The killing of Job's family... (page 2)

LMS-Chef

Maybe Job didn't remember what had happened. There is no way a person could lose there family and not be sad for many many years. I know I would be. GOd is loving and kind, I am sure he did something. I have faith that he did.

LongHairGal

I don't remember if the story is literal or not but it was used pretty often.

What I didn't like was how they expected us to place little value on our lives because we could to lose it due to persecution, etc. But I am not so sure that everybody there felt the same. I always wondered if some of the more exalted ones felt that the "other guy" should give up his life but not them.

Sith

Whether Job remembered or not is not the point. The fact is, according to the account, human beings were killed by God just to prove a point in the little poker game He was playing with Satan. It's not whether Job forgot about his dead family or whether he recieved more in compensation. Innocent people were killed. The entire Bible is full of stories about God ordering and condoning slaughter and murder. Your God Of Love places little value on human life.

Abaddon

Now don't get me wrong. I'm not trying to slam God or anything like that. We were just discussing different subjects and I brought this up. I like doing that to people. Try to get them to think outside the box or bible in this case

Feel free to slam god, or at least stupid ideas about god.

I mean, come on, which is more likely;

That god is this weirdo who will play games with people's lives to prove some kind of point, even if innocent people suffer and die, and at the same time tell us not to vest a parent's sins on the children, not to harm others, to forgive and love each other.
Or that the story in Job was made-up by some bronze-age goatherd with funny ideas about god, and history and traditon mean this sun-baked mystic's idea about some trickster god (which, interestingly was an idea many religions had back then) is now thought by some people to be God's word and therefore right and true, even though it has precisely nothing to do with god.

If god gave us brains he intended for us to use them. What's obvious is normally right. What's rather unbelivable normally isn't right.

hmike

I'd say this account was written, at least in part, to explain why bad things happen to good people. Although God allowed the bad to happen, and accepted responsibility for it, the disasters were actually the work of Satan.

I see that after the initial losses, Job still praised the name of YHWH, and after being afflicted with sores, Job said, "Shall we accept good from God, and not trouble?" Now that's one tough guy.

For the sake of argument, I'm going to take the position that this was a real, historical series of events. About the sons and daughters being killed, we aren't told much about them or the relationships between them and Job. We know the kids liked to party, and Job took it upon himself to sacrifice on their behalf. Were these wild, ungodly parties? Job certainly felt the need to sacrifice on their behalf. How much did Job really know about what went on with them? How close were the relationships with his kids? Did the kids disregard God? Why didn't they make their own burnt offerings (at least, there's no mention they did)? As for the other losses, we don't know anything about the other people or what kind of operation Job ran. Maybe, with all his personal righteousness, Job didn't manage things well for God. My point is that there is a lot we don't know in this story. While the person who wrote this down (possibly from oral tradition) didn't think the behind-the-scenes details were important for the ones who would hear or read it, those details might give our skeptical minds something to ponder about God's rationale.

Interesting that Satan didn't eliminate the wife ("I can use her").

The fact is that bad things do happen to good people. Sometimes we understand why, many times we don't. But you know, we don't have all the facts--past, present, future. If we consider things from God's perspective, at least sometimes, maybe there isn't a question of why, but rather, why not.

Also, we often know when bad things happen to good people, but we seldom are aware of when bad things DON'T happen to good people. Some people just seem to have been in the wrong place at the wrong time, but who can say how many times we missed being in the wrong place, such as when a slight delay in leaving prevents our car from being at a place where it would have collided with another. Our focus is on what went wrong rather than on what didn't go wrong.

I think Job's appreciation and care of what he had after his life was restored was much greater than before the losses. Too bad Job isn't around to give us his perspective. But then, there may be a few "Jobs" in our world today to ask for theirs.

peacefulpete

hmike the disasters are actually said to be the work of Yahwehin the body of the story. This body of the material is a work framed around a very ancient legendary character and his struggle with his god, yet the details are very sophisticated and reflect a late composition. The prologue, interpolations and balance are likely by another hand who may have been the one to compile it in present form around the 5th-3rd centuries BC.

AlmostAtheist

I cant remember but did God resurrect Jobs children that died or were the poor smucks just victims of a game between God and satan?

He got double his sheep and camels back, but only the same amount of kids. The Watchtower says he'll get the other ten back in the resurrection, so he gets double kids, too. What a deal! Bible-thumpers can always play the "god's thoughts are higher than our thoughts" card and wiggle out of any of these sorts of conundrums. But if you got them thinking about it some, that's something. Dave

The killing of Job's family...

LMS-Chef

LongHairGal

Sith

Abaddon

hmike

peacefulpete

AlmostAtheist

Sith

Dustin

stillajwexelder

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