The ‘scrapheap’ Job -- #142

[July 2006 journal entry]

Re the intent of Job’s three close friends, Peterson has -- “ . . . to keep company and comfort him” (2:11). Another possibility permitted by the Hebrew wording would be – “to show grief or mourn and to comfort or console”.

The ‘scrapheap’ Job -- #141

[July 2006 journal entry]

What could Job do to save his life? The counsel/pressure the ‘scrapheap’ Job receives from his three close friends reinforces the Accuser’s proposition – even to the point of their knowingly counseling/pressuring him to violate his integrity. They press him to trust/hold the ‘religious’ T/O paradigm, to fall prostrate before ‘God’ begging for mercy (e.g., 8:5). Elihu presses him to consider his plight a divinely engineered opportunity for spiritual refinement. The whirlwind ‘God’ humiliates the ‘scrapheap’ Job without even addressing his plight.

The ‘scrapheap’ Job -- #140

[July 2006 journal entry]

The answers individuals give to “What is more important than saving my life?” reveal each one’s character/integrity. The person for whom saving one’s life trumps all other considerations is very self-centered, ready to manipulate/exploit all others to achieve his/her end. The same is true at the national (foreign policy) level.

The ‘scrapheap’ Job -- #139

[July 2006 journal entry]

Was the Accuser’s counter argument that “a human would do anything to save his life” (2:4) an accepted truism in antiquity? Is it now? I suspect the distribution of individuals would be weighted heavily toward the ‘do anything’ end of the spectrum. Medical decision-making in life-threatening situations is but one illuminating place to look for evidence. A demonstration of the validity of the Accuser’s assessment can also be seen clearly at the foreign policy level. How does the Accuser’s proposition fit with the ‘religious’ T/O paradigm? Would ‘religious’ T/O paradigm theologies – which are centered by the eventual reduction of all life circumstances to divine will -- justify/encourage attempts by adherents to save their lives? No. For such would finally be seen as defiance and weak faith.

The ‘scrapheap’ Job -- #138

[July 2006 journal entry]

I would cast the prologue’s celestial scene with ‘God’ surrounded by an angelic host as similar to an ancient royal court. Anyone entering a monarch’s presence had to be introduced and had to have some valid reason to intrude. The prologue’s celestial scene should be cast as a monarch receiving reports of the outcome of battles or as a medical school dean or department chair or as politicians (especially federal) (or perhaps as a Wizard of Id!). The point – the monarch and, therefore, ‘God’ have no intimate or direct familiarity with what is happening ‘below’. From the ‘scrapheap’, Job most often seems to be thinking, “If I could only get his attention . . .” or “If I could only get through the bureaucracy . . .” -- suggesting he wants to hold to a view of ‘God’ analogous to Queen Elizabeth behind the scenes as the English Puritans were with her approval systematically contained/crushed all the while thinking the Queen above the bureaucracy was their ally. The whirlwind ‘God’ enters the story minus a royal court entourage and appears to have more immediate knowledge of happenings on earth (though there is no suggestion the whirlwind ‘God’ has any interest in or empathy toward human suffering).

The ‘scrapheap’ Job -- #137

[July 2006 journal entry]

When, in the development of Jewish thought in antiquity, did the pre/nonscientific cosmology (1:6ff) assumed in the story/play Job – e.g., angels, ‘God’ enthroned, an Accuser, celestial beings ‘checking things out on the earth’, ‘God’ causing or permitting things to happen on earth, . . . – become presupposed or taken for granted? With these cosmological presuppositions, how does ‘God’ know of the tragedies described in the prologue? Does the wording in the prologue suggest any divine empathy for the victims? I do not detect it.

The ‘scrapheap’ Job -- #136

[July 2006 journal entry]

What does it mean for the name ‘God’ to be blessed (1:21)? I see one answer in the story/play’s prologue with the messengers cycling through the royal court with reports that end with accolades. This ‘blessing’ – which is characteristic of liturgies (e.g., hymns, prayers, sermons) within the ‘religious’ T/O paradigm – reminds me of the conniving daughters in King Lear. Such honoring does not accurately or honestly reflect the depth and breadth of human suffering.

The ‘scrapheap’ Job -- #135

[July 2006 journal entry]

The introduction of Job’s children in the prologue creates cause for pause re Job and parenting. Hosting party after party is not what I want my or other’s first thought about my children to be. Some have suggested that Job’s children feasted only on each one’s birthday. But the text could easily refer to round after round of feasting, suggesting that they were quite spoiled and living off their father’s wealth.

The ‘scrapheap’ Job -- #134

[July 2006 journal entry]

Would the wealth attributed to Job in the prologue have appeared exceptional in antiquity? Yes, unless Job is cast as a monarch. Five hundred yoke of oxen imply large fields. And the camels would be for show if the story/play is cast in a time when camels had not yet been domesticated. What would be an equivalent description in current United States terms? Perhaps a Bill Gates. Job is ‘filthy rich’. What should we deduce from this description and from hints scattered throughout the text re Job’s lifestyle? I would cast him as living a pampered life even excessive for (D)euteronomic promises of blessing, . . . beyond a gated community, more like a compound. I would cast him and his family as fenced in by servants and by the walls of a grand estate. Within the ‘religious’ T/O paradigm, the explanation/justification would be – “If Job is so incredibly blessed, then he must be incredibly good/righteous”.

The ‘scrapheap’ Job -- #133

[July 2006 journal entry]

Who does Job – before, during, and after his ‘scrapheap’ experience -- consider his neighbor (i.e., “love your neighbor”).

The ‘scrapheap’ Job -- #132

[July 2006 journal entry]

Does ‘hate evil’ necessarily imply ‘love good’? The short version of the story/play (i.e., prologue plus epilogue) does not specifically present Job as compassionate or as loving good. The prologue does suggest an intense effort by Job not to be in the presence of or dirtied by evil. The heated exchanges with his three close friends in the extended version of the story/play do suggest he confronted evil with good. The Accuser’s wager raises doubt that Job’s hating evil and his loving good are unconditional behaviors.

The ‘scrapheap’ Job -- #131

[July 2006 journal entry]

A rewriting idea re the story/play – to write Koheleth (who delivers the monologue in the Ecclesiastes essay) into the story/play as a fourth and late-arriving friend of Job.

The ‘scrapheap’ Job -- #130

[July 2006 journal entry]

Peterson’s translation says Job “hated evil with a passion” (1:1-5). The Hebrew wording literally says that Job “turned away from evil”. Does Job hate with a passion the consequences that befell the unnamed victims in the prologue tragedies? Are there indications scattered through the story/play that would make concrete what this passionate hatred of evil would lead Job to do? Does the ‘scrapheap’ Job vary the nuance for ‘evil’ in the course of the story/play?

The ‘scrapheap’ Job -- #129

[July 2006 journal entry]

What does Job consider to be ‘evil’? The two prologue references (1:1 and 2:10) use the same term. Job might define ‘evil’ in several ways. He might think of breaking moral and/or ritual laws. (The Testament of Job – in circulation in the time of ‘Jesus’ and the beginning of Christianity -- draws particular attention to the latter.) Or he might think of not being faithful in relationships (e.g., not caring for the oppressed). The ‘scrapheap’ Job and his three close friends should be cast as sifting through all such ideas of evil in their efforts to explain Job’s plight.

The ‘scrapheap’ Job -- #128

[July 2006 journal entry]

A staging question -- Should the three close friends be staged as all present for all the heated exchanges with the ‘scrapheap’ Job?

The ‘scrapheap’ Job -- #127

[July 2006 journal entry]

‘Suffering’ (2:13) also merits a word study. The Hebrew word is rooted in the experience of pain -- mental or physical. In the story/play, the ‘scrapheap’ Job (14:22, 16:6) and Eliphaz (2:13, 5:18) use the term.

The ‘scrapheap’ Job -- #126

[July 2006 journal entry]

Peterson’s translation has ‘trouble’ where the RSV has ‘evil’ (2:11). Is Peterson’s interpretation appropriate? helpful? The Hebrew word brings to mind misery, distress, injury. The word can be used to refer to moral evil as well as to life troubles. Peterson’s ‘trouble’ may be too mild, more neutral than ‘evil’. The RSV’s ‘evil’ assesses Job’s experiences to be indeed tragic.

The ‘scrapheap’ Job -- #125

[July 2006 journal entry]
‘Friend’ is another key word in the story/play. The word occurs thirteen times (2:11, 6:14, 6:27, 12:4, 16:20, 16:21, 17:5, 19:21, 30:29, 31:9, 32:3, 35:4, 42:7, 42:10). The term is used only by the narrator (2:11, 42;7, 42:10), by Elihu (32:3, 35:4), or by the ‘scrapheap’ Job (all other occurrences). For the disappointed ‘scrapheap’ Job, his three close friends are not friends ‘in the singular’ (i.e., the phrase used by Bonhoeffer and Bethge to describe the liberty and confidence essential to their special friendship) because they are not truly present with him as he thinks and speaks radically (i.e., to root) about the reversals in his life’s fortune. For Elihu (who appears to be a character added later to the story/play) they are not true friends because they fail to defend the ‘religious’ T/O paradigm properly and forcefully in their responses to the ‘scrapheap’ Job.

The ‘scrapheap’ Job -- #124

[July 2006 journal entry]

Christian variations on the ‘religious’ T/O paradigm from the beginning have continued the contractual agreement and preferential treatment models. However, the proposition the Gospel of Matthew attributes to ‘Jesus’ (i.e., that “God causes the rain to fall on the just and the unjust”) introduces a perspective driven by neither of these models, suggesting that ‘Jesus’ – if distinguished from the ‘religious’ T/O paradigm – might bring the missing character into the story/play Job (i.e., a character who can be with Job without further harming him). What is the radical edge here? Is ‘Jesus’ offering one more variation on the whirlwind ‘God’ in the story/play Job? Or is ‘Jesus’ weaving together the Psalms’ “the steadfast love of the Lord never ceases” refrain with the inclusive/universal position in the debate re whether the ‘God’ of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob should be understood to be the ‘God’ of the nations?

The ‘scrapheap’ Job -- #123

[July 2006 journal entry]

The (D)euteronomic theology then/now characteristic of the ‘religious’ T/O paradigm encouraged/s a contractual expectation that righteousness guaranteed/s blessing and unrighteousness guaranteed/s cursing. The wisdom proposed in Proverbs and affirmed within the ‘religious’ T/O paradigm taught/teaches that observation demonstrates the righteous have reason to expect preferential treatment in life situations. Both these perspectives – contractual agreement and preferential treatment -- are found in the prologue to the story/play Job. Throughout the heated exchanges, the ‘scrapheap’ Job’s three close friends become increasingly strident in defending the contractual agreement model. The ‘scrapheap’ Job attacks both the contractual agreement model and the preferential treatment model. The whirlwind ‘God’ later in the story/play does not accept being held accountable as in the contractual agreement model. Nor does the whirlwind ‘God’ claim to have been preferentially attentive to Job.

The ‘scrapheap’ Job -- #122

[July 2006 journal entry]

Is the foolishness with which Job charges his wife (2:10) an echo of the wisdom recorded in Proverbs? Is Job’s response to his wife consistent with the wisdom promoted in Proverbs? with the ‘religious’ T/O paradigm? The wisdom recorded in Proverbs and the theologies found wihtin the ‘religious’ T/O paradigm were/are rooted in ‘the fear of the Lord’ or ‘the fear of the Almighty’. The risk in approaching a monarch as pictured in the story of Esther is analogous.

The ‘scrapheap’ Job -- #121

[July 2006 journal entry]

“Curse God and die” exposes the fine print of the ‘religious’ T/O paradigm re ‘God’. By analogy Job’s wife appears to be saying, “Just give up and let the king finish the job”. Every other character with a speaking part in the story/play -- including ‘God’ and the Accuser -- thinks, speaks, and acts within the cosmological and theological assumptions/boundaries of the ‘religious’ T/O paradigm. The differences among the characters illustrate that the ‘religious’ T/O paradigm tolerates a limited range of variations on core themes. Job’s wife alone is so disgusted with viewing the tragedies as of/from ‘God’ that she is ready to reject both the ‘religious’ T/O paradigm and its ‘God’. She certainly no longer sees this ‘God’ as worthy of worship or service. It would be valuable to hear more from her in the story/play. Eliphaz tries to challenge the ‘religious’ T/O paradigm, but he quickly moves back to defending the paradigm. Bildad and Zophar do not go as near the edge as does Eliphaz.

The ‘scrapheap’ Job -- #120

[July 2006 journal entry]

As the heated exchanges with his three close friends begin and escalate, the integrity to which the ‘scrapheap’ Job holds becomes more his consistency (even in pushing his pre-tragedy ‘religious’ T/O paradigm to its logical end -- i.e., questioning the integrity of ‘God’). The result – the ‘scrapheap’ Job claims to be ready to sacrifice the reputation and status available to him within the ‘religious’ T/O paradigm rather than to surrender his integrity.

The ‘scrapheap’ Job -- #119

[July 2006 journal entry]

The story/play opens with ‘God’ attributing integrity to Job. The prologue references to Job’s integrity appear to be tied to his allegiance to the ‘religious’ T/O paradigm. In other words, integrity in the prologue means being faithful to and consistent with the ‘religious’ T/O paradigm. The prologue also implies confidence -- over against the Accuser’s charge -- that ‘God’ too has integrity. The Accuser turns the assessment of Job’s integrity toward Job’s motivations. Job’s wife questions the integrity of the ‘religious’ T/O paradigm’s reassurance that all experiences are from ‘God’ and therefore, are ultimately good. (Macleish, in his award-winning Broadway play J.B., takes this position re Job’s wife.) Job responds to his wife by attributing evil as well as good to ‘God’. He does not deviate from the view that either ‘God’ causes evil or does not care that evil exists.

The ‘scrapheap’ Job -- #118

[July 2006 journal entry]

How should the statements of Job’s wife be expressed/interpreted on stage -- “Still holding on to your precious integrity, are you? Curse God and be done with it!” (2:9). It is important to trace the meanings, references, and nuances associated with the concept ‘integrity’ in the story/play. The Hebrew root form for ‘integrity’ occurs five times in the story/play (more times in Job than in any other writing in Jewish scripture). In the story/play, the word is used by ‘God’ (2:3), Job’s wife (2:9), and the ‘scrapheap’ Job (26:11, 27:5, 31:6). Job’s three close friends do not use the term.

The ‘scrapheap’ Job -- #117

[July 2006 journal entry]

The prologue has ‘God’ complain to the Accuser, “You tried to trick me into destroying him” (2:3). The RSV has “without cause”. Is the word ‘destroy’ to be taken literally? materially? spiritually? The Hebrew word means to swallow up. Is the statement -- “You tried to trick me into destroying him?” -- suggesting that ‘God’ has violated the ‘religious’ T/O paradigm in that there is, by the admission of ‘God’, no cause? Or, again, is this admission pointing to a fatal flaw/conflict at the core of that paradigm -- i.e., all that happens cannot be attributed to ‘the will of God’ without either attributing evil to ‘God’ or calling evil good?

The ‘scrapheap’ Job -- #116

[July 2006 journal entry]

Job worships ‘God’ (1:20). A word study re ‘worship’ is in order here. Is the term ‘worship’ linked in any way with fear? The Hebrew term for worship builds on the image of bowing. To worship is to bow down, to prostrate oneself, to recognize the superiority of the one worshiped. From a ‘scrapheap’ or ‘non-religious’ perspective, this posture deteriorates into a dog’s rolling onto his/her back in submission analogy. Given Job’s nobility/aristocracy as well as his honesty, he predictably resists rolling onto his back like a submissive dog. What about those not so privileged?

The ‘scrapheap’ Job -- #115

[July 2006 journal entry]

The “did not charge God with wrong” and “did not sin with his lips” (2:10) references to Job’s restraint should be on the list of references/concepts in the prologue (along with the references to integrity, hedge, fear, whirlwind, curse, . . .) that are developed in surprising/intense directions in the heated exchanges between the ‘scrapheap’ Job and his three close friends.

The ‘scrapheap’ Job -- #114

[July 2006 journal entry]

For the ‘religious’ T/O paradigm, what appears/feels evil must finally be considered in reality good because the ‘God’ behind the events must be exonerated as only doing good. From a ‘scrapheap’ or ‘non-religious’ perspective, these events and experiences are essentially evil in that the victims are disrespected and have their worth/dignity assaulted. I find no compelling argument in the story/play that Job’s suffering/misery is just. He is humiliated. So many others are victimized. If there is intent, it is a mean, cruel, sadistic. Shifting blame to the prologue’s Accuser finally breaks down within the ‘religious’ T/O paradigm, unless some form of metaphysical dualism is adopted. But that would contradict the core of the ‘religious’ T/O paradigm (i.e., the unlimited and unquestioned sovereignty of ‘God’).

The ‘scrapheap’ Job -- #113

[July 2006 journal entry]
Does Job’s premise in the prologue that every experience (evil as well as good) comes from ‘the hand of God’ (2:9-10) stem from a fatal flaw/conflict at the core of the ‘religious’ T/O paradigm? Yes. The conclusion that ‘God’ is responsible for all human experiences (or that all human experiences – including the worst of human suffering/misery -- have inherently benevolent intent/value) seems unavoidable within the ‘religious’ T/O paradigm, given the language/views of divine sovereignty permitted/encouraged by the ‘religious’ T/O paradigm. As suggested in Job’s prologue comments, any essential distinction between good and evil disappears within the ‘religious’ T/O paradigm.