The Book of Job: An Attempt to Justify the Actions of a Omnipotent, Childlike God
The Book of Job from the Old Testament is a story in which an attempt is made by the Hebrew author to justify the unjustifiable actions of a seemingly malevolent god. The questioning by Job as to why the "good" must suffer is induced by a childish challenge, put forth by Satan and accepted by God, to test the loyalty of Job toward God. The uncharacteristic actions of a supposedly omni benevolent God must be justified in the eyes of his followers, and in the process of doing so, God is made to look like nothing more than an omnipotent child.
The Book of Job can be separated into four natural divisions. For the sake of simplicity one must analyze each section separately. The first section is comprised of chapters one and two and contains the challenge made to God by Satan. The second section of the book, chapters three through thirty-seven, contains Job's questioning of God's conduct and the attempt to account for these actions by the three men known as the "Comforters"; Eliphaz, Bildad, and Zophar. Chapters thirty-eight through forty-two are the third section. These chapters are where one finds a dialogue between God and Job in which God explains the rationale behind his actions. The forth and final section of The Book of Job is found at the end of chapter forty-two and is the attempt at justification of God's actions. The work can be analyzed more effectively when one looks at each of these sections individually.
In section one God is issued a challenge by Satan. God tells Satan, "Hast thou considered my servant Job, that there is none like him in the earth, a perfect and upright man..." God is "rubbing it in" to Satan and telling hi...
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...did not resist Satan's temptation. By not knowing Job would curse him, God disproved omniscience. The cruelty on the part of God, justified or not, is confirmation against omni benevolence. God's actions are not only out of the presupposed nature associated with and taught, but they also show God to be childlike in his actions. God plays a game with the life of Job and later thinks he can make everything better by giving Job twice as much as he had before. These are not the actions or attitude of a perfect entity.
The Book of Job is a failed attempt at the justification of the unjustifiable acts of the Christian God. The questions asked by Job as to why the "good" must suffer are eternal. Although written in the Fifth Century BC, the questions are still being posed today. Although a failed attempt, the book is still a relevant and entertaining piece of literature.
The Book of Job is one of the three books in the Hebrew bible whose genre is described as wisdom literature.1 Certainly the Book of Job satisfies the literary conventions that qualify a biblical book for such status. 2 Yet Job may be associated with wisdom in a much more literal sense. The Book of Job attempts to deal with a problematic question that confronts suffering humanity: why do bad things happen to good people? The variety and vehemence of commentators' contemporary responses to this chapter of the Bible is testament to the continued relevance of the Book of Job's wisdom thousands of years after it was written. Although the commentators examined herein arrive at differing and sometimes conflicting conclusions after reading the story of "the holy Arab"3, none are left indifferent.
In the first chapter of God Behaving Badly, David Lamb argues that God is unfairly given a bad reputation. He claims these negative perceptions are fueled by pop culture and lead many to believe the lie that the God of the Old Testament is angry, sexist, racist, violent, legalistic, rigid, and distant. These negative perceptions, in turn, affect our faith. Ultimately, Lamb seeks to demonstrate that historical context disproves the presumptuous aforementioned. In addition, he defends his position by citing patterns of descriptions that characterize God throughout the Old Testament. “Our image of God will directly affect how we either pursue or avoid God. If we believe that the God of the Old Testament is really harsh, unfair and cruel, we won’t want anything to do with him” (Lamb 22). Clearly, they way Christians choose to see God will shape their relationship with Him.
After reading Stephen Mitchell’s translation and introduction of the Book of Job, I found that as I read the actual poem from the Bible, that I came to understand more of what the writer was trying to get across to the reader. Having grown up in a Christian household, I have heard the story of Job multiple times, but this book made me take a deeper look into the story and as I read the translation it was as if I was reading this story for the very first time. What really interested me was the way that Job and his friends interacted and how it perfectly illustrated the irony of his situation. We as readers know that Job is only being punished because of this disagreement between God and Satan, but throughout the entire book Job’s friends are
Also, the claim that God is responsible for death and suffering of innocent people also can be argued, because it implies that God has a moral guilt when he takes away lives of his creatures. But there is no moral guilt for God. It is falsely assumed that because the creatures are not allowed to take someone else's life, then is not acceptable to do the same for God. God gives life and only he has the right to take it (Job 1:21), but people do not give life, and they have no right to take it away.
God’s power “is like great waters that are dammed for the present; they increase more and more, and higher and higher, til an outlet is given” (Edwards 109). God’s anger builds up from the people who sin, and eventually he unleashes his madness and irritability towards people who are at fault. He’s the ruler of all people and with only the movement of his hand, he can send a disaster of punishments. As more people commit sins, God’s desire to retaliate becomes sufficiently greater. He has dominance over humans and when he sees the right time to strike back, he easily does. God is shown as rude when he threatens people with his bountiful power to send them to hell if they cross him. Likewise, at any given time, God can extract “his hand from the floodgate, [and] it would immediately fly open, and the fiery floods of the fierceness and wrath of God, would rush forth with inconceivable fury, and would come upon you with omnipotent power” (Edwards 109). Whenever God feels it is necessary to let out his rage, just by lifting his hand, he can release his overflowing power which will swallow the population of sinners and send them all to hell. God is a bully because his violence and power is at the tips of his fingers ready to use against guilty and disobedient humans. God is in total control for making decisions to lead people to hell, which demonstrates his dominant impact over humans.
Macbeth’s story highlights the inherent goodness found in all of us, but also the evil that lurks within us, unnourished. Although there is no redemption for Macbeth’s evil sins, he finally comes to acknowledge his crimes and thus can provoke pity in the eyes of the audience. Macbeth’s psychological journey from a courageous general to a “ dead butcher” (5.9.41) is one that truly merits to be called a tragedy.
“If trembling I inhabit then, protest me The baby of a girl. Hence, horrible shadow! Unreal mockery, hence!”
In considering Job’s companions and their purpose in the interactions in the book of Job, different implications come to the surface depending on the perspective one engages. First, what function would have Job’s companions believed they were performing? Initially, the companions Eliphaz, Bildad, and Zophar come to comfort Job in his pain and grief, as stated by the author in Job 2:11. So they did, as they sat in silence, present with him, and perhaps this was their sole original intent. Yet, once Job begins to speak and articulate his lament, asserting his innocence, the role of these three shifts to one of rebuke and correction. They claim to speak on behalf of truth and God, determining Job to be at fault and dishonest, persisting in
Macbeth’s life is a tragic story about how he was deceived and molded into an evil man. His evil, sparked by lady Macbeth, began with the murder of king Duncan. Macbeth’s heart couldn’t handle the sin but Lady Macbeth forced him to change his mind. Macbeth’s evil was a result of his overconfidence, guilty conscience, and his human nature, all of which are traits that could be seen in any person in search of power.
Seeking for greater power, Macbeth murders Duncan who is the king at that time, which caused a great pain for the kingdom. Duncan is a great king, but just not a so good human reader. He has never been aware of Macbeth. He never have a thought that Macbeth might be a danger, who is willing to kill him for the throne. On the other hand, Macbeth does not accept to be just a general for the rest of his life. He wants a greater power, higher position than he is having at the time. Because of the suggests from the trio witches: “ All hail, Macbeth! Hail to thee, Thane of Cawdor!/ All hail, Macbeth, that shalt be king hereafter!”(1.2.49-50), Macbeth has the thinking about killing the king to take his throne. By calling Macbeth the Thane of Cawdor, they give Macbeth the thought that being a king is his fate. On the night Macbeth is planning to murder Duncan, the Old Man see many strange events: “And Duncan’s horses (a thing most strange and certain),/ Beauteous and swift, the minions of their race, /Turned wild in nature, broke their stalls, flung out/ Contending ‘gainst obedience, as they would/ Make war with mankind” (2.4.14-18). It creates a scary feeling in the kingdom, and means something bad will happen to the kingdom.
This specific action consequently resulted in Macbeth’s level of morality to continually decline as he is acutely aware of his own tyranny. Therefore Macbeth attempts to forget the horrific deed he has committed and be the figure that orders and disorders. Our perception of Macbeth being a wise and loyal soldier is now eroded, as we start to view Macbeth constantly questioning his own actions, and is also impelled to perpetrate further atrocities with the intention of covering up his previous wrong-doings.
Napoleon Hill said procrastination is the bad habit of putting off until the day after tomorrow what should have been done the day before yesterday. A lot of people today will actually experience procrastination in their everyday life, and is not looked at as a problem until it interferes with peoples’ ability to work and if it creates psychological and physical discomfort. Students often procrastinate and most research is observing the college students likeliness to procrastinate. To look at only college students would be bias however since it affects everyone, almost every day. To find out why people procrastinate, looking at personality and motivation can be where the answer lies. One of the leading researchers in procrastination is Joseph Ferrari. He looks at the definition of procrastination, many reasons procrastinations occurs, and the personality types it occurs in.
A. H. C. Chu and J. N. Choi, psychologists, distinguished two types of protracting, they discovered that active procrastination has attainable characteristics that lead to positive personal outcomes (Choi and Moran). These positive personal outcomes are a result of waiting at its finest. People with these adequate dilatory skills have probably learned from their deficient habits in the past that may help everyone know that the view of holding off can change. Writing this essay has changed my view on procrastination slightly, as I can see how it can be good for you. With my siblings, free time is limited. So taking time to do something more entertaining helps me take a break from stressful work. Then when I get back to it I feel more confident that I can focus and finish it. That’s an example of active procrastination for me. Frank Partnoy shows historical views on procrastination, in an article about his book, such as how “The Greeks and Romans generally regarded procrastination highly. The wisest leaders embraced procrastination and would basically sit around and think and not do anything unless they absolutely had to” (Gambino 2012). Those Romans and Greeks were able to enjoy their time of relaxation, using procrastination as a healthy tool rather than a bad habit. Even wise leaders used it! What an amazing realization that we get procrastination from
Procrastination can be a major problem in both your career and your personal life because procrastination is the thief of time. When you keep putting off things, they keep piling up and getting in your way of achieving other things. Then you have missed opportunities, frenzied work hours, feel stressed, guilt and resentment; you find you are being overwhelmed easily because there is just so much to do.
People all procrastinate at one time or another. Procrastination is the practice of delaying work on important tasks in favor of less challenging ones. Chronic procrastinating hinders productivity and affects our state of mind by creating anxiety and stress (Reichelt). As deadlines approach, one often feels frustration and guilt for not starting on a task earlier. We often assume that projects won't take as long to finish as they really will, which often results in a mad scramble to finish the project in the twenty-four hours before the projects deadline. One of the biggest factors contributing to procrastination is the misconception that we need to be inspired or in the mood to work on the task at hand (Reichelt). However, the reality is that if you wait for the “right time” you will most likely wait for an indefinite amount of time and the task will never get completed.