Book of Job
Huh. I just read this bit from the TV Tropes website, about the book of Job:
The lesson of the book was supposed to be to not treat God and religion as something formulaic, like Job and his friends had been doing - that they need to understand, not just blindly follow...The end of the book reveals that the entire thing was a big test to make Job see that questioning God and his actions IS okay, because he was only human. It didn't help that his wife and friends either wanted him to think it was his fault somehow, or straight out be blasphemous. God yelled at him for being stubborn at the end of it, but for being so faithful, gave him TWICE what he started with. Actually, surprisingly, the one that got off the easiest was the youngest of them, because, ironically, he was the wisest out of the four.
Huh. That makes way, way WAY more sense than "God was testing Job" for...um...what reason again? Seriously, the "standard" interpretation that God allowed Job to be tested so that...uh...yeah. Because. It was good for him. Or...something.
Yep, I like this one better, because frankly the "standard" "God tests Job and he was patient and faithful so you should be too" always struck me as a bunch of jerkish dick-waving. God's proving something to Satan? Whyever for? Who cares what Satan thinks, he's a jerk anyway!
But this - THIS I can get. THIS isn't "God's being a dick to Job because He can", this is "God APPEARS TO BE a dick to Job because Job needs to learn a lesson, and that lesson is don't just formulaically and blindly follow God because hey, it's The Day To Do That; you follow God in a thinking manner. God wants thinking followers and believers, not automatons. "
I can totally get behind that. And finally - finally- a reason for the book of Job, and Job's suffering.
The lesson of the book was supposed to be to not treat God and religion as something formulaic, like Job and his friends had been doing - that they need to understand, not just blindly follow...The end of the book reveals that the entire thing was a big test to make Job see that questioning God and his actions IS okay, because he was only human. It didn't help that his wife and friends either wanted him to think it was his fault somehow, or straight out be blasphemous. God yelled at him for being stubborn at the end of it, but for being so faithful, gave him TWICE what he started with. Actually, surprisingly, the one that got off the easiest was the youngest of them, because, ironically, he was the wisest out of the four.
Huh. That makes way, way WAY more sense than "God was testing Job" for...um...what reason again? Seriously, the "standard" interpretation that God allowed Job to be tested so that...uh...yeah. Because. It was good for him. Or...something.
Yep, I like this one better, because frankly the "standard" "God tests Job and he was patient and faithful so you should be too" always struck me as a bunch of jerkish dick-waving. God's proving something to Satan? Whyever for? Who cares what Satan thinks, he's a jerk anyway!
But this - THIS I can get. THIS isn't "God's being a dick to Job because He can", this is "God APPEARS TO BE a dick to Job because Job needs to learn a lesson, and that lesson is don't just formulaically and blindly follow God because hey, it's The Day To Do That; you follow God in a thinking manner. God wants thinking followers and believers, not automatons. "
I can totally get behind that. And finally - finally- a reason for the book of Job, and Job's suffering.
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