The ‘scrapheap Job’ -- #16

Peterson uses ‘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 word ‘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 ‘scrap heap Job’ (14:22, 16:6) and Eliphaz (2:13, 5:18) use the term.

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

Peterson’s translation says Job “hated evil with a passion” (1:1-5). The Hebrew wording literally says that Job “turned away from evil”.

What does Job consider to be ‘evil’? The prologue references (1:1 and 2:10) involve 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 years 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 ‘scrap heap 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.

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 ‘scrap heap Job’ vary the nuance for ‘evil’ in the course of the story/play?

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 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 implies doubt that Job’s hating evil and his loving good are unconditional behaviors.

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 introduction of Job’s children 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’ -- #15

“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 at times, but he quickly moves back to defending the paradigm. Bildad and Zophar do not go as near the edge as does Eliphaz.

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 of 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 (D)euteronomic theology then/now 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 Job story/play. Throughout the heated exchanges, Job’s three close friends become increasingly strident in defending the contractual agreement model. The ‘scrap heap 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.

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 Job story/play (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 Job story/play? 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?

Does Job’s response to his wife mean that he views the tragedies as ‘from God’? Yes. Is there any suggestion of an Accuser throughout the heated exchanges between the ‘scrap heap Job’ and his three close friends? No.

‘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 ‘scrap heap Job’ (all other occurrences). For the disappointed ‘scrap heap 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 the root) about the reversals in his life’s fortune. For Elihu they are not true friends because they fail to defend the ‘religious’ T/O paradigm properly and forcefully in their responses to the ‘scrap heap Job’.

The ‘scrapheap Job’ -- #14

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.

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 ‘scrap heap’ or ‘non-religious’ perspective, these events and experiences are inherently 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 intent. 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 “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 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 ‘scrap heap Job’ and his three close friends.

Job worshiped ‘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 one’s self, to recognize the superiority of the one worshiped. From a ‘scrap heap’ 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 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’ had violated the ‘religious’ T/O paradigm in that there was, 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?

Another option for ‘no cause’ might be that the Accuser’s plan failed (i.e., ‘no result’), somewhat analogous to World War One trench battles when the same ground was repeatedly taken, lost, and retaken. This interpretation does not seem to probe fully the anger attributed to ‘God’ in the prologue. Nor does this interpretation remove accountability from ‘God’.

What is it about ‘God’ and the Accuser that leads both characters to argue about whose hand had caused the calamities? Is Job a pawn in an authority contest between ‘God’ and the Accuser?

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 ‘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 ‘scrap heap Job’ (26:11, 27:5, 31:6). Job’s three close friends do not use the term.

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.

Then, as the heated exchanges with his three close friends begin and escalate, the integrity to which the ‘scrap heap 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 ‘scrap heap 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.

It seems to me the Accuser ironically pushes the ‘scrap heap Job’ to nuance ‘integrity’ in the truest sense – i.e., an authentic integrity that is grounded and shaped by coping with and aggressively engaging the full range of life’s realities rather than the ‘hedged in’ integrity sanctioned by the ‘religious’ T/O paradigm.

The ‘scrapheap Job’ -- #13

The story/play assumes a cosmology in which ‘God’ is ‘out there’, in which the Accuser and other angelic messengers are viewed as coming in/out of a celestial chamber ‘out there’, . . . (cf.1:6ff and many similar places in the story/play). How critical is this pre/non-scientific cosmology to the ‘religious’ T/O paradigm? I would argue it is essential (a sine qua non) to the ‘religious’ T/O paradigm, a necessity that becomes increasingly evident as one scans the 17th-century forward theological spectrum from ‘liberal’ across to ‘fundamentalist’. The assumed pre/non-scientific cosmology in the story/play is absolutely critical re the ‘religious’ T/O paradigm’s perspective on divine sovereignty.

Within the ‘religious’ T/O paradigm, ‘God’ must remain unsullied from corruption, removed from the taint of his creation/creatures, and, therefore, contacted only through such worship media as sacrifice and prayer. Think in terms of the distance/barriers between a monarch and the population. A monarch does not tolerate being questioned. The spectrum for the population under a monarchy runs from bowing passively to confronting a corrupt monarch to rejecting royalty of any sort.

It seems a contradiction to adhere to and advocate a democratic political structure for society and yet to maintain an approach to spirituality and ethics that depends/draws on the language/imagery characteristic of a monarchical political structure. It also seems a contradiction to adhere to and live by a modern/scientific view of nature and yet to maintain an approach to spirituality and ethics that is inseparable from a pre/non-scientific view of nature.

Peterson has ‘friend’ where the RSV has ‘servant’ (1:8). Is there any sense of ‘friend’ in the Hebrew word translated ‘servant’ (RSV)? The Hebrew word can imply a special relationship (e.g., references in Jewish scripture to ‘my servants the prophets’, to Moses, to Joshua, to angels, to the patriarchs). The Hebrew word can refer to a friend, to a fellow-citizen, or simply to another person. Is this word the word for ‘friend’ throughout the story/play (e.g., 2:11, 6:14, . . .)?

‘Friend’ or ‘servant’ in the prologue description of Job should be thought of as ‘confidant with influence’. There is no sense of humility or of being ‘among the least of these’ or of ‘taking a lower seat’. Job should be cast in the story/play as aristocratic, as nobility. He has liberties and privileges, even before ‘God’, others do not have.

The frightening calamities (1:13-19) -- from the Sabeans’ violence to destructive lightning to the Chaldeans’ deadly aggression to the terrible storm -- are all attributed to ‘God’ in the story/play. The same explanation occurs re Job’s humiliating afflictions in the second cycle of calamities (2:1-10). Job, in his first lines in the prologue, accounts for the calamities with “the Lord gave” and “the Lord has taken away” (1:20-21). The narrator makes the point that the prologue Job “did not charge God with wrong” (1:22), apparently meaning Job does not accuse ‘God’ of injustice or malevolence when he attributes the calamities to ‘God’. In response to his humiliating afflictions, the prologue Job speaks of receiving good and evil from ‘God’ (revealing that he considers the wave of calamities as well as his personal afflictions to be ‘evil’). Yet the narrator repeats that Job “did not sin with his lips” (2:10). Are Job’s two responses in the prologue acceptable to/within the ‘religious’ T/O paradigm?

What, from the ‘religious’ T/O paradigm perspective, is evil about the violent events and devastating experiences recounted in the prologue? What criteria for distinguishing good from evil are common to the ‘religious’ T/O paradigm? What makes an event/experience evil? Koheleth (in the Ecclesiastes essay) uses blunt terms such as ‘offensive’, ‘tragic’, ‘grievously wrong’ in reference to human suffering/misery. The ‘scrap heap Job’ insists on similarly radical (i.e., to the root) interpretations of human suffering/misery. Are such interpretations of human suffering/misery found in other parts of Jewish scripture or in Christian scripture? Are such interpretations of human suffering/misery permitted within the ‘religious’ T/O paradigm? by ‘Jesus’?
A word study is in order re ‘evil’ in the story/play and in the larger context surrounding the story/play. Job does not point -- either in the prologue or in the heated exchanges with his three close friends -- to the prologue’s Accuser as an independent, separate, and/or primary source for evil. In the ‘religious’ T/O paradigm, ‘God’ is not just a monarch with unquestioned power. In the paradigm’s (D)euteronomic form trusted by Job and his three close friends, ‘God’ is expected to act/rule as a good/benevolent monarch who protects/rewards the righteous and who punishes/defeats the unrighteous. James in Christian scripture extended defense of the ‘religious’ T/O paradigm to the point of arguing that nothing from ‘God’ could be evil or stem from malevolent motives. All texts/writers in Jewish scripture and in Christian scripture are much nearer to James than to the ‘scrap heap’ perspective in the Job story/play or to the Ecclesiastes essay. The ‘scrap heap Job’ is being driven away from the confidence and security in divine providence promised by the ‘religious’ T/O paradigm. The heated exchanges with his three close friends leave him in the untenable position of concluding that ‘God’ (as he has to this point understood the term ‘God’) is capable of engaging in profoundly evil actions with sobering/frightening malevolent motives toward human beings. By untenable I mean that his thinking must keep moving because this position leaves him no way within the ‘religious’ T/O paradigm either to respect/honor ‘God’ or to lament before ‘God’ in anticipation of deliverance/relief.

The ‘scrapheap Job’ -- #12

Of his children, Job wonders anxiously, “Maybe one of them sinned by defying God inwardly” (1:5). Is Peterson’s ‘defy’ an appropriate rendering (‘curse’ in the RSV)? The Hebrew word translated ‘defy’/‘curse’ is an intensive form of the word for ‘bless’. Perhaps this choice is an example of a hesitation even to speak/write in any other way than to bless ‘God’. In other words, “Who would dare blaspheme ‘God’?” In a way, ‘curse’ is a stronger translation than ‘defy’ in that ‘curse’ more definitively connotes rejection. But in another way, ‘defy’ is a stronger translation than ‘curse’ in that ‘defy’ suggests the courage to stand up to and challenge ‘God’. The Hebrew word could also carry the idea of ‘to disown’.

Catching the word play that differentiates ‘defy’/‘curse’ from ‘bless’ requires an eye for irony. The idea of ‘defy’/‘curse’ then is to mutter “yeah, right” under one’s breath after saying “blessed”. Perhaps the play on the word for ‘bless’ (one of many subtle word plays that are developed through the heated exchanges between the ‘scrap heap Job’ and his three close friends that separate the prologue from the epilogue) is an illustration of the use of contrast to get the attention of the careful reader/audience.

Could/should the remarks of the ‘scrap heap Job’ in the heated exchanges with his three close friends be construed as a disclosure that he in fact does ‘defy God inwardly’? I think so if a unity between the prologue and the epilogue, over against the heated exchanges in the middle section of the story/play, is maintained.

To explore the various and surprising nuances for key terms such as ‘defy’ in the prologue, the Accuser (and, I would propose, the narrator) presents a clever, ironic, even sarcastic perspective. Does Job ever represent/express a similar perspective?

Job’s three close friends bless ‘God’ by maintaining the ‘religious’ theologically orthodox (T/O) paradigm, by following protocol, by ‘sucking up’. The ‘scrap heap Job’ seems to defy ‘God’ in the sense of ‘blessing God out’. Does he disown or reject ‘God’ (and the ‘religious’ T/O paradigm)? I think the story/play leaves the ‘scrap heap Job’ and the issue of his integrity at this very fork in his spiritual road. To maintain his integrity, I think he only has one option – i.e., to reject ‘God’ as understood within the ‘religious’ T/O paradigm to which he had long been loyal. Certainly from within the ‘religious’ T/O paradigm (to which his three close friends remain unwaveringly loyal), the ‘scrap heap Job’ must be seen as having moved across the theological spectrum to the threatening position of disowning or rejecting ‘God’. Once relief comes from his tragedies at the story/play’s end, how will the ‘scrap heap Job’ maintain his integrity? Can he return to his place as a teacher within the ‘religious’ T/O paradigm community without violating his integrity? How will he parent? How will he speak at the city gate? Will he sacrifice his aristocratic privileges in order to sustain a ‘scrap heap’ perspective? Will he add his ‘scrap heap’ voice to the caravan travelers’ stories?

What would ‘defying God inwardly’ have entailed if Job’s children (in the prologue) had done so as they were partying? And is ‘merry-making’ being criticized in the story/play?

In light of the surprise affirmation of Job’s ‘scrap heap’ thoughts (42:7-9) near the end, is the narrator encouraging the reader/audience to defy ‘God’? One trait of a ‘non-religious’ and ‘with the world face to face’ approach to ethics and spirituality (some variation of which would be an alternative for the ‘scrap heap Job’ should he choose to take the next steps away from the ‘religious’ T/O paradigm) is that individuals are encouraged to address ‘God’ bravely, in strength.

I find it thought provoking to associate the ‘scrap heap Job’ with the story of the prophet Nathan before King David, with Shostakovich before Stalin, with a concentration camp survivor. What would these associations imply re ‘God’ as understood within the ‘religious’ T/O paradigm?

The ‘scrapheap Job’ -- #11

In these and other postings, I often refer to the ‘T/O paradigm’. ‘T/O’ is short for ‘Traditional/Orthodox’. I first began referring to a ‘T/O paradigm’ in journal entries made in the mid-1990s. I created the phrase as a way to reference (1) the theological framework within which Job and his three close friends consider life experiences, (2) the theological framework that fails the ‘scrap heap Job’, and (3) my way of extending Bonhoeffer’s critique of ‘religion’ in his prison correspondence.

My judgment is that what I call the ‘religious’ T/O paradigm was systematized and institutionalized first in the northern kingdom of Israel after the Assyrian invasion/exile and later in the southern kingdom of Judah after the Babylonian invasion/exile. The cornerstone for this theological paradigm was a proposed covenant that linked being blessed with being righteous and being cursed with being unrighteous. The paradigm promised that ‘God’ could be trusted as the source of blessing or cursing. The paradigm’s proposed covenant clarified who the people were to be. Postexilic social/political reformers called for a rallying around this covenant or ‘law’ when rallying around a monarch such as David or Solomon was no longer an alternative (at least for the foreseeable future). Stories of the patriarchs (e.g., the stories now recorded in Genesis) and stories of national heroes (e.g., the stories now recorded in Exodus, Joshua, Judges) continued to be told as vehicles for communicating the ‘religious’ T/O paradigm (analogous to Greek playwrights and philosophers continuing to use the Homeric stories of the gods). Since those stories circulated in oral forms for many generations prior to the formalization of the ‘religious’ T/O paradigm, they had to be edited/reconstructed in order to serve as aids in communicating the paradigm. The abbreviated Job story/play (i.e., limited to the full story/play’s prologue plus the epilogue) would have had advantages in this regard because – in contrast to the stories of Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, et al – Job was presented in the abbreviated story/play as virtually flawless.

My judgment is that several lines of thought gradually evolved rather loosely in oral forms before the ‘religious’ T/O paradigm was systematized and institutionalized. The ‘J’ and ‘E’ lines of thought (which have been discussed in critical scholarship since the 19th century) were the oldest of these lines of thought, being stories minus systematization that predated the earliest idea of ‘Israel’ as a gathered people. Those stories (which, since being absorbed within the ‘religious’ T/O paradigm, are only available in forms reconstructed favorably toward the Deuteronomic covenant) retained hints of a ‘God’ thought to be emotional, near, attentive to human conditions. That ‘God’ could be erratic, illogical, playful, dangerous. That ‘God’ was not considered accountable to a moral code. Human response to that ‘God’ was uncertain, confused, fearful. The earliest stages of the formation of the ‘religious’ T/O paradigm into a systematic and institutionalized theology developed during Israel’s pre-exilic monarchies (especially David and Solomon). The ‘P(riestly)’ line of thought (which -- as with ‘J’, ‘E’, and ‘D’euteronomist lines of thought – has been discussed in critical scholarship since the 19th century) also predated the earliest sense of ‘Israel’ as a gathered people, but did not become institutionalized until after the Babylonian invasion/exile.

And then there was a ‘W(isdom)’ line of thought. My judgment is that this line of thought was the most ancient of the lines of thought feeding into the formation of the ‘religious’ T/O paradigm in ancient Israel. The earliest forms would likely have been folklore (i.e., ‘how to survive/succeed in life’ advice analogous to Foxfire counsel or the ‘all you need to know you learn by kindergarten’ guidance). I see the ‘W’ tradition as having matured sufficiently by the time of the establishment of Israel’s monarchy to supply the ambassadors needed to represent Israel in other royal courts. Teachers in the ‘W’ tradition offered generalizations re practical decision-making that were compatible with the theological deductions that would become characteristic of the Deuteronomic/covenant-based ‘religious’ T/O paradigm.

My judgment is that the added sections (chapters 3.1-42.9) in the expanded Job story/play emerged from the ‘W’ line of thought with at least three challenges to the ‘religious’ T/O paradigm. The first challenge argued that the confidence implicit in the Deuteronomic covenant and the wisdom of the ‘religious’ T/O paradigm (represented without reservation by Job’s three close friends) had crumbled. The second challenge argued that -- given the cultural sophistication and the commitment to common sense, ethical responsibility, and keen observation characteristic of the ‘W’ line of thought -- recasting the ‘religious’ T/O paradigm with only stories of patriarchs and heroes was no more a possibility than returning to the monarchies of Saul, David, and Solomon. The third challenge demonstrated the consequences of inflating the ‘religious’ T/O paradigm into the sheer (i.e., beyond question/challenge) sovereignty of ‘God’, into an emperor concept of ‘God’ (as in the whirlwind section of the Job story/play) that trivialized both the glory days of Israel’s monarchy and the worth of human beings.

It seems to me that variations on the ‘religious’ T/O paradigm through the centuries have taken one of two paths – i.e., either (1) to maintain the Deuteronomic ‘religious’ T/O paradigm as did Job’s three friends at the expense of being unconditionally aligned with innocent/tragic sufferers or (2) to revert to a ‘J’/‘E’ only fundamentalist-driven ‘religious’ T/O paradigm as represented in the prologue to the Job story/play. I find neither of these paths compelling.

The ‘scrapheap Job’ -- #10

The phrase ‘from the scrap heap’ (the defining perspective for me in the Job story/play), the phrase ‘life under the sun’ (the defining perspective for me in the Ecclesiastes essay), and the phrases ‘from below’/‘with the world face to face’/‘non-religious’ (the defining perspectives for me from Bonhoeffer’s last years) lead to the center/heart of the perspective on spirituality and ethics I have been pursuing over the past 3+ decades. The next several ‘scrapheap Job’ postings illustrate ways my understanding and use of the Job story/play and the Ecclesiastes essay matured through the opportunity -- in twice-monthly discussions 1999-2006 with a Hebrew language/literature specialist friend -- to present/test the results from my sustained/intense meditation (analogous to attending the same Broadway play several times each week year after year) on the Job story/play and the Ecclesiastes essay. I kept detailed notes from these discussions. Each discussion was conducted in tutorial fashion, with specific attention to my specialist friend’s judgment whether the Hebrew text permits/tolerates my appropriation of the Job story/play and the Ecclesiastes essay as I have attempted to stay on a ‘scrapheap’/‘life under the sun’/‘from below’/‘with the world face to face’/‘non-religious’ path. He freely shared his expertise with the Hebrew language and Wisdom Literature. I disciplined myself not to press him to agree with my conclusions or with the associated approach to spirituality and ethics. I accept full responsibility and accountability for the ideas put to the test in this crucible.

The primary references to the text for the Job story/play come from Eugene Peterson’s translation -- The Message of Job. I have copied the section of the story/play to which the postings that follow the text relate. Here is the text for postings #11-#17.

Prologue to the story/play

1.1Job was a man who lived in Uz. He was honest inside and out, a man of his word, who was totally devoted to God and hated evil with a passion. 2He had seven sons and three daughters. 3He was also very wealthy – seven thousand head of sheep, three thousand camels, five hundred teams of oxen, five hundred donkeys, and a huge staff of servants – the most influential man in all the East! 4His sons used to take turns hosting parties in their homes, always inviting their three sisters to join them in their merrymaking. 5When the parties were over, Job would get up early in the morning and sacrifice a burnt offering for each of his children, thinking, “Maybe one of them sinned by defying God inwardly.” Job made a habit of this sacrificial atonement, just in case they’d sinned.

6One day when the angels came to report to God, Satan, who was the designated accuser, came along with them. 7God singled out Satan and said, “What have you been up to?” Satan answered God, “Going here and there, checking things out on earth.” 8God said to Satan, “Have you noticed my friend Job? There’s no one quite like him – honest and true to his word, totally devoted to God and hating evil.” 9Satan retorted, “So do you think Job does all that out of the sheer goodness of his heart? 10Why, no one ever had it so good! You pamper him like a pet, make sure nothing bad ever happens to him or his family or his possessions, bless everything he does – he can’t lose! 11But what do you think would happen if you reached down and took away everything that is his? He’d curse you right to your face, that’s what.” 12God replied, “we’ll see. Go ahead – do what you want with all that is his. Just don’t hurt him.” Then Satan left the presence of God.

13Sometime later, while Job’s children were having one of their parties at the home of the oldest son, 14a messenger came to Job and said, “The oxen were plowing and the donkeys grazing in the field next to us 15when Sabeans attacked. They stole the animals and killed the field hands. I’m the only one to get out alive and tell you what happened.” 16While he was still talking, another messenger arrived and said, “Bolts of lightning struck the sheep and the shepherds and fried them – burned them to a crisp. I’m the only one to get out alive and tell you what happened.” 17While he was still talking, another messenger arrived and said, “Chaldeans coming from three directions raided the camels and massacred the camel drivers. I’m the only one to get
out alive and tell you what happened.” 18While he was still talking, another messenger arrived and said, “Your children were having a party at the home of the oldest brother 19when a tornado swept in off the desert and struck the house. It collapsed on the your people and they died. I’m the only one to get out alive and tell you what happened.”

20Job got to his feet, ripped his robe, shaved his head, then fell to the ground and
worshiped: 21“Naked I came from my mother’s womb, naked I’ll return to the womb of the earth. God gives, God takes, God’s name be ever blessed.”

22Not once through all this did Job sin; not once did he blame God.

2.1One day when the angels came to report to God, Satan also showed up. 2God singled out Satan, saying, “And what have you been up to?” Satan answered God, “Oh, going here and there, checking things out.” 3Then God said to Satan, “Have you noticed my friend Job? There’s no one quite like him, is there – honest and true to his word, totally devoted to God and hating evil? He still has a firm grip on his integrity! You tried to trick me into destroying him, but it didn’t work.” 4Satan answered, “A human would do anything to save his life. 5But what do you think would happen if you reached down and took away his health? He’d curse you to your face, that’s what.” 6God said, “All right. Go ahead – you can do what you like with him. But mind you, don’t kill him.”

7Satan left God and struck Job with terrible sores. Job was ulcers and scabs from head to foot. They itched and oozed so badly that 8he took a piece of broken pottery to scrape himself, then went and sat on a trash heap, among the ashes. 9His wife said, “Still holding on to your precious integrity, are you? Curse God and
be done with it.” 10He told her, “You’re talking like an empty-headed fool. We take the good days from God – why not also the bad days?” Not once through all this did Job sin. He said nothing against God.

11Three of Job’s friends heard of all the trouble that had fallen on him. Each traveled from his own country – Eliphaz from Teman, Bildad from Shuah, Zophar from Naamath – and went together to Job to keep him company and comfort him. 12When they first caught sight of him, they couldn’t believe what they saw – they hardly recognized him! They cried out in lament, ripped their robes, and dumped dirt on their heads as a sign of their grief. 13Then they sat with him on the ground. Seven days and nights they sat there without saying a word. They could see how rotten he felt, how deeply he was suffering.

Reading for ‘seeing from below’ #4

N through Z

The Next Century (Halberstam)
Nietzsche: A Very Short Introduction (Tanner)
The Nightmare Years: 1930-1940 (Shirer)
No Rusty Swords: Letters, Lectures, and Notes (Bonhoeffer)
Notebooks (1935-51) (Camus)
The Notebooks of Leonardo da Vinci (MacCurdy, ed.)
Old Possum’s Book of Practical Cats (Eliot)
On the Edge: A History of Poor Black Children and Their American Dreams (Nightingale)
On Looking Into the Abyss (Himmelfarb)
Out of My Later Years (Einstein)
Out of My Life and Thought (Schweitzer)
The Parables of Joshua (Girzone)
Paris 1919: Six Months That Changed the World (MacMillan)
The Passion of the Western Mind (Tarnas)
A Past in Hiding: Memory and Survival in Nazi Germany (Roseman)
Peace Is Possible: The Politics of the Sermon on the Mount (Alt)
The People’s History of the United States: 1492 – Present (Zinn)
Pensees (Pascal)
Physics for the Rest of Us (Jones)
The Plague (Camus)
The Plague: Fiction and Resistance (Kellman)
Philosophical Scientists (Foster)
Plato and a Platypus Walk Into a Bar (Cathcart and Klein)
Plotting Hitler’s Death (Fest)
The Politics of Jesus (Yoder)
Power and Powerlessness (Gaventa)
The Practices of Piety and the Practice of Medicine (Verhey)
Prayers (Quoist)
The Prehistory of The Far Side: A 10th Anniversary Exhibit (Larson)
The Prince (Machiavelli)
The Problem of Evil: An Alternative History of Philosophy (Neiman)
The Problem of Pain (Lewis)
The Prophetic Imagination (Brueggemann)
The Protean Self (Lifton)
The Proud Tower: A Portrait of the World Before the War (1890-1914) (Tuchman)
Rabbi Jesus: An Intimate Biography (Chilton)
Rawls: A Theory of Justice and Its Critics (Kukathas and Pettit)
Reflections on an Affirmative Action Baby (Carter)
Reverence for Life (Schweitzer)
Sara Midda’s South of France: A Sketch Book (Midda)
Schindler’s List (Keneally)
Science and Human Values (Boronowski)
Science and the State in Greece and Rome (Africa)
The Secret Country of C. S. Lewis (Arnott)
Seduced by Hitler (LeBor and Boyes)
The Seekers (Boorstin)
Shakespeare: The Invention of the Human (Bloom)
Shared Values for Troubled Waters (edited by Kidder)
Sharing the Promised Land: A Tale of Israelis and Palestinians (Hiro)
Sheltering the Jews: Stories of Holocaust Rescuers (Paldiel)
A Short History of Myth (Armstrong)
A Short History of the Universe (Hawking)
Signposts in a Strange Land (Percy)
Simone Weil: An Anthology (ed., Miles)
Six Great Ideas (Adler)
The Solace of Fierce Landscapes (Lane)
Sophie’s World: A Novel About the History of Philosophy (Gaarder)
Southern Journey: A Return to the Civil Rights Movement (Dent)
The Spirit Catches You and You Fall Down (Fadiman)
The State Papers of Levi Eshkol (Christman)
Statistics (Koosis)
Statistics in Medicine (Colton)
Statistics Without Tears (Rowntree)
Stephen Hawking: A Life in Science (White and Gribbin)
Stephen Hawking: Quest for a for a Theory of Everything (Ferguson)
The Story of Physics (Motz and Weaver)
‘Subtle is the Lord . . .’: The Science and the Life of Albert Einstein (Pais)
The Sunflower: On the Possibilities and Limits of Forgiveness (Wiesenthal)
Survival in Auschwitz (Levi)
The Survivor: An Anatomy of Life in the Death Camps (des Pres)
The Swing Era: How It Was To Be Young Then (Daniels, ed.)
The Swing Era: Vintage Years of Humor (1937-38) (Daniels, ed.)
Tales of Good and Evil, Help and Harm (Hallie)
A Testament of Devotion (Kelly)
Testimony: The Memoirs of Dmitri Schostakovich (Volkov)
Textual Criticism of the Old Testament: From the Septuagint to Qumran (Klein)
A Theology of Life: Bonhoeffer’s Religionless Christianity (Wustenberg)
Theories of Everything (Barrow)
A Theory of Justice (Rawls)
There Are No Children Here (Kotlowitz)
This I Believe (edited by Morrow)
To Bear Witness: Holocaust Remembrance at Yad Vashem (Gutterman and Shalev, eds.)
The Trial and Death of Jesus (Cohn)
True Patriotism (Bonhoeffer)
Truth Beyond Relativism: Karl Mannheim’s Sociology of Knowledge (Baum)
Tuesdays with Morrie (Albom)
The Two Cultures: And A Second Look (Snow)
Ty Cobb: His Tumultuous Life (Bak)
The Unconscious God (Frankl)
The Universe in a Nutshell (Hawking)
The U.S. Health System: Origins and Functions (Raffel, Raffel, and Barsukiewicz)
V for Vendetta (Moore and Lloyd)
Vietnam: A History (Karnow)
The Ville: Cops and Kids in Urban America (Donaldson)
Voice of Israel (Eban)
Voices from the Future: Our Children Tell Us About Violence in America (edited by Goodwillie)
Walking Between the Times (Sampley)
The Way to Freedom: Letters, Lectures, and Notes (Bonhoeffer)
Ways to the Center (Carmody and Carmody)
The Western Canon: The Books and School of the Ages (Bloom)
Western Painting from Prehistory to Post-Impressionism (eds., Agosta and Smith)
What Is Theology? (Wiles)
What Is This Thing Called Science? (Chalmers)
When Compassion Was a Crime: Germany’s Silent Heroes (1933-45) (Leuner)
Why the Jews? The Reasons for Antisemitism (Prager and Telushkin)
Witches and Jesuits (Wills)
Woman’s Surgeon: J. Marion Sims (Harris)
The Words (Sartre)
The Words We Live By: An Annotated Guide to the Constitution (Monk)
A World Lit Only By Fire: The Medieval Mind and the Renaissance (Manchester)
World of Our Fathers (Howe)
The Youngest Science: Notes of a Medicine Watcher (Thomas)

Reading for ‘seeing from below’ #3

G through M

Galileo’s Daughter (Sobel)
Generations of the Holocaust (Bergmann and Jucovy, eds.)
Genes, Genesis, and God: Values and Their Origins (Rolston)
The Genesis of Ethics (Visotsky)
George Washington’s False Teeth: An Unconventional Guide to the 18th Century (Darnton)
The German Resistance Movement (Wyschograd)
The Germans (Craig)
Get Great Marks for your Essays (Germov)
Get a Grip on Evolution (Burnie)
Get a Grip on Physics (Gribbin)
God and Human Suffering (Hall)
God, Suffering, and Belief (Burkle)
God’s Equation: Einstein, Relativity, and the Expanding Universe (Aczel)
God’s Funeral: A Biography of Faith and Doubt (Wilson)
Good and Evil (Buber)
A Good Life: Newspapering and Other Adventures (Bradlee)
“The Good Old Days”: The Holocaust as Seen by its Perpetrators and Bystanders (Klee et al)
The Gospel According to RFK: Why It Matters Now (MacAfee, ed.)
The Great Composers: The Lives and Music of 50 Great Classical Composers (Nicholas)
Great Photography Workshop (Fortney)
The Great Unraveling: Losing Our Way in the New Century (Krugman)
The Greek Way (Hamilton)
A Grief Observed (Lewis)
The Guns of August (Tuchman)
Guns, Germs, and Steel (Diamond)
Has Modernism Failed? (Gablik)
The Healer’s Power (Brody)
The Healer’s Tale: Transforming Medicine and Culture (Kaufman)
The Hero Within (Pearson)
The Hidden Children: The Secret Survivors of the Holocaust (Marks)
The Hidden Scrolls (Silberman)
The Hidden Wound (Berry)
Historians’ Fallacies (Fischer)
A History of Classical Physics (Bernal)
A History of God (Armstrong)
Hitler’s Thirty Days to Power (Hunter)
Hitler’s Willing Executioners (Goldhagen)
An Honorable Defeat: A History of German Resistance to Hitler, 1933-1945 (Gill)
Hope for the Flowers (Paulus)
How I Believe (Teilhard de Chardin)
How Modern Should Theology Be? (Thielicke)
How to Live Life Well (Carmody and Carmody)
How to Read a Book (Bloom)
How to Read and Why (Bloom)
Human Evolution: A Very Short Introduction (Wood)
I Knew Dietrich Bonhoeffer (Zimmermann and Smith, eds.)
I Knew Hitler (Ludecke)
I and Thou (Buber)
I Will Bear Witness (1933-41) (Klemperer)
I Will Bear Witness (1942-45) (Klemperer)
The Illustrated Atlas of Jewish Civilization (Bacon and Gilbert, eds.)
Illustrated History of the Third Reich (Hook)
The Illustrated Theory of Everything: The Origin and Fate of the Universe (Hawking)
In the Beginning: A New Interpretation of Genesis (Armstrong)
In Pursuit of Dietrich Bonhoeffer (Kuhns)
In the Shadow of the Reich (Frank)
In the Time of the Americans: The Generation That Changed America’s Role in the World (Fromkin)
The Inextinguishable Symphony: A True Story of Music and Love in Nazi Germany (Goldsmith)
The Inklings (Lewis et al)
Inside Hitler’s Germany: Life Under the Third Reich (Hughes and Mann)
Inside the Third Reich (Speer)
Into Thin Air (Krakauer)
The Invisible Wall: Germans and Jews (Blumenthal)
Ishmael (Quinn)
Israel and the Palestinian Territories (Hellander, Humphreys, and Tilbury)
J.B. (MacLeish)
The Jefferson Bible (with introduction by Percival Everett)
Jesus (Great Lives Observed series, edited by Anderson)
Jesus’ Audience (Derrett)
Jesus the Jew (Vermes)
Jesus and the Forgotten City (Batey)
Jews in Germany: From Roman Times to the Weimar Republic (Gidal)
Judges (Wiesel)
Karl Barth in the Theology of Dietrich Bonhoeffer (Pangritz)
Kingdom Coming: The Rise of Christian Nationalism (Goldberg)
A New Kind of Christian (McLaren)
Language in Thought and Action (Hayakawa)
Late Night Thoughts On Listening to Mahler’s Ninth Symphony (Thomas)
Lee (Freeman)
Legacy of Love: My Education in the Path of Non-violence (Arun Gandhi)
The Legends of Genesis (Gunkel)
Leonardo Da Vinci: Art and Science (Pedretti)
Letters to Freya (1939-45) (Helmuth James von Moltke)
Letters to Leontine Zanta (Teilhard de Chardin)
Letters and Papers from Prison (Bonhoeffer)
Life Together (Bonhoeffer)
Lincoln at Cooper Union: The Speech That Made Abraham Lincoln President (Holzer)
Lincoln at Gettysburg (Willis)
The Lives of a Cell (Thomas)
Lives on the Edge: Single Mothers and Their Children in the Other America (Polakow)
The Living Thoughts of Spinoza (Zweig)
Local People: The Struggle for Civil Rights in Mississippi (Dittmar)
The Lord of the Rings (Tolkien)
Love at the Heart of Things: A Biography of Douglas V. Steere (Hinson)
Love Letters from Cell 92 (Bonhoeffer and van Wedemeyer)
The Making of a Mind: Letters from a Soldier-Priest (1914-19) (Teilhard de Chardin)
The March of Folly (Tuchman)
Martin Buber (Panco)
Martin Buber: An Intimate Portrait (Hodes)
Martin Heidegger: a Political Life (Ott)
Masks of the Universe (Harrison)
Medicine: A History of Healing (Porter, ed.)
Memories of Summer (Kahn)
Messengers of God (Wiesel)
The Message of Job (Atkinson)
The Message of Job (Peterson)
Meeting Jesus Again for the First Time (Borg)
Meetings (Buber)
Mid-century Journey: The Western World Through Its Years of Conflict (Shirer)
Modern Times (Johnson)
The Moral Life of Children (Coles)
Mother Teresa: The Private Writings of the ‘Saint of Calcutta (Kolodiejchuk, ed.)
Mountains Beyond Mountains (Kidder)
The Mythmaker: Paul and the Invention of Christianity (Maccoby)

Reading for ‘seeing from below’ #2

A through F

Abba Eban: An Autobiography (Eban)
The ABCs of Relativity (Russell)
Aequanimitas: With Other Addresses (Osler)
After the Darkness (Wiesel)
Albert Camus: A Biography (Lottman)
Albert Camus: The Invincible Summer (Maquet)
Albert Camus: A Study of His Work (Thody)
Albert Schweitzer: Christian Revolutionary (Seaver)
Albert Speer: His Battle With Truth (Sereny)
All Rivers Run to the Sea: Memoirs (Wiesel)
Amazing Grace: With Evers in Mississippi (Berry)
The Anatomy of Hope (Groopman)
Answer to Job (Jung)
Archeology and the New Testament (McRay)
Archibald MacLeish: An American Life (Donaldson)
Autobiography of a German Pastor (Ehrenberg)
The Autobiography of Martin Luther King, Jr. (King)
Becoming a Doctor (Konner)
Beethoven: The Universal Composer (Morris)
Bergman on Bergman: Interviews (Bjorkman, Manns, and Sima)
Berlin Diaries (1940-1945) (Vassiltchikov)
Bertrand Russell Speaks His Mind (Russell interviewed by Wyatt)
Beyond Good and Evil (Nietzsche)
Black in Selma (Chestnut)
Black and White Photography (Horenstein)
Blood and Iron: From Bismarck to Hitler (Friedrich)
Bonhoeffer (Bethge)
Bonhoeffer: An Illustrated Biography (Bethge)
Bonhoeffer in a World Come of Age (Vorkink, ed.)
The Bonhoeffers: Portrait of a Family (Leibholz-Bonhoeffer)
The Book of J (Bloom and Rosenberg)
The Book of Job (Scheindlin)
The Book of Psalms (Alter)
The Book Nobody Read (Gingerich)
The Boys of Summer (Kahn)
The Brain: A Very Short Introduction (O’Shea)
Breaking the Silence: The Eduard Shulte Story (Lacqueur and Breitmann)
A Brief History of Science (Gribbin, ed.)
The Canaris Conspiracy (Manvell and Fraenkel)
Canaris: Hitler’s Master Spy (Horne)
The Cartoon Guide to Statistics (Gonick and Smith)
The Changing Faces of Jesus (Vermes)
Chess for Beginners (Horowitz)
Chess: 5334 Problems, Combinations, and Games (Polgar)
Children of the Holocaust and World War II: Their Secret Diaries (Holliday)
The Churches and the Third Reich (vol. 1) (Scholder)
The Churches and the Third Reich (vol. 2) (Scholder)
A City Year (Goldsmith)
The Classical Era: From the 1740s to the end of the 18th Century (Zaslaw, ed.) (Man and Music series)
The Cocaine Kids (Williams)
The Coming of the Third Reich (Evans)
The Complete Civil War (Katcher)
The Complete Guide to Digital Photography (Freeman)
The Consolation of Philosophy (Boethius)
A Consuming Fire: Encounters with Eli Wiesel and the Holocaust (Roth)
Contemporary European Ethics (edited by Kockelmans)
The Cost of Discipleship (Bonhoeffer)
Costly Grace (Bethge)
Cotton Patch Parables of Liberation (Jordan and Doulos)
Counterpoint (Piston)
The Creators (Boorstin)
Creation and the Persistence of Evil (Levenson)
Crossings: A White Man’s Journey Into Black America (Harrington)
C. S. Lewis at the Breakfast Table and Other Reminiscences (Como)
The Curse of the Bambino (Shaughnessy)
Dag Hammerskjold: A Spiritual Portrait (Stolpe)
Daring, Trusting Spirit: Bonhoeffer’s Friend Eberhard Bethge (de Gruchy)
The Day the Universe Changed (Burke)
The Death of Common Sense (Howard)
The Death of Ivan Ilyich (Tolstoy)
The Death of Ivan Ilyich: A Reader’s Companion (Jahn)
Degenerate Moderns (Jones)
The Dialogues of Archibald MacLeish and Mark Van Doren (Bush)
Dietrich Bonhoeffer (Bethge, revised edition)
Dietrich Bonhoeffer: A Brief Life (Renate Bethge)
A Discarded Image (Lewis)
The Discoverers (Boorstin)
Disorder and Decline: Crime and the Spiral of Decay in American Neighborhoods (Skogan)
Discovering the Writer Within (Ballenger and Lane)
The Divine Milieu (Teilhard de Chardin)
Doctors: A Biography (Nuland)
Does the Center Hold? (Palmer)
Ecotone: Wayfaring on the Margins (Krall)
Einstein: The Life and Times (Clark)
Encounters (edited by Erikson)
The End of Order: Versailles 1919 (Mee)
The Enlightenment: An Evaluation of Its Assumptions, Attitudes, and Values (Hampson)
Ernie Pyle’s War: America’s Eyewitness To World War II (Tobin)
Essays in Science (Einstein)
The Essays of E. B. White (White)
The Essential Jesus (Crossan)
Ethics (Bonhoeffer)
Ethics After Babel (Stout)
The European Dictatorships 1918-1945 (Lee)
The European Mind 1680-1715 (Havard)
Everyday Science Explained (Suplee)
Evil and the God of Love (Hick)
Evil in Modern Thought (Neiman)
Eyes on the Prize (Williams)
The Ethics of Genetic Engineering (edited by Junker-Kenny and Cahill)
Faith and Meaning in the Southern Uplands (Jones)
The Fall of Berlin (Read and Fisher)
Fiasco: The American Military Adventure in Iraq (Ricks)
Fiction from Tegel Prison (Bonhoeffer)
Final Testimonies (Barth)
The First Dissident: The Book of Job in Today’s Politics (Safire)
The First Man (Camus)
The First Three Minutes: A Modern View of the Origin of the Universe (Weinberg)
The First World War (Gilbert)
The Five Biggest Ideas in Science (Wynn and Wiggins)
Five Days in London (May 1940) (Lukacs)
Five Equations That Changed the World (Guillen)
For the Time Being (Dillard)
Foresight and Understanding (Toulmin)
Friendship and Resistance (Bethge)
From Cradle to Grave: The Human Face of Poverty in America (Freedman)
From Death Camp to Existentialism (Frankl)
From Midwives to Medicine (McGreggor)
From Paracelsus to Newton: Magic and the Making of Modern Science (Webster)

Reading for ‘seeing from below’ #1

Introduction

The reflections about my search ‘for a very healthy center’ I am posting on this website derive from a way to address questions about ‘authority’ – i.e., when, why, how various sources (e.g., a person, an institution, a culture, an idea, a writing, an object, an experience) exercise authority in my life. I find it noteworthy that the word ‘author’ is imbedded in the word ‘authority’. The two words share a common root – i.e., L. augere (to increase, to enlarge). This reminder creates the vivid/challenging image of an authority figure/source ‘writing’/‘editing’ in my life story.

I think in terms of a spectrum with ‘authoritarian’ repression of an individual’s responsibility/liberty to write his/her life story at one end and ‘authorities’ that nurture/encourage such responsibility/liberty at the other end. I keep this range of experiences with ‘authorities’ in mind as I ponder the timeline from infancy to adulthood -- e.g., inheriting ‘authorities’ at birth, childhood criteria for assessing ‘authorities’, adolescent reaction to ‘authority’, the need thoughtfully to determine who/what is permitted (to remain) inside one’s story ‘with pen in hand’, . . . . As an educator, I am especially mindful of the transitions from elementary student to graduate student – e.g., the variations in testing/grading, the differences between a report and an essay, the maturation in footnoting, the evolution in the student-teacher relationship.

Exploring the association of ‘author/ing’ and ‘authority’ led me to begin keeping a log of the books/authors I have chosen to read since my decision two decades ago to leave my ‘home’ in academia and in the ‘religious’ sphere in order to be imbedded in the medical education/practice sphere as I search for a ‘very healthy center’. I find a person’s elective reading – i.e., reading not assigned or required – to be very revealing. The list below documents the books/authors I have chosen to read thus far during my search since the late-1980s for a way to experience/encourage spirituality and ethics that sees ‘from below’, is ‘non-religious’, and is authentically ‘with the world face to face’. The list – which I have kept alphabetically by title rather than chronologically -- includes some sources initially read prior to and then read again after the late-1980s. Otherwise, writers/ings studied thoroughly/carefully prior to the late-1980s during my graduate education and during my years as a history/theology professor – are not included. Some of the listed works have been read several times.

The Scrapheap Job -- #9

[Since writing this essay in 1995, I have come to see/interpret Job as unprepared throughout the story to argue that ‘righteousness is to be pursued because it is right’. Instead, his complaints reveal he has not yet turned loose the expectation that his righteousness would be blessed. I do see him at a decision point whether or not to embark on the radical (i.e., into the roots) rethinking and reconstructing re spirituality, ethics, theology prerequisite to his being able to make the argument. The epilogue does not encourage imagining his doing so.]

A Parable: Before the introduction of double/thermal-paned windows, homeowners could use storm windows for protection from the chilling effects of winter. Late one fall, new homeowners decide to put storm windows on their home’s fourteen windows before winter arrives. They check at every hardware store in their small town, but can find only eleven storm windows in stock. They purchase the eleven. Once home, they have to decide which windows have to be covered and which will be left to leak the cold winter air. Their one child -- a four-year-old daughter -- suffers with asthma.

I grew up with protected windows -- literally and metaphorically speaking. None of my close friends or neighbors had too few resources to be insulated from life-threatening chill. I would have told the parable’s couple they could still find the remaining three storm windows. I did not yet know their crisis, their fear.

Education -- especially in the history of ideas -- raised new questions for me. Experience with tragedy -- especially chronic, humiliating disease -- reduced my answers. Life became a series of decisions about which windows to cover and which windows to leave exposed. In time, the ‘scrapheap Job’ and Ecclesiastes’ Koheleth became the canonical voices with whom I sit as I reconsider Jesus of Nazareth. I imagine all three meeting beyond the reach and control of organized religion. I imagine listening closely to their exchanges because I see all three as knowing the force of being face to face with the full range of life experiences.

One way to experience Job is to assess the story’s ‘storm window’ options. The narrative by itself – i.e., the abbreviated form in which the story circulated initially and which is most familiar in religious circles down to today -- seems to fit the ‘God is just and the righteous are blessed’ theological paradigm. However, that paradigm breaks down when pressed hard by day-to-day realities. ‘God’ seems too human -- e.g., proud, petty, discriminating, exasperated, indulgent. The fairy-tale ending – i.e., the climax to the abbreviated form of the story -- cannot completely erase memories of the devastation borne by the animals, the hired help, the children, their mother, and the ‘scrapheap Job’.

And so the characters in the simple narrative were at some point developed. As the dialogues unfold, it becomes apparent that Job and his special friends -- Eliphaz, Bildad, and Zophar -- do not see the hand of the Accuser in human affairs. Their working hypothesis is that ‘God’ -- who has immediate and intentional control of the natural order -- dispenses blessing to the righteous and curses the unrighteous. The ‘scrapheap Job’ claims to have had his doubts even before the tragedies that befell him and his family. Travelers’ testimony and his own observations had left him uncomfortable with traditional wisdom. As his devastation drags on for months, the ‘scrapheap Job’ maintains his integrity against charges that he had collapsed into unrighteousness, leaving him at times to picture ‘God’ as a ruthless enemy and at other times to picture ‘God’ as distracted for some reason from his situation.

Elihu attempts to explain human suffering as a prospective warning from ‘God’. Then the whirlwind section challenges the anthropocentric perspective otherwise assumed in the story – e.g., it is tough even for ‘God’ to maintain order in the cosmos . . . in some quarters chaos reigns . . . still order in the natural realm argues for order in the moral realm.

Most of my considerations -- except for human will, the earth’s evolutionary age, randomness, and scientific causality -- get attention in the story of Job. I find the ‘scrapheap Job’ believable and compelling. Even after Copernicus, anthropocentrism is hard to shake. Prolonged suffering intensifies this struggle against taking ourselves too seriously. Human suffering is, for me, an uncovered window during cold winter months. Every attempt to explain why so many suffer so much requires sacrifices that are too costly to make, that severely damage one’s integrity. This judgment does not make integrity easier to maintain. It does sharpen the focus on the sufferer in the midst of the suffering.

The Scrapheap Job -- #8

[Is God GOD? is a book title that was published in the midst of a broad theological discussion in the 1950s/1960s known as the ‘God’ is dead debate. Most seem to have easily dismissed this debate (e.g., the “God’s not dead, I talked to him last night” bumper sticker). But beneath this obviously sensational phrase remains a very serious and spiritually practical question about the relationship between ‘God’ language and the reality to which that language points. Also, since writing this essay, I have moved to the end of the spectrum in the third paragraph re no contact between God and ‘God’.]

Is ‘God’ God?

Does this sound like a trick question? That is, if you view it as a question at all . . . and many would not. For me, the validity of the question depends on who asks it. Some ask “Is ‘God’ God?” in search of a philosophical novelty or an academic publication or even something that can be marketed. Frankly, for them I have little interest and no time. Others ask “Is ‘God’ God?” out of deep wounds they have experienced or observed. They ask cautiously, yet earnestly. The ‘scrapheap Job’ is among them. I am too.

The force of the question stems from the subtle distinction signaled by the single quotation marks. ‘God’ points to the language we use to picture a reality that transcends the reach of our words -- i.e., God. In other words, God exceeds every meaning for ‘God’. Job’s story probes several variations on the meaning of ‘God’. Have you noticed variations expressed by Job first before and then after his shattering experiences? by Job’s wife? by Job’s friends? by the story’s narrator?

At one end of the spectrum, some are convinced that God and ‘God’ have no contact. At the opposite end of the spectrum, some are convinced that the reality and the language for the reality (usually their particular meaning of the words) exactly correspond. The former see idolatry in every appeal to ‘God’. The latter cannot see their idolatry.

I remember a few Sunday School teachers in my childhood who introduced the word ‘anthropomorphism’ to us. The meaning of the word ‘God’ always embodies something human, whether or not it discloses something about a transcending reality. Nicholai Berdyaev -- a 20th-century Russian theologian -- stretched this assessment of ‘God’ language to include ‘sociomorphism’ and ‘cosmomorphism’. The point -- God does not have eyes or hands (anthropomorphisms). God is not a mother, a father, a shepherd, a king, or a friend (sociomorphisms). God is not ‘up there’ or ‘out there’ (cosmomorphisms). These descriptions are metaphors or analogies.

You may be wondering, “Could a pair of single quotation marks possibly matter?” The ‘scrapheap Job’ and many who have been deeply wounded by life experiences cherish what makes those marks so significant. For them, the difference is the freedom to remain conscious of God even as previously trusted meanings of ‘God’ die and new possibilities are tested.

The Scrapheap Job -- #7

“My integrity is at stake.”

Isn’t it always? ‘At stake’, I mean. Perhaps integrity is most visible (and least noticed) in the mundane and usually forgotten details of living in which we react out of instincts rather than out of reflection. Then something happens that suddenly or eventually puts our integrity ‘at stake’. The force of such defining experiences -- like a hurricane’s winds and waves -- can sweep/tear away what is extraneous to who we are.

Defining experiences can be painful, surprising, frightening, devastating, exhilarating. Some slip past too quickly for our focus to be sharp. Others can hardly be avoided. Most of us look for ways not to pause, not to see, not to listen, not to decide. Instead, one paradigm after another lures us or holds us by the promise to explain or at least to help us forget. But our guard is down -- however briefly -- when the victim is a spouse, a child, a parent, a colleague, a friend. As our mind’s eye adjusts, we begin to notice ‘the others’.

It happened to me just that way. I had been in the shacks in which some of my high school teammates lived. I had classmates whose bodies had to be pulled from wrecked cars. I had seen the disabled mocked. I had played and worked with orphans. I had visited the aging in nursing homes. I had officiated at the graveside of a stillborn baby. . . . But none of these experiences swept me away from the protective barriers standing between them and me. My place was not yet among them.

What question centers Job’s story? I think it is ‘integrity’. The stage is set around questions about Job’s integrity. The narrator sketches Job’s values, his manner of being, his standing. Then the curtain is drawn to reveal a stunning scene of celestial celebration as messenger after messenger praises ‘God’ and his handiwork. Then out from the crowd meanders the Accuser. He too has glanced around the heavens and the earth. He has a wager, not an affirmation. At issue -- Job’s integrity. He grants Job’s behavior. He raises doubt about Job’s intentions, Job’s ‘core’. The Accuser predicts Job can be made to curse ‘God’.

Leaving undecided the question of whose ‘hand’ – ‘God’ or the Accuser -- to blame for devastating Job and so many around him, the narrator quickly and dramatically replaces the initial image of Job with a horrible image -- financial ruin, sons and daughters dead, painful sores. ‘God’ calls attention to Job’s integrity (2:5). Job’s wife understands -- ‘Are you still holding on to your integrity’ (2:9). Job tries in vain to get through to his closest friends -- ‘Relent, do not be unjust; reconsider, for my integrity is at stake’ (6:27); ‘ . . . till I die, I will not deny my integrity’ (27:5).

Integrity has to do with character, soundness, reliability; with what makes something or someone whole, complete. ‘Integer’ and ‘integrate’ share etymological roots with ‘integrity’. Could Job keep a grip on his integrity without having a way to see ‘God’ as an ally? The story says no. Severely stricken, Job searches intensely through alternative meanings for the term ‘God’. Would Job still possess his integrity if he yielded to the pressure around him to deny his moral consistency? The story again says no.
As Job’s struggle unfolds, others are drawn into the crucible. What of his wife’s integrity? His family’s integrity? His friends’ integrity? His religious and social communities’ integrity? What of the integrity of ‘God’? What of your integrity? And mine?

The Scrapheap Job -- #6

‘After this, . . .’ (3:1)

After what? And how long after? Is this fast-paced narrative moving to closure? That is the way the story of Job seems so often to have been told and retold --

Messengers appear before ‘God’ to report in turn on the marvels of the creation. ‘God’ notices and challenges the Accuser among them – ‘Have you looked closely at my servant Job?’ ‘God’ points confidently to Job’s values, his behavior, his religion. The Accuser questions Job’s motivation and the insight of ‘God’ when he points to the thick hedge of blessing around Job and his family -- ‘Does Job fear God for nothing?’ (1:9). Unknown to Job, a wager is set. The stakes are high. The Accuser, with the approval of ‘God’, cuts down Job’s hedge in swift strokes. Job grieves deeply and visibly, but ‘did not charge God with wrongdoing’ (1:22). ‘God’ mistakenly expects the Accuser to fold in defeat -- ‘ . . . (Job) still maintains his integrity, though you incited me against him to ruin him without any reason’ (2:3). Instead, the Accuser argues that Job’s integrity remains in doubt as long as he has his health – ‘Strike his flesh and bones’ and see the truth. The Accuser, again with the approval of ‘God’, covers Job with painful sores. Sleepless, in agony, smelling foul -- Job withers away. His wife breaks – ‘Curse God and die!’ (2:9). Still Job does not ‘sin’ in what he says. Three close friends rush to him, only to hesitate from a distance when they can barely recognize him. Grief overtakes them. They sit in the silence with him for seven days and nights.

What could be ‘after this’? Job has weathered two tests of character. The Accuser’s suspicion -- that Job’s ultimate intent is prosperity -- is surely false. The link between uprightness and blessing -- i.e., a matter of gift rather than payment -- has been clarified. All that remains is for Job to be restored. Job’s story is comforting, even edifying, to many when the story they hear closes with ‘After this, . . . the Lord made him prosperous again and gave him twice as much as he had before’ (42:10). This way of telling Job’s story seems in line with the narratives about Noah and Daniel (Ezekiel 14). It seems to fit the reason James pointed his readers to ‘Job’s perseverance and . . . what the Lord finally brought about’ (5:11).

‘After this, Job opened his mouth and cursed the day of his birth’ (3:1).

In a single sentence, the narrator tears apart a neatly packaged story on the verge of a happily-ever-after ending. In a single sentence, he shakes the reader’s confidence. Is the Accuser right after all? Is Job charging ‘God’ with wrongdoing? Has ‘God’ utterly ruined him? In a single sentence, Job becomes at the same time much more familiar and yet deeply disturbing.

Do not be surprised if you hesitate to cross this jarring transition. A remarkable number in religious circles have never read closely what follows ‘after this, . . .’ (3:1). Is the narrator merely pointing to a much longer and complicated route to the story’s eventual ending? Or is the narrator -- by disclosing the raw truth about Job’s struggle -- boldly challenging accepted ways of associating ‘God’ with human experience? We face a choice. Will we treat the abbreviated story -- from prologue to wager to tragedies to epilogue -- as complete, leaving the extended interlude (chs. 3:1-42:9) either to be forced into theological conformity or to be ignored? Or will we regard what comes ‘after this, . . .’ (3:1) as the story’s core, even if the views advanced in the abbreviated version of Job’s story collapse – for us as well as for the ‘scrapheap Job’ -- as a house of cards?

The Scrapheap Job -- #5

[For the first few months after moving to New Orleans (January 1995), my family and I participated as guests with a Disciples of Christ congregation. That fall the pastor – with whom I met often for coffee and conversation – asked me to facilitate a discussion group re the story of Job. I entitled the discussions ‘Out of the Silence’. These next five ‘scrapheap Job’ postings – each prepared for the discussion series -- illustrate how my understanding of the ‘scrapheap Job’ had matured by 1995. This first posting opens with a sentence from a letter my doctoral supervisor and close friend – Glenn Hinson, PhD/DPhil -- sent me shortly after the discussion group began to meet.]

“I am proud to claim you as one of my students and a dear
friend.”

This sentence in a letter I received recently forced me to pause, to remember. Nearly twenty years ago, the person who sent the letter began to guide my doctoral study of the theological, philosophical, scientific, and political ideas that have shaped western civilization. Why did I seek to study with him? Yes, I had noticed the Oxford ‘DPhil’ beside his name. Yes, I had heard he knew well such notables as Thomas Merton and Douglas Steere. From my first conversation with this Quaker-leaning contemplative, I wanted to be his student. He walked humbly. He spoke with gratitude. He had reason not to take health for granted. He seemed genuine. I hoped he would find reason to be proud to claim me as one of his students. But ‘a dear friend’? I had not anticipated this gift, this responsibility.

Job had three dear friends. They had prayed together, planned together, laughed together, worried together, taken public stands together. He was confident they would come -- to console, to encourage, to affirm, to show pity, to remember. And they did.

How many ‘dear friends’ do you have? How many count you ‘a dear friend’? No conditions. No small-print loopholes even if they or you are driven to curse the day of birth, to despair, to ‘forsake the fear of the Almighty’. They or you are ready to die -- physically, socially, spiritually -- together. The intensity and the vulnerability keep the number to a few. A single ‘dear friend’ makes you rich.

There are a few individuals in my life who would come to me or to whom I would go simply and solely because of intimate friendship. For instance, my doctoral mentor -- Glenn. And Shelly -- a Jewish neonatologist from New York City who has given his professional life to critically-ill inner-city newborns. And Tom -- a Schweitzer-like obstetrician-gynecologist from Texas. And Erin, Kimberly, Morgan – my three daughters. And Barbara -- my most intimate friend. And then there are others with whom shared experiences may in time take us to the rare treasure of being ‘dear friends’.

‘You see something dreadful and are afraid . . . ‘You treat the words of a despairing man as wind’ . . . ‘Relent, do not be unjust’ . . . ‘You smear me with lies; you are worthless physicians’ . . . ‘Your maxims are proverbs of ashes’ . . . ‘Miserable comforters are you all’ . . . ‘Surely mockers surround me; my eyes must dwell on their hostility’ . . . ‘How long will you torment me and crush me with words?’ . . . ‘Shamelessly you attack me’ . . . ‘All my intimate friends detest me’ . . . ‘You say -- Where now is the great man’s house, the tents where wicked men lived?’ . . . ‘So how can you console me with your nonsense?’ . . . ‘How you have helped the powerless! How you have saved the arm that is feeble!’

These are hard, pained words from Job to his three close friends. Eliphaz, Bildad, and Zophar respond in kind. Their good intentions fail. The word ‘friend’ – in the special or ‘dear’ sense -- withers away.

And yet I trust my ‘dear friends’. I believe they would risk themselves for me and I for them. Why?

Image #7

Franklin, TN, . . . 2004 . . . neighbor's backyard . . . subjects quietly observed a few hours the previous day . . . light and wind promising . . . a full morning taught by the subjects -- responsible, alert, mindful, grace, playful, artistic, . . .

Image #6

Franklin, TN, . . . 2004 . . . neighbor's backyard . . . subjects quietly observed a few hours the previous day . . . light and wind promising . . . a full morning taught by the subjects -- responsible, alert, mindful, grace, playful, artistic, . . .

Image #5

Franklin, TN, . . . 2004 . . . neighbor's backyard . . . subjects quietly observed a few hours the previous day . . . light and wind promising . . . a full morning taught by the subjects -- responsible, alert, mindful, grace, playful, artistic, . . .

Image #4

Franklin, TN, . . . 2004 . . . neighbor's backyard . . . subjects quietly observed a few hours the previous day . . . light and wind promising . . . a full morning taught by the subjects -- responsible, alert, mindful, grace, playful, artistic, . . .