The following extract is taken from Robert Sutherland’s new book “Putting God on Trial: The Biblical Book of Job” (Trafford, Victoria, 2004) It is reproduced with his permission and he retains the copyright. Mr.Sutherland is a Christian Canadian criminal defense lawyer instrumental in changing the Canadian law on aggravated assault and solicitor-client privilege. He is a Senior Fellow at the Mortimer J. Adler Centre for the Study of the Great Ideas. And he is a member of St.Stephen’s Anglican, Thunder Bay. The book has received high praise from Job scholars: David Clines, Norman Habel and Gerald Janzen. Several chapters and order information are online at http://www.bookofjob.org
PUTTING GOD ON TRIAL
Act 3 might be entitled Putting God on Trial for, within a canonical perspective, it reworks the Revelation story. The Oath of Innocence trumpets a Final Judgment, a judgment on God himself. God is summoned to the bar of universal justice to give a defense for the world he has created.
God’s Appearance in a Golden Whirlwind
To the astonishment of all, God appears before this court of justice. God appears in the form of a golden whirlwind. (Job 37:22; 38:1) In part, the whirlwind is a cloak for God’s own goodness. On the terms of God’s own trial, God cannot fully disclose his purpose in creation. In part, the whirlwind mirrors the whirl of emotions in the three cycles of speeches that have immediately preceded it. This is the culmination of that discussion.
Most importantly, the golden whirlwind is a powerful mythological symbol for the divine control of evil. The mythological background is primarily the Babylonian myth of creation. And its use here intimates God’s discussion of Leviathan to follow in his second speech to Job.
In Ancient Near Eastern creation myths, goodness is order; evil is chaos. The creation of the world and the creation of man is the imposition of order on chaos. Creation is not creation out of nothing, but rather creation out of chaos. The chaos consists of pre-existent physical materials which are inherently difficult to control. Those pre-existent materials are usually described in terms of water, probably because of its shapelessness. Those pre-existent materials are usually pictured as a sea monster or monsters within the water, though they represent the water itself. All the monsters are one: chaos. Any multiplication of monsters is merely for dramatic effect. The creation of the world is a divine struggle to impose order on this pre-existent chaos. That struggle is pictured through a combat motif in which the high God battles the chaos monsters, defeating them, killing some and imprisoning others. It is the triumph of good over evil. The world is created out of the body of a slain chaos monster. Land emerges out of the water. Form has been imposed on chaos. The primordial waters of chaos are then confined to the waters above the firmament (the heavens), to the waters below the firmament (the underworld) and to the waters surrounding the firmament (the oceans that circle the world). Man is then created out of the blood of a slain chaos monster. This is the poetic way of saying four things. Evil is all around us. Evil is deep within us. Evil is part of the very fabric of creation. And evil is part of God’s very purpose in creation. The Babylonian myth of creation typifies these Ancient Near Eastern creation myths.
In the the Babylonian myth of creation, the whirlwind is the identifying sign of the high God Marduk’s triumph over evil. Marduk himself is draped golden auras.
“His body was magnificent, fiery his glance,
He was a hero at birth,
he was a mighty one from the beginning!
..
He wore (on his body) the aura of ten gods,]
had (them) wrapped around his head (?) too,
Fifty glories were heaped upon him.
Anu formed and produced the four winds,
He put them in his hand, “Let my son play!”
Marduk holds in his hand the whirlwind and because he is golden, the whirlwind becomes a golden whirlwind. The phrase “Let my son play!” can mean “My son, let them whirl” referring to the winds.
“He made the bow, appointed it his weapon,
He mounted the arrow, set it on the string,
He took up the mace, held it in his right hand,
Box and quiver he slung on his arm.
Thunderbolts he set before his face.
With raging fire he covered his body.
Then he made a net to enclose Tiamat within.
He deployed the four winds that none of her might escape:
South Wind, North Wind, East Wind, West Wind,
Gift of his grandfather Anu, he fastened the net at his side.
He made ill wind, whirlwind, cyclone.
Four-ways wind, seven-ways wind, destructive wind,
irresistible wind:
He released the winds which he had made, the seven of them,
Mounting in readiness behind him to roil inside Tiamat.”
The four winds, the seven winds circle together to create the irresistible ill wind, the whirlwind. The whirlwind is the vehicle by which Marduk defeats evil.
“Tiamat and Marduk, sage of the gods, drew close for battle,
They locked in single combat, joining for the fray.
The Lord spread out his net, encircled her,
The ill wind he had held behind him, he released in her face.
Tiamat opened her mouth to swallow,
He thrust the ill wind so she could not close her lips.
The raging winds bloated her belly,
Her insides were stopped up, she gaped her mouth wide.
He shot off the arrow, it broke open her belly,
It cut to her innards, it pierced her heart.
He subdued her and snuffed out her life.
He flung down her carcass, he stood his stand upon it.”
Tiamat is killed as she opens her mouth to swallow the high God. She swallows the whirlwind and is destroyed from within. Marduk shoots an arrow through her mouth and it pierces her heart and tears open her belly. Her innards fall out. She is dead. And Marduk takes his stand on her dead carcass. The author’s introduction of this Babylonian image of a golden whirlwind intimates the introduction of the chaos monster Leviathan in God’s second speech. Leviathan is the Jewish reworking of the Tiamat myth.
Yet the whirlwind is a morally ambiguous image for Job. He has previously complained to God that “you have turned cruel to me; with the might of your hand you persecute me. You lift me up on the wind, you make me ride on it, and you toss me about in the roar of the storm. I know that you will bring me to death, and to the house appointed for all the living.” (Job 30:21-23) The whirlwind had already taken the lives of Job’s children. (Job 1:19) And in light of his Oath of Innocence, Job has to be apprehensive that God has come to personally take his own life.
To the astonishment of all, Job is not struck dead for his claim. It is a silent witness Job is in the right. To the astonishment of all, God does not enter a defense to the claim made by Job. God is prohibited, on the terms of his own trial with Satan, from explicitly giving Job the reason for his suffering, lest that in turn give Job and humanity a reason to worship God and ultimately to manipulate him for their own ends. God is on trial for his life and his very purpose in creation and his hands are tied. He is forced into a strategy of indirection.
God’s First Speech
In his first speech, God reviews the created order at length, challenging the extent of Job’s wisdom not his innocence or his integrity. God hints that there is a purpose in all things, his concern is ongoing and one should be ever mindful of one’s created status.
1. Physical World
Job has asked, Job has demanded that God explain his activity in the world. Specifically, Job has asked, Job has demanded that God answer the question why is there evil in the world.
So God proceeds to describe his activity in the world. God first reviews the physical world through seven things:
(1) the foundations of the earth (Job 38:4-7),
(2) the sea (Job 38:8-11),
(3) Sheol (Job 38:12-21),
(4) the storehouses of snow and hail (Job 38:22-24),
(5) the rain (Job 38:25-30),
(6) the heavens (Job 38:31-33) and
(7) the lightning (Job 38:34-38).
Opening Question: Then the LORD answered Job out of the whirlwind: “Who is this that darkens counsel by words without knowledge? Gird up your loins like a man, I will question you, and you shall declare to me. (Job 38:1-3 Italics added for emphasis and clarification.)
Physical World
1. Foundations of the Earth: “Where were you when I laid the foundation of the earth? Tell me, if you have understanding. Who determined its measurements–surely you know! Or who stretched the line upon it? On what were its bases sunk, or who laid its cornerstone when the morning stars sang together and all the heavenly beings shouted for joy? (Job 38:4-7 Italics added for emphasis and clarification.)
2. Sea: “Or who shut in the sea with doors when it burst out from the womb? when I made the clouds its garment, and thick darkness its swaddling band, and prescribed bounds for it, and set bars and doors, and said, ‘Thus far shall you come, and no farther, and here shall your proud waves be stopped’? (Job 38:8-11 Italics added for emphasis and clarification.)
3. Sheol: “Have you commanded the morning since your days began, and caused the dawn to know its place, so that it might take hold of the skirts of the earth, and the wicked be shaken out of it? It is changed like clay under the seal, and it is dyed like a garment. Light is withheld from the wicked, and their uplifted arm is broken. “Have you entered into the springs of the sea, or walked in the recesses of the deep? Have the gates of death been revealed to you, or have you seen the gates of deep darkness? Have you comprehended the expanse of the earth? Declare, if you know all this. “Where is the way to the dwelling of light, and where is the place of darkness, that you may take it to its territory and that you may discern the paths to its home? Surely you know, for you were born then, and the number of your days is great! (Job 38:12-21 Italics added for emphasis and clarification.)
4. Storehouses of snow and hail: “Have you entered the storehouses of the snow, or have you seen the storehouses of the hail, which I have reserved for the time of trouble, for the day of battle and war? What is the way to the place where the light is distributed, or where the east wind is scattered upon the earth? (Job 38:22-24 Italics added for emphasis and clarification.)
5. Rain: “Who has cut a channel for the torrents of rain, and a way for the thunderbolt, to bring rain on a land where no one lives, on the desert, which is empty of human life, to satisfy the waste and desolate land, and to make the ground put forth grass? “Has the rain a father, or who has begotten the drops of dew? From whose womb did the ice come forth, and who has given birth to the hoarfrost of heaven? The waters become hard like stone, and the face of the deep is frozen. (Job 38:25-30 Italics added for emphasis and clarification.)
6. Heavens: “Can you bind the chains of the Pleiades, or loose the cords of Orion? Can you lead forth the Mazzaroth in their season, or can you guide the Bear with its children? Do you know the ordinances of the heavens? Can you establish their rule on the earth? (Job 38:31-33 Italics added for emphasis and clarification.)
7. Lightning: “Can you lift up your voice to the clouds, so that a flood of waters may cover you? Can you send forth lightnings, so that they may go and say to you, ‘Here we are’? Who has put wisdom in the inward parts, or given understanding to the mind? Who has the wisdom to number the clouds? Or who can tilt the waterskins of the heavens, when the dust runs into a mass and the clods cling together? (Job 38:34-38 Italics added for emphasis and clarification.)
2. Animal World
God then reviews the animal world through seven things:
(1) the wild lions (Job 38:38-41),
(2) the wild goats (Job 39:1-4),
(3) the wild ass (Job 39:5-8),
(4) the wild ox (Job 39:9-12),
(5) the wild ostrich (Job 39:13-18),
(6) the war horse (Job 39:13-18) and
(7) the birds of prey (Job 39:26-30).
Animal World
1. Wild Lions: “Can you hunt the prey for the lion, or satisfy the appetite of the young lions, when they crouch in their dens, or lie in wait in their covert? Who provides for the raven its prey, when its young ones cry to God, and wander about for lack of food? (Job 38:39-41 Italics added for emphasis and clarification.)
2. Wild Goats: “Do you know when the mountain goats give birth? Do you observe the calving of the deer? Can you number the months that they fulfill, and do you know the time when they give birth, when they crouch to give birth to their offspring, and are delivered of their young? Their young ones become strong, they grow up in the open; they go forth, and do not return to them. (Job 39:1-4 Italics added for emphasis and clarification.)
3. Wild Ass: “Who has let the wild ass go free? Who has loosed the bonds of the swift ass, to which I have given the steppe for its home, the salt land for its dwelling place? It scorns the tumult of the city; it does not hear the shouts of the driver. It ranges the mountains as its pasture, and it searches after every green thing. (Job 39:5-8 Italics added for emphasis and clarification.)
4. Wild Ox: “Is the wild ox willing to serve you? Will it spend the night at your crib? Can you tie it in the furrow with ropes, or will it harrow the valleys after you? Will you depend on it because its strength is great, and will you hand over your labor to it? Do you have faith in it that it will return, and bring your grain to your threshing floor? (Job 39:9-12 Italics added for emphasis and clarification.)
5. Wild Ostrich: “The ostrich’s wings flap wildly, though its pinions lack plumage. For it leaves its eggs to the earth, and lets them be warmed on the ground, forgetting that a foot may crush them, and that a wild animal may trample them. It deals cruelly with its young, as if they were not its own; though its labor should be in vain, yet it has no fear; because God has made it forget wisdom, and given it no share in understanding. When it spreads its plumes aloft, it laughs at the horse and its rider. (Job 39:13-18 Italics added for emphasis and clarification.)
6. War Horse: “Do you give the horse its might? Do you clothe its neck with mane? Do you make it leap like the locust? Its majestic snorting is terrible. It paws violently, exults mightily; it goes out to meet the weapons. It laughs at fear, and is not dismayed; it does not turn back from the sword. Upon it rattle the quiver, the flashing spear, and the javelin. With fierceness and rage it swallows the ground; it cannot stand still at the sound of the trumpet. When the trumpet sounds, it says ‘Aha!’ From a distance it smells the battle, the thunder of the captains, and the shouting. (Job 39:13-18 Italics added for emphasis and clarification.)
7. Birds of Prey: “Is it by your wisdom that the hawk soars, and spreads its wings toward the south? Is it at your command that the eagle mounts up and makes its nest on high? It lives on the rock and makes its home in the fastness of the rocky crag. From there it spies the prey; its eyes see it from far away. Its young ones suck up blood; and where the slain are, there it is.” (Job 39:26-30 Italics added for emphasis and clarification.)
Concluding Question: And the LORD said to Job: “Shall a faultfinder contend with the Almighty? Anyone who argues with God must respond.” (Job 40:1-2 Italics added for emphasis and clarification.)
Seven is a symbolic number and this is a symbolic review of all in the physical and animal worlds that God intends to reveal.
God deliberately chooses not to review the human world. While his descriptions are extensive and often beautiful, they are entirely irrelevant to question at hand- God’s moral activity in the creation of evil in the human world. At first glance, the whirlwind appears to be nothing more than a windbag. God goes round and round the world missing the moral point at every turn.
God seems to be making only one point. Job is ignorant and should be every mindful of his created status in challenging God. God hammers home that point time and time again- thirty five times in all. “Who is this that darkens counsel by word without knowledge?” (Job 38:1)
“Declare to me” (Job 38:3) “Where were you?” (Job 38:4) “Who determined” (Job 38:5) “Have you” (Job 38:12) “Have you” (Job 38:16)
“Have you” (Job 38:17) “Have you” (Job 38:18) “Declare, if you know all this” (Job 38:18) “Where is the way” (Job 38:19) “Surely you know” (Job 38:21) “Have you” (Job 38:22) “What is the way” (Job 38:24) “Who has” (Job 38:25) “Can you” (Job 38:21) “Can you” (Job 38:32) “Do you know” (Job 38:33) “Can you” (Job 38:33) “Can you” (Job 38:34) “Can you” (Job 38:35) “‘Who has” (Job 38:36) “Can you” (Job 38:39) “Do you know” (Job 39:1) “Do you observe” (Job 39:1) “Can you” (Job 39:2)
“Who has” (Job 39:1) “Who has” (Job 39:1) “Can you” (Job 39:10) “Will you” (Job 39:11) “Do you” (Job 39:12) “Do you” (Job 39:19) “Do you” (Job 39:19) “Do you” (Job 39:20) “Is it” (Job 39:26) “Is it” (Job 27)
Yet God’s point is of limited worth. Job has never claimed omniscience. In his Oath of Innocence, Job has testified that God is the author of undeserved evil in the world and that man has a right to know the reason why. Those are the issues. God’s defence might legitimately include a cross-examination of the plaintiff Job. But God is brow-beating the witness Job on a point that is irrelevant to the question at hand. In the entire Bible, this first speech is the longest speech God ever gives. It leaves Job and many a reader wondering what is God up to here and in the world.
On the terms of his own trial with Satan, God cannot give direct answers. Somehow whatever answer God does give is tied to man’s created status. Job certainly does not know what has happened in heaven. And God cannot tell him without defeating the very purpose of creation. God has to be harsh with Job. God cannot appear loving, lest Job find in kind words a reason to love God. If this is love, then it is the toughest love possible.
God’s description of the physical and animal worlds finds some interesting parallels in Psalms 104 and 89. Both psalms link the natural world with the mythological world. And God’s use of similar language in his first speech should prompt the discerning reader to expect the appearance of Leviathan in God’s second speech.
(a) Psalm 104 is a myth of creation modeled on an earlier Egyptian myth of creation involving the high God Ra. However, the psalmist seems to have had before him a Canaanite copy of that myth, as evidenced by the use of a number of Canaanite words and images within this psalm.
“Bless the LORD, O my soul. O LORD my God, you are very great. You are clothed with honor and majesty, wrapped in light as with a garment. You stretch out the heavens like a tent, you set the beams of your chambers on the waters, you make the clouds your chariot, you ride on the wings of the wind, you make the winds your messengers, fire and flame your ministers. You set the earth on its foundations, so that it shall never be shaken. You cover it with the deep as with a garment; the waters stood above the mountains. At your rebuke they flee; at the sound of your thunder they take to flight. They rose up to the mountains, ran down to the valleys to the place that you appointed for them. You set a boundary that they may not pass, so that they might not again cover the earth. You make spring gush forth in the valley; they flow between the hills, giving drink to every wild animal; the wild asses quench their thirst.From your lofty abode you water the mountains; the earth is satisfied with the fruit of your work. You cause the grass to grow for the cattle.The high mountains are for the wild goats.You have make the moon mark the seasons; the sun knows its time for setting.The young lions creep roar for their prey, seeking their food from God. When the sun rises, they withdraw and lie down in their dens…Yonder is the sea, great and wide, creeping things innumerable are there, living things both small and great. There go the ships, and Leviathan that you formed to sport in it. These all look to you to give them their food in due season; when you give to them, they gather it up; when you open your hand, they are filled with good things.” (Psalm 104:1-11,13-14,18-19,21-22, 25-28 Italics added for emphasis.)
Echoes of the Babylonian myth of creation can be heard in the emergence of the land out of the waters that “covered the earth.” The cosmic battle has been demythologized to a very great degree. It is by God’s “rebuke” not his weaponry that the waters of the deep flee. The imposition of order is by fiat command. Chaos is given a role to play in the world, but that role is dramatically circumscribed. “They.ran to the place that you appointed for them. Yet set a boundary that they may not pass.” (Psalm 104:8-9) This language of boundaries, limits and appointed places will reoccur in God’s first speech to Job. “Who shut in the sea with doors, when it burst out from the womb?- when I made the clouds its garment, and thick darkness its swaddling band, and prescribed bounds for it, and set bars and doors, and said, ‘Thus far shall you come, and no farther, and here shall your proud waves be stopped?” (Job 8-10)
The author of The Book of Job may have known this psalm. The order of creation in this hymn: stretching out the heavens, covering them with clouds, fixing the foundations of the earth and rebuking the raging sea is repeated in Job’s first words in the third speech in the third cycle. They precede his Oath of Innocence.
“With whose help have you uttered words, and whose spirit has come forth from you? The shades below tremble, the waters and their inhabitants. Sheol is naked before God, and Abaddon has no covering. He stretches out Zaphon over the void, and hangs the earth upon nothing. He binds up the water in his thick clouds, and the cloud is not torn open by them. He covers the face of the full moon, and spreads over it his cloud. He has described a circle on the face of the waters, at the boundary between light and darkness. The pillars of heaven tremble, and are astounded at his rebuke. By his power he stilled the Sea; by his understanding he struck down Rahab. By his wind the heavens were made fair; his hand pierced the fleeing serpent. These are indeed but the outskirts of his ways; and how small a whisper do we hear of him!” (Job 26:4-14 Italics added for emphasis)
In many ways, God’s first and second speech to Job play off this introduction to Job’s Oath of Innocence. Much of the language and many of the images will be repeated. The idea of a providential control of chaos is deepened with the repeated image of a covering garment. (Psalm 104:6; Job 38:9) God treats the chaos as his child, presumably rearing it for a special purpose. That purpose involves the effortless control that is play. God brings up this child through play. God is said to “sport” with Leviathan, that chaos monster of the deep. (Psalm 104:26)
The Hebrew here “lesaheq bo” is admittedly ambivalent and can be read either as “sport in it” meaning the sea or “sport with it” meaning the dragon. The NRSV opts for the former, but the latter seems preferable. A similar expression, “hatesheq bo” occurs in God’s second speech to Job where it is clear the meaning is “sport with it”. “Will you play with it as a bird, or will you put it on lease for your girls.” (Job 41:5)
This latter usage should dictate in our understanding of the passage at hand.
(b) Psalm 89 presents that myth of creation once again. The heavenly council has its Babylonian and Canaanite counterparts, but God’s kingship is never in question. God is the creator of all things, not the fashioner of pre-existent things.
“For who in the skies can be compared to the LORD? Who among the heavenly beings is like the LORD, a God feared in the council of the holy ones, great and awesome above all that are around him? O LORD God of hosts, who is as mighty as you, O LORD? Your faithfulness surrounds you. You rule the raging of the sea; when its waves rise, you still them. You crushed Rahab like a carcass; you scattered your enemies with your mighty arm. The heavens are yours, the earth also is yours; the world and all that is in it-you have founded them.” (Psalm 89:6-11 Italics added for emphasis.)
The chaos monster is retained, under one of its Hebrew names Rahab. “Rahab” means “boisterous one”.
The author of The Book of Job may have known this psalm. The reference to God stilling the waves of the Sea, Rahab, reoccurs in Job’s third speech in the first cycle, the one where he contemplates a mediator.
“He is wise in heart, and mighty in strength- who has resisted him and succeeded? he.who alone stretched out the heavens and trampled the waves of the Sea, who made the Bear and Orion, the Pleiades, and the chambers of the south; who does great things beyond understanding, and marvelous things without number. Look, he passes by me, and I do not see him; he moves on, but I do not perceive him. He snatches away; who can stop him? Who will say to him, ‘What are you doing?’ God will not turn back his anger; the helpers of Rahab bowed beneath him. How then can I answer him?” (Job 9:4-14)
In many ways, God’s first and second speech to Job play off this introduction to Job’s hope for a mediator. Much of the language and many of the images will be repeated.
3. Purpose and Providence
A deeper reading of God’s first speech reveals two important points.
First, God’s language in his review of the physical world suggests purpose. It is the language of order, purpose, constancy and control. The foundations of the world were laid as an architect would. “Measurements” were taken (Job 38:5), survey “lines” “stretched out” (Job 38:5), a “cornerstone” laid (Job 38:6). The sea was subjected to “prescribed bounds” (Job 38:10), shut in with “bars and doors” (Job 38:10). “Thus far shall you come, and no farther.” (Job 38:11) The morning light was “commanded” to reappear every morning. (Job 38:12)
“Reserves” were placed in the storehouses of the snow and hail. (38:23)
“Channels” “were cut” for the rain. (Job 38:25) Order was imposed in the heavens. Some things were “bound in chains”. (Job 38:31) Some had their “cords” “loosed”. (Job 38:31) Some things were “led forth”. (Job 38:32) “Ordinances” were made (Job 38:38:33) and “rule” was “established”. (Job 38:33) There is a certain “wisdom” or “understanding” (Job 38:36) in the nature of the physical order.
Second, God’s language in his review of the animal world suggests providence. God “satisfies the appetites” of the young lions. (Job 38:39) He hears the young ravens and answers their “cry”. (Job 38:41) He gives “freedom” to the wild ass. (Job 39:5) He frees the ostrich from “fear”. (Job 39:16) He gives “might” and “majesty” to the war horse. (Job 39:19-20) He enables the birds of prey to “soar” to the heights they do. (Job 39:26) That concern is purposeful and on-going.
Yet these suggestions are veiled and can be read otherwise. The language of providential purpose here is tinged with a lack of concern for the human world and with a certain hostility towards it. The rain that falls is not described as falling on the agricultural fields where it needed by man. The rain falls “on a land where no one lives, on the desert, which is empty of human life, to satisfy the waste and desolate land.” (Job 38:26) There is an inherent “cruelty”, even stupidity, in how the ostrich deals with its young. (Job 39:16) The “terrible snorting” of the war horse foreshadows the wars that bring death to men, women and children. (Job 39:20,25) The birds of prey are there to “suck up” their blood. (Job 39:30)
At best, these are all suggestions of possible purpose and providence. God may be suggesting that Job should not only see purpose and providence in the natural and animal worlds, but that he should infer a similar purpose and providence exists in the human world. They are insights and inferences that Job might reasonably draw, but they are insights and inferences that he need not draw.
_____
Day, J., God’s Conflict with the Dragon and the Sea: Echoes of a Canaanite Myth in the Old Testament (Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, 1985) p. 28-29.
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