upon their heads." 2:12 "Is there any taste in the white of an egg?" 6:6 Does God pervert Justice? Well, if you believe the Bible he sure as hell does! 8:3 "He runneth upon me like a giant." 16:14 "I have sewed sackcloth upon my skin, and defiled my horn in the dust." 16:15 Job says "my breath is strange to my wife." Mine too. 19:17 "His breasts are full of milk." 21:24 When things were going well for Job he washed his steps with butter and rocks poured out rivers of oil. 29:6 Job's "bowels boiled." Now that doesn't sound pleasant. 30:27 Job is the brother of dragons. 30:29 "For God speaketh in a dream ... He openeth the ears of men, and sealeth their instruction." 33:14-16 "By the breath of God frost is given." 37:10 "Then the LORD answered Job out of the whirlwind." 38:1 The morning stars sang together, and all the sons of God shouted for joy." 38:7 God could (if he wanted to) pick up the earth by its ends and shake all the wicked people off of it. 38:13 God has snow and hail stored up to use later in time of trouble and war. 38:22 "Out of whose womb came the ice?" Gosh, I don't know. Was it Glinda, the Good Witch of the North? 38:29 "Who can stay the bottles of heaven?" Gosh, I don't know. I didn't even know there were any bottles in heaven. 38:37 "Gird up thy loins now like a man." 38:3, 40:7 Bible believers have identified the behemoth as a hippopotamus, dinosaur, wildebeest, or crocodile. But my favorite is the way these verses are translated by Stephen Mitchell: "Look now: the Beast that I made: he eats grass like a bull. Look: the power in his thighs, the pulsing sinews of his belly. His penis stiffens like a pine; his testicles bulge with vigor." 40:15-16 "Canst thou draw out leviathan with an hook? or his tongue with a cord?" 41:1 After God and Satan get done tormenting Job, God gave Job even more stuff than he had before, including children. God gave Job another set of 10 kids, with even prettier daughters! 42:13-15 "Which shaketh the earth out of her place, and the pillars thereof tremble." The earth rests upon pillars and doesn't move (unless God gets angry or something). 9:6 "Which commandeth the sun, and it riseth not." The earth is fixed and the sun travels about it. 9:7 "The measure thereof is longer than the earth." What is the length of a sphere? 11:9 Heaven is set upon pillars that tremble when God gets mad. 26:11 God spread out the sky, which is a solid structure, hard and strong like a mirror. 37:18 The earth is set on foundations and it does not move. 38:4-6 God could (if he wanted to) pick up the earth by its ends and shake all the wicked people off of it. 38:13 "Wilt thou hunt the prey for the lion?" God seems pleased to have created prey for lions and ravens to eat. 38:39-41 Ostriches are not cruel and stupid birds who abandon their eggs to die after laying them, as these verses imply. They are, in fact, careful and attentive parents. The male scoops out a hollow for the eggs, which are incubated by the female during the day and the male at night. After the eggs are hatched, they are cared for by the mother for over a month, at which time the chicks can keep up with running adults. 39:13-16 www.skepticsannotatedbible.com/job/abs_list.html
It was pointed out to me (by an evangelical no less) that when G$d decided to test Job through loss and affliction, he didn't take away the old ball & chain......now that's a parable!
JOB is not giving us the full story. He said "The thing which I greatly feared has come upon me." What did Job before Satan came? "In the days of my youth, when the SECRET OF GOD was upon my Tabernacle." Job 31:35 (31+35=66 book bible) "If my adversary had written a book, I would surely bind it as a crown to me."
That's somewhat misleading. It IS in all likelihood a very old story - almost certainly from ancient Mesopotamian sources (though almost certainly not as old as, say, the flood narrative adapted from Mesopotamian sources and imported into Genesis at around the same time). But it's a very late addition to the writings section of the Tanakh. Its inclusion dates back to - at the earliest - the Babylonian exile, if not the Achaemenid Persian period.
Bart's claim that the Book of Job was written in the 5th or 6th century B.C. is highly suspect, and your presentation that Job is the OLDEST book in the Bible, written even before Moses' Pentateuch, is quite likely correct.
With all due respect to Dr. Ehrman who's fogotten more theology & early church history than I know, the views he expressed about the Book of Job's ending lacking a unified theme & message is not predominant in mainstream schlarship. Please review the commentary & notes in recent Oxford Annotated Bible.
@@1bengrubb Thanks & again with all due respect to Dr. Ehrman who sometimes reminds me of a reformed alcoholic in his skepticism aimed primarily at Scriptural literalists; something like a former drinker who wants nothing do with alcohol. IMHO there's another path between the skeptics & literalists where we can treat the NT as having some historical value even if not a historical document. Dr. Michael Bird I think does a good job with that & was recognized by Dr. Ehrman as "learned" even if the 2 disagreed.
I strongly suspect the Satan is a parody of the leader of the lying spirits in 1 Kings 22: 20-23, and Job's response to all the bad news to thank God is a parody of King Hezekiah in 2 Kings 20: 12-19. Then most of the book of Job is an extensive dialectic from a few authors about the deeper moral and theological implications of those parodies.
Claiming that 10 more children would see someone "restored" after having lost their first 10 suggests that this story was written by some "wise" old idiot. Presumably one who has never had kids. And what about a the 10 innocents who were killed simply as collateral damage in this heavenly wager? Were they somehow "restored" after being snuffed out also? And then there are all the other bereaved family members? Given that Jobs "children" were clearly adult children, it is safe enough to assume that there were most likely wives/husbands of these "children" who lost their partners, and also children who lost their parents? Anyone who thinks this story sets any good example regarding morals or righteousness needs to take a good hard look at themselves, and then ask how they ever became so deluded and divorced from rational thought.
The best synopsis of the book of Job was the folk rock song by Seatrain in the '70's, "The Tale of Job" ! 8:30 ... all of Job's family are killed except his harpy wife ... double curse!!! 🤣 Interesting that God didn't just tell Job at the end that He and the Accusor had a bet and God won! "And as a reward, Job, here's a bunch more children!" (Job's wife: "Wait, what?! I have to pump out twice as many children??!! How young do you think I am?!" 😆 So, Job basically has nothing to repent for until he questions God and God takes offense, "Hey! Who are you??!!" Job: "Awww, you're right, I'm sorreeee!" God: "Okay, we're good!"
I've never understood why if God is eternal, omnipotent, omnipresent and omniscient, why is there any space for a Satan? Surely that is proof that the writings are the thoughts of men who are trying to understand the world. A God who was eternal, omnipotent, omnipresent and omniscient has absolutely no need for a Satan. On the other hand, men (or women) who are trying to make sense of how the world works might invent a God to explain what they can't understand, and then invent a Satan to help explain why a God can't control the chaos.
Let's just take a moment to remember all the servants in Job's service killed to test Job's righteousness and their bereaved families. As a child in a "job" of a family, one of seven sons with three sisters, the idea that Job's wife would have to go through more pregnancies and likely miscarriages to give back to Job his "job" of kids rather horrifies me. I think you are missing exactly how the outer story depicts the wealth of Job. He has camels, donkeys, paired oxen, and sheep. And the servants to care for them. Donkeys have one real use, to carry heavy loads for rural delivery of goods, camels carry goods long distances in caravans, paired oxen pull heavy wagons of goods over roads. In the outer story these all get stolen. Sheep are the odd item, but they can provide nonperishable uncarded, spune, or woven wool as potential trade goods to round out the loads Job is sending around, to help make a profit. Job was the Jeff Bezos of his day. A what strikes me as stupid about the writing of the outer story is that none of these animals and their caretakers would ever be in one place at one to be stolen or killed in one raid. They would be out doing their work. Even sheep wouldn't be kept together. Those poor sheep, killed by an exploding volcano. I think the inner story is actually a pretty good effort to put forward different reasons why suffering happens, differing philosophical viewpoints on the suffering of the innocent. Note that Job lives in a tent (inner story)while his oldest son lives in an admittedly poorly built house (outer story). You'd think with his own house that son at least would have given Job a grand child, but no mention of spouses or grandchildren. When I read Job the story struck me as having three layers, the poetic inner core, a middle buffer describing the personal harm done to Job, his wife's part, and the appearance of Jaweh to brag on creating the world with his amusing beastry, and the third layer being the wealth loss and restoration wrapped around that, along with El holding his council meeting with Jaweh and the Satan, El's inspector/provocator, attending. The Satan strikes me as being rather put out with Jaweh's prying, rather than acting shifty. The way the Satan challenges Yaweh's boosting by saying Yaweh's holds Job safe from the Satan, under his personal protection, makes me feel that El had assigned the position of the Satan to one of his sons especially to see how well the tribal gods were doing. I think the original lyrical poets who composed the inner core didn't even describe the suffering of Job because that would be more effective during a recitation, "You've all heard of the suffering of Job, but let me tell you about..." Let the audience imagine the worst infliction they could rather than get into an argument with them over whether what the poet gave was really all that bad.
Always wondered if Job hadn't originally ended at 42:11, right before he got everything back like it never happend. It feels very tacked-on, like someone hated that it didn't have a happy ending, and didn't care that adding one kinda defeated the point of the story.
I’ve read the bible seven times cover to cover, there should be an award for putting one’s self through that. To be the book of Job is the most disturbing book in the Bible. Not only does the book directly blame god for jobs suffering. Gods response to Job when he finally cries out is basically “who the hell do you think you are to question me. I’m god and do what I please”. Gods giving job a new family and greater riches is appalling when you think god someone thinks giving Job another family somehow makes it alright.
My thought is that this may be the best explanation for suffering, especially starting in 38. If one believes bad things are the result of bad behavior, punishment makes sense. But we know from the beginning is that Job is innocent. So, for me, God is saying “you think you can ask me for explanations. If you think you understand, answer this. Explain the Unified Field Theory. What triggered the Big Bang? What is Dark Energy and Dark Matter? Because if you can’t understand this universe, why do you think you can understand my explanation?
Way back in University, I wrote an enormous work I titled, Bargaining with the Devil: A Game Theoretic Analysis. One of the chapters was on the Book of Job. From memory (this was 40 years ago) the conclusion was that given the strategies and outcomes (in matrix form) God would continue testing Job until God runs out of ways of testing Job. My conclusion was that Job finally begins questioning God’s action when the only thing left to take from him is his Wife. Who, up until then, had been left conspicuously untouched.
Spare a thought for Mrs Job. All the pregnancies and natural births. She was bereaved of her children like Job was. When, in the immeasurable grief and desolation she asked why Job didn't curse God to get things over with, she was called a fool. And when Job's fortunes and family were restored she had to go through all the pregnancies and births again. Just because God and Satan had a little wager about a man's loyalty. To me, that is pretty bloody callous...
@@johandelen1838 Good thing it’s only a story. The interesting question is why would such a story be created? What is it about the circumstances in which the author(s) are living that such a story is designed to address?
@@kencusick6311 I agree with you, it is a story, in my mind it is a parable. It is a story meant to convey a truth or to give information. Judging by the end of the story , God knew from the beginning that Job wasn't as perfect as he could be and allowed a situation to develop to expose some flaw in Job that wasn't obvious to anyone but God and maybe also Elihu. It is evident that Job comes to a self awareness at the end, that the whole episode was designed to elicit. It appears to me that Job had some error in his thinking that God was correcting. It seems to me that God knew Job meant well even if he didn't fully understand God. It seems to me that God was using Satan, who was also misreading Job, to create a situation to get Job's attention to increase and improve Job's self awareness, which seems to have been that Job didn't actually know as much as he thought he did, that he, Job, didn't actually have the full picture, quite. I think the comforting thing about the story is that we relax and trust God to do his good work in us, and bring us to where he wants us, our own failings not withstanding Him.
I was always struck by the idea that Job lost his family and later God replaced them and everything was fine again. Obviously the writer has never lost anyone close to him. There's always a hole in your heart.
My thoughts exactly.
Not true....there are 40 chapters of pain....the issue is perspective....the finite meets the infinite. This is the perspective most people miss since they cannot comprehend it. Job personally met it.
@@1bengrubb senseless suffering to make a point. This is Hellenistic thinking. This will always be an issue with thinking people.
If humans can't comprehend then why this stupid test@@1bengrubb
In ancient times infant mortality was very common. It was not difficult to come up with the idea of having more children to make up for the lost ones. Regardless, it was a very easy way of ending the narrative and not entering into complications.
To say that God tested Job would imply that 1) God can't see inside someone's mind and 2) God can't see the future.
Great question! OBVIOUSLY god is after something else! oh the depths of the infinite
its' also curious that Satan does not know this about humans at this point..
I was a JW and we were taught that there were things god prevented himself from knowing
@@cygnustsp but the only reason to do any test is to see what happens.
@@hamobu right, so god decided not to read Job's heart or see the future, he left everything up to Job and Satan.
Spare a thought for Mrs Job. All the pregnancies and natural births. She was bereaved of her children like Job was. When, in the immeasurable grief and desolation she asked why Job didn't curse God to get things over with, she was called a fool.
And when Job's fortunes and family were restored she had to go through all the pregnancies and births again.
Just because God and Satan had a little wager about a man's loyalty.
To me, that is pretty bloody callous...
What do you mean"Go through the births again"?.... Being pregnant was a blessing back then..... Perhaps not today
Jobs wife was one of the people I used to look forward to meeting in Heaven. I’m no longer convinced there is such a place, so I’ll just have to invent our conversation I guess.
@@1bengrubb We usually perceive pregnancy in ancient times through the patriarchal male perspective. I'm sure that, just like today, pregnancy back then occurred in a wide variety of circumstances: in some of them, it would be viewed as a blessing; in others, it would be viewed as very burdensome and unfortunate.
@@1bengrubb Try going through 20 pregnancies as fast as humanly possible and see what a blessing you think it is. I expect some of the children came from concubines or slaves though.
@@lawsonj39 no...family was just more important in that culture than ours. A big family was status---for the woman as well---she viewed the world through the patriarchal male perspective.. Replacement rate was something like 6 kids. A big family was a fortress, an economic engine, source of connections, the commenter is just ignorant of the culture. All through the bible children are a blessing never a burden. Happy is the man his quiver full. The first command "be fruitful and multiply" defines the culture.
This podcast has changed my life
Mine too. For the better !
I wouldn't go that far, but I do love it. In a world of culture wars, genocides, and ecological destruction, it is such a treasure to find a small space for intelligent discussion between two respectful and empathetic people.
Will your death change your life?
@@tryme3969 I would say there's a good case for thinking that our knowledge that we are mortal (and the subsequent repression of that realisation) is indeed the major driver of our beliefs and perhaps the reason why we developed culture in the first place. In that sense death has shaped all our lives. It's a complicated story though...
JOB is not giving us the full story. He said "The thing which I greatly feared has come upon me." What did Job before Satan came? "In the days of my youth, when the SECRET OF GOD was upon my Tabernacle." Job is the oldest book in the Bible, and it's mysteries are very deep. Job 31:35 (31+35=66 book bible) "If my adversary had written a book, I would surely bind it as a crown to me." There is a lot more to say, but people respect a scholar, they don't respect an Esotericist.
Reading Job as a young Christian opened up so many questions. Looking into Job helped close the door on Christianity for me.
Good for you. It's nicer out here in reality, isn't it?🙂
Why? Suffering is a part of life, and the book of Job helps teach us that not everything seems just all the time, but we have to trust in the process, and everything does have a purpose.
@@jacksonray3596 if you went through what job went through and you knew the petty reason God killed your entire family, would you still believe in a just God?
@@alvinyong9370 I’m not going to pretend like I understand everything. There is so much we can’t comprehend. Yes, I would still believe in a just God.
@@jacksonray3596 Apart from the story of Job and other killings ordered by God in the old testament, the most difficult part for me to believe in a just God is hell.
I appreciated Bart's honest and accurate show of anger against - and disapproval of - God in his assessment here of the Book of Job. This is one of the first times I have seen Mr. Ehrman come flatly out in a revealed display of anger against God, and this is helpful and emboldening for me to do the same.
There’s a very funny episode in the second season of the wonderful show Good Omens that depicts the Job story, including angels perplexed that Job doesn’t seem too thrilled to hear God will be replacing his dead children with more children as a “reward.”
Best episode of season 2 by far.
"Apparently I need to create a whale"
I was just coming here to recommend that. Love that series
I just saw that for the first time last night.
Funny, witty and intelligent.
Then this afternoon I get this video in my You tube feed.
Coincidence, or AI algorithm at work?
I'm convinced it's the latter.
Sounds like an interesting show. I'll have to watch that when my wife is away. I think she'd have a stroke watching it.
I wish the whole series was actually just those Bible snippets! Id love to watch just that and the running commentary.
Job: what have I done to be punished?
YHVH: Fuck you, that’s what.
😂😂😂😂😂
Is god Donald Trump? His party has only one platform: F_ck you!
😂
Very good question....job violated the first commandment
Not being a theist that was my attitude to Job. But then I'm thankful to Christianity because at age of 15 I went to a church for the first time and I became an atheist before the end of the service.
Putting aside the theological implications of God killing Job's choldren and then giving him new ones like it's all good, the sociological inference is really disturbing. There was a time when wives and children were resources.
God replacing Jobs wife and children sound harsh (which it is) however, if you see them as possessions, non people, minor slaves, it changes the perspective.
Certainly not for the better
@@markc5015 very true. I am basing this off ancient Near East culture on how they viewed women and children.
Or if you assume they view women and children as we do today ( read job 29). Then you have more of a struggle here
@@anthonycraig274 Except that's not how the Bible treats losing children elsewhere. When Jacob believes Joseph was killed, he grieves bitterly and later on it's said that losing Benjamin would outright kill him. So no, children were not treated like mere possessions. I mean, if they were then God wouldn't even bothered with the whole "sacrifice Isaac" thing.
Thank you for spreading information about the bible.
"The best cure for Christianity is reading the bible"
- Mark Twain
This is rarely sufficient, especially on people who were raised as children to believe their Bible is both (1) always wise, (2) full of mysteries. It creates a mindset of excessive generosity and provides a backup plan that makes it very impervious, even to contradictions, inconsistancies or obscurity. This is why sound epistemology or actual bible criticism is needed and more efficient. Not saying deconversion / deconstruction never happens by just reading the Bible, but it's rare, and usually requires a prior "breach", and "tools".
@@ackbooh9032is sufficient but no Christian will read it
Never understood this point. I've read the Bible all the way through twice and I haven't turned away from my faith because of it.
@@ackbooh9032 - it is extremely rare that they read it like a regular book, cover to cover, even if it takes a month or two. A couple of people calling themselves Christian have said they did (out of a thousand that I've asked) but weren't convincing as they could recall nothing beyond sunday school stories when asked.
As an agnostic, reading Job commands more of my respect for the Ancient Hebrew outlook, not less. It distills more reality than your average atheist tract. It's interested in life unmediated by human all too human defence mechanisms.
I'm not a bible scholar. I do have a doctorate in clinical psychology, so that's the lens through which I look. After hearing and reading the views of non-apologist bible scholars for the last several years, here is what I personally believe. Given the people who came to power around the time of the bronze age collapse were most probably the most violent of warlords, they were probably akin to what we'd think of today as narcissists and psychopaths. We know sometimes humans were deified in the cultures of that time... and I suspect violent narcissists would have loved being deified. And if, as a lower status person, you had such a powerful warlord on your side, protecting you from other warlords, you probably became enmeshed with your own warlord's views and desires. If you didn't acquiesce to his demands, you'd either face his violent and capricious whims, or possibly lose his protection against other warlords. Over time, I suspect these types of power dynamics just became cultural norms. At some point we could use the modern construct of Stockholm Syndrome as a model for how lower status peoples would interact with their local strongman. To my way of thinking, this bronze age and post bronze age way of life was the context in which we happened to inherit our idea of who God is. So yes, when trying to contemplate why there is suffering in the world, and why we might lose control to outsiders, etc, at that time, they would have to reason based on these cultural memes and dynamics. Why do we suffer? Because we didn't do a good enough job of appeasing capricious warlords/gods. That's why. 🦋🧡🦋
Basically, Bible god is bipolar, a narcissist, etc.
@@jasonnelson316 - definitely, and don't forget drunken stepfather. Who else would create the cosmos and every creature within it but not build a fence around his two favorite trees and then blame the kids?
I suggest reading Domination and the Arts of Resistance: Hidden Transcripts by James C. Scott. Contrary to the Marxist insistence on "false consciousness", or convenient recapitulation of the life of a people in the culture bound frame of psychoanalysis, the empirical evidence suggests most subalterns are aware of their interests, and are not "gaslighted", "enmeshed" , or "fused" with respect to their self. Job is unlikely to be a moral homily devised by the elite of the time since it deals with an elite man in context. Rather, it deals with reality; unmediated, existential reality 21st century life experiences - to borrow from your argot- only as reaction formation.
❤
Read job 29 then tell me about warlords....
Job’s original children were *replaced* as if people are fungible.
Some people think the author is unusually callous, but it seems that the biblical view, and maybe the most of the culture’s view, of children was like this.
I really struggle with this book of the bible. Job is destroyed with God's consent...basically in a deal with Satan...and when Job wants to know why, he's treated abysmally. How can you not be absolutely terrified by a God like that? How can a person honestly love a God like that? He terrifies me.
I totally agree!
I think it’s important to start with an all loving god created a Very Good creation out of his love and created humans as sharers, helpers, and participaters in this divine creation. God gifts humans with free will. We are immature and fall. As we fall god grants us grace to save us. Suffering from illuminates and intensifies as we fall further from grace to keep us from losing ourselves completely. That’s not to say “kids with illness is to glorify god”. I would say that is a tragic consequence of the fall and we are able to recognize that as awful bc we inherently know they good in which things should be.
And an Omniscience God doesn't know what is going to happen ... can't really loose the bet. Gotta feel story for Satan
@@tookie36 - "The fall"? I'd say that it is Christianity that fell. Even in a legend like this, how can anybody else possibly be culpable for some perceived fault of Adam & Eve? What a terrible religion these tales spawned!
@@MossyMozart Christianity def fell. Everyone wants to use God for their own glory. The irony would be funny if it was so tragic.
What a fantastic video! Bart and Megan are both outstanding scholars and great presenters.
22:00 Bart "... its really a troubling view of sufferings" aaaaaahhhh now we can feel the leftovers of Bart's personal frustrations, anger, confusion with suffering. Great struggle!
So we have more faith in God than he has in us. And instead of giving us reasons for testing us, it's just a bunch of hot air and bullshit and threats. Pretty weak stuff, God
JOB is not giving us the full story. He said "The thing which I greatly feared has come upon me." What did Job before Satan came? "In the days of my youth, when the SECRET OF GOD was upon my Tabernacle." Job is the oldest book in the Bible, and it's mysteries are very deep. Job 31:35 (31+35=66 book bible) "If my adversary had written a book, I would surely bind it as a crown to me." There is a lot more to say, but people respect a scholar, they don't respect an Esotericist.
isnt' it interesting that Satan says Job has a TON of protection and Job says he had a TON of fear?? quiz question...what was his fear?
I know this is not the focus but MEGAN!! Your glasses are AMAZING
These discussions are invaluable for informing the masses
_I form the light, and create darkness: I make peace, and create evil: I the Lord do all these things._ Isaiah 45:7
This thing about the children - I also find it deeply disturbing. Job is an ancient text; could this be before the Israelites thought of God as being able to raise the dead?
The quote from Isaiah sounds exactly like something Satan would say. Interesting.
totally agree. I don't think job had the concept of life beyond this one....making the death that much more tragic.. once he met the infinite death takes a different perspective
Arguably the Hebrew Bible doesn't include an afterlife, or the idea of resurrection except under very special circumstances. This was a later development and only really one or two of the most recent books (e.g. Daniel) include any reference to these ideas.
30:50 Bart "....god will bring horrible suffering on you in order to see if you remain faithful.." is there worse suffering than the death of your child? Is there a worse god that would give permission for your children to be killed? What if that god told you to kill your only child that you have prayed and waited for? What kind of God is this?
Gen 22:2 And he said, Take now thy son, thine only son Isaac, whom you love, and get thee into the land of Moriah; and offer him there for a burnt offering upon one of the mountains which I will tell thee of.
From this Jesus said Jn8:56 Your father Abraham rejoiced to see my day: and he saw it, and was glad.... what in the world is god doing to our minds???
I remember reading this Bible book and thinking that Satan actually won the bet. Job ultimately lost hope and basically accused God of wrongdoing and upheld his own innocence. Maybe that's not exactly "cursing God to his face" but it's pretty close. And then God's only response is a tirade about how powerful he is and how that makes Job automatically wrong, which is the behavior of a child or narcissist who is losing an argument. I don't believe the writer ever stated that God won the bet. I don't know that God is necessarily even supposed to be the good guy in this book, given that it has almost nothing to do with the rest of the OT or the Hebrew religion anything is possible.
God basically used the Bill Cosby explanation. "I brought into this world, I'll take you out!"
And, just like Bill Cosby, the biblical god has been presented and believed to be a wonderful deity, but turned it to be quite horrible.
Too soon.
God brought suffering for a bet, didn't tell Job then has a "Who are you to question me? I will answer none of your questions"
Classic gaslighting manipulator. Why couldn't he just say "I was testing you to see your faithfulness" which...he should know...because he's All Knowing...
And then his wrath burns against the friends who've been fed the party line and spout it but he's angry bc they said what he says happens after you sin?
The book of Job has never made sense to me
Because is hard for us to accept that this is not God but a very evil I would say satanic entity. Not God hence it makes no sense. But it makes sense if job is speaking to the devil.
I don't think it's to be taken so literally. It's about how God/unbound-mind is NOT meta-conscious enough to reflect back to us like that; it does what it does because it is what it is. And that's, ultimately, okay. It leads to great suffering from our dissociated POV, but there is a bigger picture.
@LukasOfTheLight so in other words he's not all powerful ?🤔
The book of Job works fine as a meditation on why good people suffer in a seemingly uncaring world.
It works very differently when apologetics start getting tied into it because it paints god as as a sociopath who will kill your family to prove you really love him.
@@MrDalisclock It seems the Fundamentalists tap into the second part. 😮
Job seems to me to be a reflection of ourselves when it comes to suffering. Was there something i did to cause it? Can i remain a good person in the face of tragedy? We can do all the right things but still be struck down by the randomness of life. If we continue to uphold our principles through hardship, we have the possibility to regain what we've lost as long as we don't lose sight of who we are. People turn to substance abuse, for example, when life beats them down. By doing that, they spiral into a bottomless pit and end up in a hell of their own making. Holding tight to your morality may, at the very least, keep you from making things worse and possibly coming out a better person on the other side. That is my takeaway.
I agree its about handling pain and suffering with an outlook to hope. To be a parable it has to be the most extreme example. I dont think job is happy his kids are dead but there is chance for light on the other side of the tunnel. Kids died all the time back then, it was in humanities interest to mourn but then hope and try again
Without a God, we see things as random- life just happens. This book is literally saying the opposite, that bad things are happening intentionally. Suffering because someone wills it against you is different than a random tragedy striking.
@@justinbaker2883 a child dying is different than a child being murdered.
@amyrenee1361 You are right. The intentional suffering we bring upon each other is the most evil of all. People conspire with the dark side of themselves to bring tragedy to others.
My favorite theological podcast - Bart is fantastic!
Glad you're here! - Social Media Team
Some people don't even notice these materials are not a continuous story. They read like robots, not paying attention. I noticed the book was discontinuous, like a collection of writings on Job, the very first time I read this book as a young adult (I had not read it in my childhood).
The book totally disregards the fate of the children, and so do all religious apologists. I find that terribly immoral
Is this the same God that's omniscient? And the devil knows that he cannot lie. So they don't have to perform the experiment. God can just tell him-- No actually if we did that he wouldn't curse me so we're done. Oh by the way, I think things are going to be getting a bit warmer for you this Fall.
Job is the oldest book in the Bible. It sounds like this is back when El was still just one of the Elohim and not yet quite so all pervasive.
Honestly, I think the Elohim were never the same after they replaced God with that headbanger Al-Baqarah. And the solo stuff he did afterwards always just rubbed me the wrong way.
One of the reasons among many that I'm an atheist, and if there is a god, it's a cruel being, and i want nothing to do with it. Like he knows Job did absolutely nothing wrong. And then comes down on him for questioning his actions of cruelty.
It's literally a story of an all powerful being gaslighting someone. Just to prove a point.
well... no....we have an all powerful being that stops everything to respond to job.... what level does that put job on?
But if there is an All powerful cruel God. What does you not wanting anything to do with it even mean? If that being really is cruel it can force you to be with it for a literal eternity and not wanting to do anything with it means absolutely nothing in every sense of the word
@@Malik-lf6zj- WTF? God either does not exist or he is an asshole, pure and simple. Just ask the 100 million people who died in WWII.
@@Malik-lf6zj I totally agree with this sentiment, you would worship it out of pure self interest. I do think the Bible and the Quran depict this deity as evil, but if an evil deity is our god, then it would be in our best interest to worship it. Clearly the injunctions in both mandate believers to commit evil deeds by any normative definition. The atheist is not someone who says I do not want to worship evil, the atheist is one who says that natural error and contradictions within both the Bible and Quran clearly demonstrate that those who wrote these texts were neither omnipotent nor omniscient and therefore cannot be inspired or dictated by a deity with these qualities. The god of the Bible and the god of the Quran cannot exist.
@@1bengrubb well yes. you keep inserting "infinite" into your arguments but you don't seem to realize that this is also negates all of your arguments. if your God is infinite than it's no issue for him to "stop everything to respond to job". if your God is infinite then he already knows the outcome of this petty, disgusting game he's playing. it's a faulty argument.
Reminds me of Lincolns second inaugural address where he attempts to find meaning in the Civil War: "Fondly do we hope, fervently do we pray, that this mighty scourge of war may speedily pass away. Yet, if God wills that it continue until all the wealth piled by the bondsman's two hundred and fifty years of unrequited toil shall be sunk, and until every drop of blood drawn with the lash shall be paid by another drawn with the sword, as was said three thousand years ago, so still it must be said "the judgments of the Lord are true and righteous altogether."
~19 minutes - The conversation about God testing Job, and Jews and Christians as an answer to suffering.
If God is all-knowing, why would he need to test anyone? He already knows the outcome. If he knows the outcome, and inflicts suffering on someone he knows will be faithful anyway, isn't that cruelty?
This are the obvious objections so it’s probably easy to assume there is a deeper meaning to be understood
It is, and the message of the Book of Job is "and what are you going to do about it?"
The way Job gets new kids to replace the old ones makes me think it's a clue that the writer was not a parent, like maybe he was some kind of celibate priest or similar, because he didn't comprehend how horrifying a compromise that would be in actual reality.
no....the creator of the universe has personally explained to job his kids are not dead. --you just had to be there
@@1bengrubbYou were there!!??
@@JamesDirette no what I'm saying is you have to take in so much information to really understand what's going on. Job 29 tells us how much he loved his kids.... And at the very beginning of the book they are adults and he's still watching out for them. Job is exactly the same as we are today and the story is presenting all that....
@@1bengrubb how so? ... I thought a roof fell on them.
@@russellmiles2861 no no you have to think beyond this life. Death is not the end of existence and that's what Job learns in his exchange with God. His kids are not dead he'll see them again. Job in his mortality gains the perspective of eternal life. His whole perspective shifts. The pain of his loss is still there but now he knows it's temporary
The story of Job's is often criticized because it ignores his emotional attachment to his children, as though they were objects (like a tent) that could be replaced.
There is another theological side of the Job story that I have never seen discussed. Job is a worthy human being in God & Satan's sight but his children are disposable objects. Are his children not also God's creations who deserve to have a relationship with God as much as Job?
This is the first time I've heard that the book of Job was actually two sources mashed together.
If you read any modern commentary on it, or even just read the introduction to it in an academic annotated Bible (say the Oxford Annotated Bible, or the Oxford Jewish Study Bible) it's one of the very first things that it will mention.
It seems like the introduction is chronically overlooked. It starts with Job presuming the guilt of his sons and explicitly without any actual knowledge of it. Eventually, Job is confronted with being inescapably on the receiving end of that thinking, he handles it badly, and eventually claims to know the real whole truth even better than God. So, God slaps him down with how Job has never had all that knowledge he thinks he has and never will. Job repents for his presumptive thinking, confesses that he himself shares the deficiency he accuses of others, and repents. The whole gift of kids as restoration does seem weird to us today, but remembering conversations about family size with my rural ancestors while they still lived convinces me that it was not so strange not so long ago.
The God portrayed in certain parts of the Hebrew Bible is clearly a sociopath. If I were still a Christian, I would have to adopt the view of Marcion.
Any similarities to Q in Star Trek TNG?
Bible is ill-devised literature.
_" If I were still a Christian, I would have to adopt the view of Marcion."_
Have you created another god/religion for yourself or of yourself?
Hell, it does not stop there: The New Testament has another sociopath torturing and murdering his begotten son to expel the sins of man. HOW BLOODY CRUEL and EVIL the father is. Even Abraham did not kill his son. The NT is based on a blood lust that has poisoned mankind for 2000 years.
@@John.Flower.ProductionsYou realize there are different views and interpretations right?? Your view isn’t the only one.
I think Job is the greatest book in the Bible. I understood it to say that we can never understand God or do anything to affect him so why try? Who or what God is or isn't, wants or doesn't want, isn't our business or concern; just be the best you, stick to your ideals. That was my takeaway as a teen and I still like it. Especially useful with pesky born-again types.
Nothing in the book of Job indicates that it's by or about an Israelite (or Judahite). It's almost certainly a story picked up (with minimal editing and adaptation) from Mesopotamian or Persian sources during the Babylonian exile. THAT's why it seems so out of place in the Tanakh...
The Book of Job is indeed a revealing look at Bronze Age ideas of morality. It's about power, not grace or fairness.
Exactly!
14:48 So you're saying most people don't have the patience to read Job
Job and Ecclesiastes might be the most existentialist books the Bible.
Book of Revelations to you; ‘fine, I am a children’s book’
@@potiphajerenyenje6870It's Revelation
Job and Ecclesiastes are the two books of the Bible that come the closest to "telling it like it is." That's the reason you'll rarely hear priests and pastors and rabbis quoting scripture from them.
👏🙂
Great podcast episode
I would never believe as someone who doesn’t believe in god, the stories of the bible, etc would be listening to this. However, seeing it as classical literature, it changes everything. I may even consider buying Bart’s book about memory.
Why does god need a world wind? Why can’t he just restore what took away. God sounds an abusive spouse. And he likes to gamble.
And He's very vain!
Does the Book of Job say that God is omnipotent or does it merely say that he is extremely powerful? Not having actually read it, a fortiori memorized it, I can’t say, but I’d wager it does not call him omnipotent-if only because omnipotence is an abstract, philosophical idea, and the story is concrete and particular.
He "use" a world wind because it is not a real story. Is just a literate piece to convey certain ideas of God, suffering and so forth. Job did not exist either. Is a character in a drama. Just it. Is amazing how several critiques speaks as the story was true... Is a piece of writing that try to convey certain ideas (god or bad)
The four noble truths provide a solution to the problem of suffering. The reason why we suffer is because the universe is constantly changing, and our attachment to things can not keep up.
There are things we can do as humans to lessen suffering, and this is to live compassionately towards self and others. To live compassionately we must cultivate our mind by overcoming harmful thoughts, habits, and behaviors. This should be the point of all religions.
Thanks & as a Christian who's studied & learned much from Buddhism, the 2 systems have much in common & can complement each other IMHO. For more, see Sermon on the Mount & Thich Nhat Hanh's book, Living Buddha, Living Christ
Indeed, this is the point of the Book of Job. At the start, Job has no compassion. He admitted that he only did good in order to maximize his riches and reputation. He mocked people behind their backs and covered it up when people called him out so that no one would believe the accusers. He put homeless employees out on the street because he thought they were too dirty. He emotionally abused his children, and did not respect his daughters on the same level as his sons.
At the end of the book, he gives his daughters an inheritance on the same level as his sons, even though he is not duty-bound to. He does it out of love.
I think there is also a societal intent in the Job narrative. It's saying, in effect, that if someone is down on their luck or inflicted by a disease, they aren't necessarily on God's bad side, or guilty of some sin. Only God knows. It is a sin however to think that you know that someone else has sinned in the eyes of the God just because of someone's personal circumstances.
So, in the day to day workings of a society you're allowed to think kindly and support those who are in pain or in need. Their suffering doesn't mean they are cursed by God, by default. It might simply be a test (or even a whim) of the deity. However, if you judge them harshly that can raise the ire of the deity. So don't do that.
The lesson of the Book of Job is in how it teaches us to deal with the Problem of Evil. The takeaway is "Never ask that question." Problem solved!
This question is so important it’s one of the pillars of billions of peoples faith 😂 I think I interpreted Job differently than you
The lesson I learned from Bart ehrman and other theologians is never ask ANY question if you want to to keep your faith. Don't ask how bible came about, don't ask history of christianity, don't ask origin of trinity etc. You'll do pretty well.
I assume you are being sarcastic, since that does not solve anything.
Job was not rewarded in the end, it was added later. People who suffer don’t always get things back even if they are saintly
Maybe Job should be understood as a thought experiment exploring the nature of free will as it relates to faith. Then it all culminates by juxtaposing a temporal perspective with an eternal one, giving a final evaluation of the merits of faith vs nihilism.
Yes, one way to escape from all the evil in the bible is to "understand" it as something different. Believing what the bible actually says would be absurd.
"Blessed is the one who grasps your infants and smashes them against the rock"
(Book of psalms 137:9)
I don't understand what juxtaposting a culminate temporal spective is but I think i agree with what you said sortof.
Job's wife is the book's most intriguing character in my opinion. She had to be affected as well, especially losing all of their children, but she basically leaves it to Job and his friends to hash out why all this is happening. "Curse God and die" she says before leaving the scene. She seems alienated from Job's God; she's not involved in the cycle of debates, she doesn't even seem interested in the subject. Is it because she knows she has no place in all this because she is a woman? It's all God and Job and I suspect it always has been even before these events. So, denied the ability to participate, she goes about her own way. While Job and his friends are sitting and arguing on the ash heap, there is work to be done. The damaged house needs repair, the crops need replanting, animals need to be replaced, food has to be cooked, clothes need washing and mending, and the men certainly aren't doing any of this. I can see her heading for the storm cellar when the Tornado God shows up; she knows that it is a waste of time to argue with it because all it does is go round and round and destroy things. She is a lot like Benjamin the Donkey in Animal Farm: life goes on, regardless--badly. I think it is interesting that the Lord "gives" Job ten more children to replace the ones he lost--children do not just pop out of nowhere, so where did they come from? Was she a willing participant in the process of creating new children or was this just one more thing she had to put up with? Or did Job start over with a new wife (or wives) as well?
I also think it is interesting that Christian apologists who defend how Job's friends responded to him completely miss the verse where the Tornado God tells them, "I am very angry with you because you have not spoken the truth about me the way my servant Job has." So he is agreeing with Job that he is everything that Job has said about him. The authors of the Book of Job knew exactly what they were doing when they made God appear as a tornado; it's not a random choice. Quite frankly, I am surprised that the book made it into the canon of either the Jewish or Christian Bibles; it's a really subversive text that does not portray God in a flattering light. I once challenged a Christian friend to show me where in the Book of Job it says that God loves him. Oh, but God does, he loves everyone, she said. Then show me where it says that. Show me where the word love appears. I'll get back with you, she said. I'm still waiting.
Very good commentary.❤
Enjoyed reading it 👍
Great comment!! I totally agree!!
I thought Job's first wife got dizzed ... you saying she went on a holiday, hung out with in-laws or some such?
She really doesn’t appear in the book at all. I mean you can say you as a feminist find the lack of her presence to be a very interesting topic, but she is not the most interesting character, she can’t be when she’s barely alluded to
@@HkFinn83 First of all, you are making the assumption that I am a feminist. You don't know that. You are basing this assumption on my being a woman and sympathizing with this character. Secondly, why shouldn't her absence from the story be significant? Sometimes it is what is not there that may be the most important detail--I believe there is a famous Sherlock Holmes story that is built around this concept.
I was thinking about this story recently. The story of Job seems to me to be a Jewish take on what the Greeks do with bad things happening to well off people. Usually the gods get jealous or ruin that person because they desire them. In Job it seems that a prosecutorial being does that job and god welcomes it in weirdly boastful attitude.
Almost the entirety of Job is as from being Jewish as anything in The Bible.
why I love Neil Gaiman's version in Good Omens season 2... oh, yeah... these are totally NEW children. They're not the original children, those are gone for sure!
Why does God need a Starship?
My favorite movie line of all time.
Even Thanos needed a starship
When i first read the bible in my early 20's i went into it knowing nothing other than it's "The good book" I wasn't religious but i wasn't really opposed to religion or considered it a negative pox on society and critical thinking like I do now. I was of course utterly horrified with the bible's contents and The Book of Job really stood out as one of the most particularly diagnostic stories for me forming my impression of the character of God as a malignant narcissistic psychopath devoid of any empathy whatsoever who views humanity as ants who exist for no reason other than to be sycophants for him, give him adoration and labor for him.
Flash forward to today, i'm a professional artist and working on a 10 book graphic novel that allegories some of the most famous stories of the bible to try to get people to see it from my perspective, in part skewing the perspective it's told from from god and his chosen people but instead telling the story from the perspective of God's victims, most of whom are utterly devoted to him and just trying their best.
The book of job is by far the most important story to this graphic novel and sorta mirror's the main character's story throughout it. WHen i was writing the part of the script where i really hit home on this point I reread the book of job and the whole bible as it had been awhile (I've read the thing four times.) and even moreso today I found the book of job to be just one of the most horrifically indicting stories of god's character. The main character is of course faced with the same dilemma as Job as to how to view god after he's done this or allowed this to be done to him. Do you love god even more and submit and possibly accept great rewards or do you set out to destroy him so he can never do this to anybody else?
I wonder if the writers/compiler of Job weren't trying to refute the theory of karma or fate or something like that which may have existed contemporaneously
Question: what happens when one adds an eternal perspective to the authors? The apocalyptic perspective may not have developed for a few centuries more after this was written, yet the poetry contains one of the clearest references to resurrection in the Bible. And the imputation of righteousness to his children from Job's faith exercised through sacrifices, although that is neither endorsed nor criticized, what is that?
From a perspective that is not solely temporal, if Job expected to see his children after he was resurrected, wouldn't it be a blessing that he was granted more? In effect, his children were doubled in eternity, just as his cattle were doubled on earth -- a point that appears to be deliberate by the "miscount" of blessings.
The book of Job seems similar to the movie 'Trading Places' where the the rich brothers bet a dollar on how one guy will respond to sudden adversity and another to sudden fortune.
Yes, indeed.
25:00 This always made me think that the message is people are replaceable, which I also found disturbing.
I grew up hearing this story a lot, and it never made sense to me and always made me uncomfortable.
And here I always thought this book was about writing a CV and how to ace your interview >.>
Job knows the truth, that he has not sinned, that he is devoted to God, and is not deserving of his mistreatment, and God says, who are you to say that? So, man cannot know truth?
The Book of Job , and the God therein , are both abominations, imho. As is just about everything in the Old Testament…..btw, Bart’s book “God’s Problem” is so great….all about suffering and how it’s not possible to understand why there’s so much of it on this planet…cannot be reconciled with Christianity or the Jewish God of the Old Testament.
at 32'53".....we see something extremely rare: Bart's true feelings of exasperation at religious dogma; he's the consummate professional and balanced academic 99% of the time but I LOVED it when he asked rhetorically (of the person who lives blissfully without ever questioning the proposition that suffering is the will of G@d and that we shouldn't engage our faculties on the matter) "how human are you?" This was a brilliant episode that really got to the heart of the matter!
One of the most important books of the Bible.
but soooo clouded and obscure and difficult to get the meanning..
I could not wait for this discussion. I feel that Job is the most profound book in the old testament. When I was a freshman in college, my humanities prof said that Job was a contest between god and satin. I was appalled. After listening to Bart's analysis, I have a better understanding of this book after 50 years. The one thing that keeps coming to mind is whether the Jews of Europe fell back on this book during their persecution under the Nazis. I somehow wish that this was brought into Bart's discussion and analysis of Job.
Anyone who has lost a child knows that having another child does not ease the pain of loss. This book of Job conveys a cruel god who uses horrific pain to prove a point.
no....god personally appears to job to ease the pain of his loss....this is an incredible story of god meeting a man in his pain....you have to dig a little deeper than just the words---there is sooo much going on here
@@1bengrubb
But God caused jobs pain and suffering by making a wager with his own special enforcer. Almost like an abusive spouse. I love you so much I have to hurt you to help you be strong. God is the ultimate gaslighter. I’m sure the authors of job did not intend for the reader to get caught up in the duplicity and seeming sadism of god in the narrative, it was a different time but for this reader it stands out quite clearly.
I see four distinct sections and worldviews in Job, not just two. Chapters 1 and 2 say at the outset that it was satan, not God, that caused all the problems (albeit at God's prompting). But then chapters 3 through 37 ignore all that and present the argument under the maintained hypothesis that it was just God who caused everything. Then chapters 38-41 depict God as showing up to defend his honor, leaning heavily on the "might makes right" principle. Finally, someone tacked on chapter 42 at some point, figuring that we can't just end the narrative with Job being beaten down and God left looking like an ass; gotta restore Job's honor and fortunes (as though the loss of his kids in chapter 1 was inconsequential!) and make God look good again - and notice that it never explains in what way(s) Jobs friends were wrong in their arguments. No, I'm not a trained Bible scholar, but - as Garry Nolan has said when acknowledging that he's not a metallurgist - I can read.
From an "analytic idealist" point-of-view, I'd argue that the Book of Job is showing us how unbound mind (God, in religious symbolism) is not a meta-conscious agent but rather an instinctual one, behaving how it does because it is what it is. That makes it unique in major religious canon, as far as I'm aware.
Great stuff as always, thank you Bart and Megan!
JOB is not giving us the full story. He said "The thing which I greatly feared has come upon me." What did Job before Satan came? "In the days of my youth, when the SECRET OF GOD was upon my Tabernacle." Job is the oldest book in the Bible, and it's mysteries are very deep. Job 31:35 (31+35=66 book bible) "If my adversary had written a book, I would surely bind it as a crown to me." There is a lot more to say, but people respect a scholar, they don't respect an Esotericist.
Bro what does any of that Yap even mean 😂😂 tf is a meta conscious agent?? What is an instinctual one??? And what is an unbound mind?? There’s nothing instinctual about God ( your unbound mind) making a decision to fuck with Job. When anything acts instinctually there is no conscious decision been made. Instinct isn’t a thought. It’s an action. God was either testing job or punishing job so how is that an instinctual conscious mind? Please help me understand stand
@@Malik-lf6zj - God keeps saying how incomprehensible he is to a human mind like that of Job, how much beyond understanding and definitely not to be controlled or held accountable in any way. Lukas reflects that in common modern idiom, nonsensical as it may seem. But who are we to say what makes sense to a creature such as God?
Folx in the comments aren't happy, Lukas. It's a third view that isn't Creationist or Orthodox Atheist. You HAVE to be one of those two camps, ok?
@@realbrickwalls no he doesn’t. I just wanted to know what he was saying with those words that probably mean nothing
Sometimes the point of a story is what is not said, or what is not asked. Job demands evidence of his sins/wrong doings from God, which is the same as demanding evidence of God's existence. God confronts and speaks to Job after this inquiry. God is displeased, but that is irrelevant to Job, Job still got what he desired from his original demand, which is proof of God's existence. The point of the story of Job is not given directly in Job, the point comes down to one's own inner view. The point of Job is to consider: If everything was taken away from Job and Job demanded evidence of his sins from God, but God did not respond to Job. Ask yourself: What would Job have done then? Would he remain pious and praise God? Would he stop believing in God? Would he curse God? Would he believe in God but think God is faulty or not completely righteous? Would he do as his three friends suggested and strive to find sins in his own behaviour, no matter how small or seemingly insignificant? Whatever ones' view of how Job would behave through God ignoring Job's demand is the point of the story of Job.
I mean what you're saying isn't accurate at all. Job does not ruminate on his doubts of the existence of god. He is ruminating on his doubts on the morality of god's seeming judgement of him. Job rightfully has to assume god is judging him for something and job wants to have counsel with him to plead his case that he doesn't deserve this.
So what does god do? God shows up and basically shows what a monster he is and how little he cares for job or anybody else beyond what job or anybody else can do for him in worshipping him and praising him. God then rewards job for his utter submission in the face of his horrible cruelty. It's an awful story.
@@nunyabusiness9056 I never said Job runinates on his doubts of the existence of God. BECAUSE as you said, God shows up. You missed the point entirely. The question is: What would Job have done if God hadn't showed up?
It's all rhetorical...none of the events happened in real life, it's a manufactured story... Job had to repent because it was necessary for the plot of the story...
@@DarwinsStepChildren I didn't miss anything haha. Demanding evidence of ones sins isn't demanding evidence of the existence of god. You're just flat out making garbage up lol.
If i get interrogated by the police and they suggest i did something wrong, i might ask them for evidence i did some wrong doing. I"m not doubting the existence of god.
You're twisting yourself in knots here to be an apologist for this story lol.
@@nunyabusiness9056 You still haven't answered the question: What would Job have done if God hadn't shown up? If you wish to say mentioning the police and stating someone is twisting themselves in knots answers this question, then you didn't miss anything.
It's funny, I was 7, at religion school, and asked the exact same question to my cathecist about Job's children, as if the deaths of the original set was even meaningful. :D My cathecist didn't know how to answer, by the way.
I’m guiding my friend through the Bible and she’s currently on Job, it’s my absolute favorite book, “Isn’t man’s life but a drudgery?”
Either God was right and Job did NOTHING wrong, meaning that his true reward for obedience should have been being left alone OR Satan was correct, making God imperfect. Satan WAS right to the extent that God felt the need to reprimand Job towards the end of the book.
EDIT: It's all ridiculous from the start anyway. A bet to see what will happen? God is...GOD. He ALREADY KNOWS what will happen.
If god already knows like you say-----then something else is afoot....what if the real story is not written but implied
Or this is not about Gods character but suffering and what the author thinks about it, and how to bare it.
Today when I hear stories like this one, God seems more like an insecure human fabrication than the almighty creator. The devil tricks God into letting him kill 10 innocent people without incident by playing on his obsession for unwavering loyalty. This is supposedly the almighty God?
I played one of the counselors in a production of "J.B." by Archibald MacLeish. The play doesn't (as I remember it) do anything to resolve the troubling aspects of the book. I'm afraid I missed a few that you described here in my re-readings of the book itself. What a cluster! Yes, a very disturbing set of ideas. But what awful friends the "counselors" were...
Read gods very first quesiton to job as an answer......probe that for a bit
Ironically, had Bart understood Job from a non -Christian perspective, I strongly believe he'd still be a Christian today.
The least interesting part of the story for me is that it can be argued from the names of the new children and the fact that unlike all other possessions, they weren't doubled in number, that God had restored the souls taken by Satan. He doubles Jobs joy to compensate for the suffering, not as a reward.
God did all that to tell us a story about his system of justice. Job is the first and still best treatment of theodicy. God sets this all up for the sake of the book, for this lesson to the rest of humanity.
Satan is God's angel. At his service. His job is to bring calamity, to advise evil plans. See, it's all about free will. If God forces us into an action, he gets the reward not us. You don't pay a man you have a gun to his head. We cannot get to heaven without freely choosing to do Godly actions. And heaven is the goal of life. We have God and the angels doing their best to protect people, to teach morality, it's like pushing people to make a choice. They need a counter force for balance, to give us a higher merit for doing a good deed. And they need the chaos of nature to hide the divine order. You can't tell if God stopped a tsunami and saved a million people. If he stopped a nuclear apocalypse. But you can tell there are tsunamis, and atomic bombs, and bad people who want to use them. If bad people didn't exist, if science told us there should be tsunamis but in reality God stopped all harmful ones, would we not be compelled to believe, would we be able to choose evil?
So God asks Satan where he's been. Dah God, walking around earth enjoying the view. Oh wow, did you see my favorite innocent guy? He is soooo good don't you think?
God is clearly goading Satan to suggest harming Job. But God won't suggest it Himself because He does not want to speak evil. That's Satan's job. Satan takes the bait and tells God to deprive Job of what he gave him. God refuses and tells Satan to do as he wills. Again nothing specific about harming a man, except something specific to not take Jobs life. Job will be instrumental in the teaching.
Job loses everything he has, kids included, and he knows it's from God. He trusts God still that He was righteous. If this was a bet, Satan lost. Job didn't love God because of his blessings, rather because of who he is.
Satan comes back and again God goals him. Look how great Job is. Well, says Satan, he is still healthy. Job knows God took his health. Rleative health is something that is taken for granted by others, not something God has to give. Job has every right to file for grievance now. What kind of bet is this? What is the point? The point of course is that God wants to face Job and explain the world to him. Satan's job is done. He no longer appears in the book. Not to settle any bets, not to claim victory or admit defeat.
Jobs friends come and the poetry starts. It must have replaced some less satisfying prose, but the theme is the same, not different. The friends cheer Job up by telling him if only he repented he could be restored. Job promises he did nothing wrong. As a righteous man he won't lie even to ingratitude himself to a capricious God. The friends now get angrier, how dare Job impune God's reputation even by suggestion. He must have been a wicked sinner. Job replies: look around and face reality. There is no justice for anyone. Job was the most righteous man. Helped the widow, fed the homeless. Had he rejoiced at his own success or even his enemies misfortune he would not accuse God. As it is, God cares not about justice or mankind. Job wishes he were never born.
This is worse than cursing God. If this was a bet, Satan won. By no means should Job be rewarded by God for this.
Job also doesn't demand God justifies Himself to him. He prayed to him a lot, but he only states his bitter disappointment of reality and expectations from a just God, whose existence he does not doubt.
God appears to Job, not to scare him, rather that's His form when talking to men. Part 1: God details miracles he made to create a wonderful world. And here is the first answer. Job's experiences and observations are anecdotal. But God's actions transcend space and time. He did far more than man can know to bring truelly appreciable beauty. Should God be judged as uncaring because of anecdotal evidence and should we dismiss all he's done? Is that truthful? Or is it possible God setup the world so bad things can happen so that we have free will? God does not tell Job about Satan. Job truly does not know why these troubles afflicted him. But Satan would have afflicted trouble on some one. God had just redirected him to Job for this lesson in this book.
Part 2. God created fearsome creatures, Satan, nature. Cruel, unyielding, unforgiving. There is no sympathy, no mercy there. And He can control them when it is necessary, but he won't always do it. God doesn't explain the free will cause to our ancient forefathers, but it should appear clear to us.
God turns to Jobs friends and tells them they were wicked to accuse Job and Job was right. He had a right to grieve, to hurt, to seek justice and complain when he didn't find it. He has a right and obligation to question God and seek the answers for his faith. His friends should have supported him in that quest.
Job is rewarded for accusing God of injustice, not for pretending the world is already divine and refusing to curse God.
God gives a timeless answer to an ancient man. He may not be able to explain His reasons to a man lacking advance philosophical and scientific underpinnings, but God can point to the things beyond our understanding and say, though they can cause suffering and injustice,, He created them for the overall benefit of mankind. He can ask for our faith on that matter. He earned that.
It’s an odd God that’s portrayed in Job. He’s not an attractive character at all, he’s neither reasonable, nor kind nor even good in any way that we would think of nowadays.
but what if this event is the first discovery of life after death?
To me, the authors forgot god was supposed to be all knowing so for god to wager with Satan on whether job would stay faithful comes off as cruel and sadistic. The question of suffering that this narrative is supposed to answer ends up being an indictment against god.
All nonsense anyway.
There are a few places in the bible where the god character wasn't all knowing. It's been several years since I've read it though.
Jesus said unless you eat my flesh and drink my blood you have no part in me.... The god here is no different
@@ginafrancis4950 if this God is all knowing and Satan is not then there is some other un mentioned objective.
18:40 BART "god is testing him.. he's seeing if job will remain faithful even if there is suffering"...wrong --that is Satan's test----there is a lot of things god is accomplishing but "discovering" if job will remain faithful is not one of them. SATAN'S question of "will job remain faithful" is just coincident to what god wants to accomplish in job.
I always enjoy your videos. However, this one on Job does not sit comfortably with me. There are subtle nuances in the Book of Job that you do not take into account. After the dialogue between Job and his friends, God blames the friends for not speaking right of God as Job did. God did not dismiss Job's position entirely. In the great poem of God's speech, the principle of causality is undermined - making room for mystery and paradox. In logic and traditional theology, the principle of causality and its theological equivalent retribution are seen as the foundation of 'meaning'. Here and in the book of Ecclesiastes this view is challenged. However, the world is not surrendered to total chaos. The central motives in God's speech are procreation and nourishment, indicating that God is trustworthy although He is not predictable.
For those who don't bother to read all the nonsense in the Book of Job, here are some highlights:
God makes a bet with his son, Satan. God tells Satan to do nasty things to Job to see if he can get him to curse God to his face. 1:6-12
God gives Satan power over all that Job possesses. 1:12
God kills (or allows Satan to kill) Job's children, but Job doesn't "foolishly" blame God. Since God was responsible, why would it be foolish to blame God? 1:20-22
The sons of God came to present themselves before the Lord, and Satan came also among them."
Satan is the son of God -- the only one that God ever seems to talk to. 1:6, 2:1
God and Satan play a little game with Job. God allows Satan to torment Job, just to see how he will react. 2:3-7
"So went Satan forth from the presence of the LORD, and smote Job with sore boils from the sole of his foot unto his crown." 2:7
"They rent every one his mantle, and sprinkled dust upon their heads." 2:12
"Is there any taste in the white of an egg?" 6:6
Does God pervert Justice? Well, if you believe the Bible he sure as hell does! 8:3
"He runneth upon me like a giant." 16:14
"I have sewed sackcloth upon my skin, and defiled my horn in the dust." 16:15
Job says "my breath is strange to my wife." Mine too. 19:17
"His breasts are full of milk." 21:24
When things were going well for Job he washed his steps with butter and rocks poured out rivers of oil. 29:6
Job's "bowels boiled." Now that doesn't sound pleasant. 30:27
Job is the brother of dragons. 30:29
"For God speaketh in a dream ... He openeth the ears of men, and sealeth their instruction." 33:14-16
"By the breath of God frost is given." 37:10
"Then the LORD answered Job out of the whirlwind." 38:1
The morning stars sang together, and all the sons of God shouted for joy." 38:7
God could (if he wanted to) pick up the earth by its ends and shake all the wicked people off of it. 38:13
God has snow and hail stored up to use later in time of trouble and war. 38:22
"Out of whose womb came the ice?" Gosh, I don't know. Was it Glinda, the Good Witch of the North? 38:29
"Who can stay the bottles of heaven?" Gosh, I don't know. I didn't even know there were any bottles in heaven. 38:37
"Gird up thy loins now like a man." 38:3, 40:7
Bible believers have identified the behemoth as a hippopotamus, dinosaur, wildebeest, or crocodile. But my favorite is the way these verses are translated by Stephen Mitchell: "Look now: the Beast that I made: he eats grass like a bull. Look: the power in his thighs, the pulsing sinews of his belly. His penis stiffens like a pine; his testicles bulge with vigor." 40:15-16
"Canst thou draw out leviathan with an hook? or his tongue with a cord?" 41:1
After God and Satan get done tormenting Job, God gave Job even more stuff than he had before, including children. God gave Job another set of 10 kids, with even prettier daughters! 42:13-15
"Which shaketh the earth out of her place, and the pillars thereof tremble."
The earth rests upon pillars and doesn't move (unless God gets angry or something). 9:6
"Which commandeth the sun, and it riseth not."
The earth is fixed and the sun travels about it. 9:7
"The measure thereof is longer than the earth."
What is the length of a sphere? 11:9
Heaven is set upon pillars that tremble when God gets mad. 26:11
God spread out the sky, which is a solid structure, hard and strong like a mirror. 37:18
The earth is set on foundations and it does not move. 38:4-6
God could (if he wanted to) pick up the earth by its ends and shake all the wicked people off of it. 38:13
"Wilt thou hunt the prey for the lion?"
God seems pleased to have created prey for lions and ravens to eat. 38:39-41
Ostriches are not cruel and stupid birds who abandon their eggs to die after laying them, as these verses imply. They are, in fact, careful and attentive parents. The male scoops out a hollow for the eggs, which are incubated by the female during the day and the male at night. After the eggs are hatched, they are cared for by the mother for over a month, at which time the chicks can keep up with running adults. 39:13-16
www.skepticsannotatedbible.com/job/abs_list.html
of course job "blames" god.....he doens't foolishly "curse" god. Job knows god is doing it all
This book de-converted me.
You let a book take your faith away from you?
@@tryme3969 do you believe that aesop witnessed a race between a tortoise and a hare?
If a finite mind meets the infinite how does that change the reading?? Hint God's very first question is actually the answer.
@@mister_kanielathe characterization of God is the issue not if you believe the event
@@mister_kaniela Are you trying to make a point or just being silly?
It was pointed out to me (by an evangelical no less) that when G$d decided to test Job through loss and affliction, he didn't take away the old ball & chain......now that's a parable!
That's right! And then she has to pump out twice as many children! I'd say she'd be ready to curse God and die!! 😆😆😆
Fun fact: Job is the oldest book of the bible, and shows a very different view of God.
what is the view that is different?
JOB is not giving us the full story. He said "The thing which I greatly feared has come upon me." What did Job before Satan came? "In the days of my youth, when the SECRET OF GOD was upon my Tabernacle." Job 31:35 (31+35=66 book bible) "If my adversary had written a book, I would surely bind it as a crown to me."
That's somewhat misleading. It IS in all likelihood a very old story - almost certainly from ancient Mesopotamian sources (though almost certainly not as old as, say, the flood narrative adapted from Mesopotamian sources and imported into Genesis at around the same time).
But it's a very late addition to the writings section of the Tanakh. Its inclusion dates back to - at the earliest - the Babylonian exile, if not the Achaemenid Persian period.
Bart's claim that the Book of Job was written in the 5th or 6th century B.C. is highly suspect, and your presentation that Job is the OLDEST book in the Bible, written even before Moses' Pentateuch, is quite likely correct.
With all due respect to Dr. Ehrman who's fogotten more theology & early church history than I know, the views he expressed about the Book of Job's ending lacking a unified theme & message is not predominant in mainstream schlarship. Please review the commentary & notes in recent Oxford Annotated Bible.
I guess the only "mainstream scholarship" he mentioned was the agreement on 2 editors.
@@1bengrubb Thanks & again with all due respect to Dr. Ehrman who sometimes reminds me of a reformed alcoholic in his skepticism aimed primarily at Scriptural literalists; something like a former drinker who wants nothing do with alcohol. IMHO there's another path between the skeptics & literalists where we can treat the NT as having some historical value even if not a historical document. Dr. Michael Bird I think does a good job with that & was recognized by Dr. Ehrman as "learned" even if the 2 disagreed.
Isn't Job a pre Hebrew story/text?
I strongly suspect the Satan is a parody of the leader of the lying spirits in 1 Kings 22: 20-23, and Job's response to all the bad news to thank God is a parody of King Hezekiah in 2 Kings 20: 12-19. Then most of the book of Job is an extensive dialectic from a few authors about the deeper moral and theological implications of those parodies.
Claiming that 10 more children would see someone "restored" after having lost their first 10 suggests that this story was written by some "wise" old idiot. Presumably one who has never had kids.
And what about a the 10 innocents who were killed simply as collateral damage in this heavenly wager? Were they somehow "restored" after being snuffed out also? And then there are all the other bereaved family members? Given that Jobs "children" were clearly adult children, it is safe enough to assume that there were most likely wives/husbands of these "children" who lost their partners, and also children who lost their parents?
Anyone who thinks this story sets any good example regarding morals or righteousness needs to take a good hard look at themselves, and then ask how they ever became so deluded and divorced from rational thought.
The best synopsis of the book of Job was the folk rock song by Seatrain in the '70's, "The Tale of Job" !
8:30 ... all of Job's family are killed except his harpy wife ... double curse!!! 🤣
Interesting that God didn't just tell Job at the end that He and the Accusor had a bet and God won! "And as a reward, Job, here's a bunch more children!" (Job's wife: "Wait, what?! I have to pump out twice as many children??!! How young do you think I am?!" 😆
So, Job basically has nothing to repent for until he questions God and God takes offense, "Hey! Who are you??!!" Job: "Awww, you're right, I'm sorreeee!" God: "Okay, we're good!"
you seem to have many different pairs of glasses
I've never understood why if God is eternal, omnipotent, omnipresent and omniscient, why is there any space for a Satan? Surely that is proof that the writings are the thoughts of men who are trying to understand the world. A God who was eternal, omnipotent, omnipresent and omniscient has absolutely no need for a Satan. On the other hand, men (or women) who are trying to make sense of how the world works might invent a God to explain what they can't understand, and then invent a Satan to help explain why a God can't control the chaos.
Job is an Uz-realite!
Let's just take a moment to remember all the servants in Job's service killed to test Job's righteousness and their bereaved families.
As a child in a "job" of a family, one of seven sons with three sisters, the idea that Job's wife would have to go through more pregnancies and likely miscarriages to give back to Job his "job" of kids rather horrifies me.
I think you are missing exactly how the outer story depicts the wealth of Job. He has camels, donkeys, paired oxen, and sheep. And the servants to care for them. Donkeys have one real use, to carry heavy loads for rural delivery of goods, camels carry goods long distances in caravans, paired oxen pull heavy wagons of goods over roads. In the outer story these all get stolen. Sheep are the odd item, but they can provide nonperishable uncarded, spune, or woven wool as potential trade goods to round out the loads Job is sending around, to help make a profit.
Job was the Jeff Bezos of his day.
A what strikes me as stupid about the writing of the outer story is that none of these animals and their caretakers would ever be in one place at one to be stolen or killed in one raid. They would be out doing their work. Even sheep wouldn't be kept together. Those poor sheep, killed by an exploding volcano.
I think the inner story is actually a pretty good effort to put forward different reasons why suffering happens, differing philosophical viewpoints on the suffering of the innocent.
Note that Job lives in a tent (inner story)while his oldest son lives in an admittedly poorly built house (outer story). You'd think with his own house that son at least would have given Job a grand child, but no mention of spouses or grandchildren.
When I read Job the story struck me as having three layers, the poetic inner core, a middle buffer describing the personal harm done to Job, his wife's part, and the appearance of Jaweh to brag on creating the world with his amusing beastry, and the third layer being the wealth loss and restoration wrapped around that, along with El holding his council meeting with Jaweh and the Satan, El's inspector/provocator, attending. The Satan strikes me as being rather put out with Jaweh's prying, rather than acting shifty. The way the Satan challenges Yaweh's boosting by saying Yaweh's holds Job safe from the Satan, under his personal protection, makes me feel that El had assigned the position of the Satan to one of his sons especially to see how well the tribal gods were doing.
I think the original lyrical poets who composed the inner core didn't even describe the suffering of Job because that would be more effective during a recitation, "You've all heard of the suffering of Job, but let me tell you about..." Let the audience imagine the worst infliction they could rather than get into an argument with them over whether what the poet gave was really all that bad.
So good.
This story brought me through some very difficult times… and, yes, I’m receiving everything back, in many forms 🥰🙏🏻
eres ateo?
Always wondered if Job hadn't originally ended at 42:11, right before he got everything back like it never happend. It feels very tacked-on, like someone hated that it didn't have a happy ending, and didn't care that adding one kinda defeated the point of the story.
Glasses game on point as always!
If God has to test people's devotion, it means he is not all knowing. YHVH only makes sense as regional god, one among many, a petty despot.
I’ve read the bible seven times cover to cover, there should be an award for putting one’s self through that. To be the book of Job is the most disturbing book in the Bible. Not only does the book directly blame god for jobs suffering. Gods response to Job when he finally cries out is basically “who the hell do you think you are to question me. I’m god and do what I please”. Gods giving job a new family and greater riches is appalling when you think god someone thinks giving Job another family somehow makes it alright.
My thought is that this may be the best explanation for suffering, especially starting in 38. If one believes bad things are the result of bad behavior, punishment makes sense. But we know from the beginning is that Job is innocent. So, for me, God is saying “you think you can ask me for explanations. If you think you understand, answer this. Explain the Unified Field Theory. What triggered the Big Bang? What is Dark Energy and Dark Matter? Because if you can’t understand this universe, why do you think you can understand my explanation?
Stop conflating difficult science questions with religious BS.
@@dominicestebanrice7460those “difficult science questions” are just the surface of reality. Which shows gods point all the more
Way back in University, I wrote an enormous work I titled, Bargaining with the Devil: A Game Theoretic Analysis. One of the chapters was on the Book of Job. From memory (this was 40 years ago) the conclusion was that given the strategies and outcomes (in matrix form) God would continue testing Job until God runs out of ways of testing Job. My conclusion was that Job finally begins questioning God’s action when the only thing left to take from him is his Wife. Who, up until then, had been left conspicuously untouched.
Spare a thought for Mrs Job. All the pregnancies and natural births. She was bereaved of her children like Job was. When, in the immeasurable grief and desolation she asked why Job didn't curse God to get things over with, she was called a fool.
And when Job's fortunes and family were restored she had to go through all the pregnancies and births again.
Just because God and Satan had a little wager about a man's loyalty.
To me, that is pretty bloody callous...
@@johandelen1838 Good thing it’s only a story. The interesting question is why would such a story be created? What is it about the circumstances in which the author(s) are living that such a story is designed to address?
@@kencusick6311 I agree with you, it is a story, in my mind it is a parable. It is a story meant to convey a truth or to give information.
Judging by the end of the story , God knew from the beginning that Job wasn't as perfect as he could be and allowed a situation to develop to expose some flaw in Job that wasn't obvious to anyone but God and maybe also Elihu. It is evident that Job comes to a self awareness at the end, that the whole episode was designed to elicit. It appears to me that Job had some error in his thinking that God was correcting. It seems to me that God knew Job meant well even if he didn't fully understand God. It seems to me that God was using Satan, who was also misreading Job, to create a situation to get Job's attention to increase and improve Job's self awareness, which seems to have been that Job didn't actually know as much as he thought he did, that he, Job, didn't actually have the full picture, quite.
I think the comforting thing about the story is that we relax and trust God to do his good work in us, and bring us to where he wants us, our own failings not withstanding Him.