Suffering and The Book of Job

A REFLECTION:

I should like to meet the person who originally suggested that the Book of Job is good reading for those who suffer.

I should like to tie a rock around his neck and drop him in the nearest pond and then fish him out so I can dance on his grave.

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Better Never To Have Been Born: Is That Like God?

From the Mailbag:

In the story of Noah's ark, its says that God was sorry he'd made all those [wicked] people (that were then wiped out by the flood.)

After Judas betrayed Jesus, Jesus said it'd have been better if Judas had never been born.

Since God knew this before he created them, why did he anyway?

I think it's pretty intense to think that God regrets making certain people...when it's in his power to NOT make them to begin with.

Any thoughts?

Hell yeah.

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Reflections About Boredom And Scripture Stemming From Reflections on James Joyce's Unreadability

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If you have no pleasure in scripture, it has no power in you.  Only power over you, like a really brilliant but dismally dull book that you're made to read and which takes 24 hours to read and produces no real pleasure or insight.

Scripture is boring until you know this.

That's why it never does to exclude yourself as the real evidence for either the Resurrection or the Redemption of creation.

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The Book of Job: How Low Can You Go?

I think that Job is another excellent case where reading theologically causes a great deal of problems.

What I mean is, if you approach the text with the modernist assumption that there is one specific question ("What is the meaning of evil?") and one right answer, and that Job indicates what that answer is satisfactorily, prosaically, and with no remainder, you'll be disappointed.

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