You may have read the story of a blameless and upright man that existed many centuries ago. (No, I am not referring to Jesus of Nazareth here.) This righteous man was, as some would say, a very blessed person. He was a believer in the Almighty and a seeker of truth, and he was also pleasing to God and just in God's eyes. Nevertheless - and contrary to the notion that only good things happen to good people - he began to experience tremendous misery and hardship. His name was Job.
His life is detailed in the biblical book bearing his name and deals with the mysterious human reality of suffering. In addition to raising the question of why people suffer unjustly in this world, the book of Job attempts to help us understand that all people experience suffering – indeed, neither the innocent nor the just are exempt from it. Certainly, to be human is to be susceptible to periods of adversity in this life.
However, we attain a comforting lesson when we attentively read Job’s story. Even though he suffered with great anguish, the Omnipotent God of all creation never abandoned him. Ultimately, the book disproves the notion that suffering serves no purpose when we patiently reflect on Job’s struggle and relationship with the Lord. In addition, we begin to understand that even though God does not desire to see us in agony, He
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As these rabbis debated about whether God is innocent or guilty, they referenced a number of scriptural passages that relate to the people of ancient Israel and their experience of suffering. Their debate presented clearly the questions that human beings have raised for centuries: “If God is good, why does evil exist?” “Why do good people suffer?” “Why does God allow the suffering that people experience?” “Has God forgotten us?” These are questions that will never disappear and will never grow
This quarter in IGE 121- Rationalism, Revelation, and Enlightenment: The Ancient World there has been a lot of material covering death, suffering, fate, destiny, and good and evil. Three out of the many readings that cover death and suffering would be “Book of Matthew” and “Antigone” and “Book of Job”. A reading of this quarter that reveals suffering would be “Prometheus Bound” and “Book of Matthew”. An additional text that disclose one of themes is the Mayan book “Popol Vuh”. People often ask what the reasons are on why good people have to suffer.
(8.92-96).” Later in the concentration camp, fellow prisoners including Elie, starts thinking the God he knew when he was innocent. but this God has a different persona, possibly one indifferent to suffering, “Some of the men spoke of God: His mysterious ways, the sins of the Jewish people, and the redemption to come. As for me, I had ceased to pray. I concurred with Job!
And if God is God, why is He letting us suffer?” (1) The lifelong quest for answers to these questions shaped his theology
What does Your grandeur mean, Master of the Universe, in the face of all this cowardice, this decay, and this misery? Why do you go on troubling these poor people's wounded minds, their ailing bodies?” (66). This presents the thought that with the constant physical struggle and torment, he begins to question whether those things he believes in strongly are even valid things. He questions why all these people need to suffer and why God has allowed them to suffer for his cause.
Pathos is also evident when Banneker alludes to Job, a religious figure in the Bible who endures much suffering. Towards the end of his letter, Banneker quotes Job’s message that one must “‘put [his] souls stead,’ thus shall [his] hearts be enlarged with kindness and
The Book of Job provides an example of how people should praise God by illustrating a blameless, responsible, and fearing man who will always turn away from evil. Therefore, this book presents the same man tortured by outside forces lacking the possibility to acquire help from family and friends. Throughout the reading in particular (14:11) demonstrates how there was a moment of weakness in which Job fails and ask for his death, but after all, he did not commit sin and endured waiting for his torment to banish. In addition, the book reveals how men turned against a man in need and instead judged him without understanding the sources causing his disgrace. However, the book provides a comparison in how humans behave by providing vivid examples of characters who showed behaviors illustrating how humanity functions.
A “simple creature of flesh and bone”(76-77) is not seen as being capable of understanding god’s will. Unlike god a person’s views may be warped by emotion; someone may “suffer hell in [their] soul and [their] flesh.”(77) After the death of Akida Drummer the prisoners forget to pray for him as a direct result of their own suffering. Unlike a god they have been rendered unable to fulfill their promise to their friend because of their own emotional trauma. Sorrow and other emotional responses are described as a force capable of destroying one’s ability to reason. Furthermore humankind is not seen as having adequate trust in god’s will.
Job was a man of faith, he repented for little injustices. He was tested to prove his righteousness and succeeded. His children were killed, his cattle was killed, he was painfully diseased and his was wealth diminished. Through all this he remained faithful. His so called friends told him to abandon God as he had him.
Job owns seven thousand sheep, three thousand camels, five hundred yokes of oxen, three daughters, seven sons, and a wife-in short, prosperity. In addition, he is a respectful and religious man who worships God and lives a chaste life. However, God chooses to test Job and sets a list of punishments for him, who undergoes these challenges throughout the book of Job. There is a certain contradiction in a deity that punishes those who obey, and the story emphasizes the omniscience of God’s unique role in Job’s life. God’s seemingly capricious nature demonstrates the usage of power by an omnipotent figure, in terms of beneficence, retributive justice, and exploitation.
Many were filled with distaste, as the God, they were so devoted to had abandoned them when they were victim to such torture. “What are You, my God? I thought angrily. How do You compare to the stricken mass gathered to affirm to You their faith, their anger, their defiance? What does Your grandeur mean, Master of the Universe, in the face of this cowardice, this decay, and this misery?
The reality of the world's ongoing suffering can be a heavy burden to bear, and it is not surprising that it might manifest in his
I concurred with Job! I was not denying His existence, but I doubted His absolute justice” (45). Before his struggle, he was emotionally and spiritually connected to God and spent so much of his time studying the Jewish faith. In contrast, after he experienced living in a concentration camp he questioned God’s motives and no longer believed in absolute justice. He doesn’t believe in the same God he once did; before, he believed in a benevolent and kind father of humankind, he now can only believe in an apathetic and cold observer of the Jew’s