Friends:

(November 2004)

Good news. Enclosed please find the Review of Biblical Literature review of my book “Putting God on Trial- The Biblical Book of Job’. It was very encouraging.

Robert Sutherland

Review of Biblical Literature, October 30, 2004, by Alice M Sinnott, Auckland University

Auckland, New Zealand

In this first volume of a promised trilogy [Putting God on Trial-The Biblical Book of Job], Sutherland proposes that the primary task for the reader of the book of Job is to interpret the existing text and integrate seemingly disparate elements rather than abandon the literary challenge and blame the difficulty on a clumsy redaction of preexisting texts. He is more concerned about what has been said than with how it came to be said and reads the received text as a unity, seeing it as a classic text in its present form. Sutherland bases his thesis on the notion that a lawsuit metaphor is central to the book and claims that Job offers a nontraditional answer to the question of why there is evil in the world. This answer is posited on four pivotal claims about God: God created a world of unremitting and undeserved suffering in order to make the highest form of love possible; God cannot reveal this explanation for evil; God expects human beings to challenge the creation of such a world; God will reveal the answer on the day of the final judgment.

Asserting that Job is ‘one of the greatest books ever written’, Sutherland reads it as a provocative theodicy, an attempt to justify the ways of God to human beings. It is, he claims, the story of the most righteous human being on earth putting God on trial for crimes against humanity and refusing to acquit God. Yet its startling resolution preserves the moral integrity of God and of Job and suggests an even fuller resolution beyond its pages. He concludes that traditional attempts to justify the ways of God have proven inadequate because of their inability to deal with the dilemma of gratuitous evil and the problem of God’s nonintervention.

Sutherland outlines what he sees as a lawsuit drama, a philosophical answer in poetry and prose put into words through the vehicle of a legal drama. He proposes that the moral issues of theodicy are easily translated into a legal framework of duties and rights. Thus, Job portrays a series of overlapping and interlocking trials: God puts Job on trial, Satan puts God on trial, God puts Job on trial a second time, Job’s friends put Job on trial, and Job puts the friends on trial. Finally, everything builds to the climactic moment when Job puts God on trial and refuses to acquit God.

In a series of five speeches, all of which Sutherland claims are delivered on the Day of Atonement, Job demands to know why there is evil in the world. Though an oath of innocence, Job embarks on formal legal proceedings against God in order to provoke an answer. To his friends the oath of innocence is blasphemy, but in the eyes of God this oath is the pinnacle of righteousness. Finally, to the surprise of all, God appears to Job but does not give him any direct answers. God places before Job and all humanity a single question: Will they condemn God so that they themselves may be justified? Job chooses not to condemn God but does not retract his lawsuit. Sutherland claims that Job is .the perfect embodiment of the selfless love and moral integrity for which the world was created.. He argues forcefully and coherently against those he calls liberal and conservative scholars who find the legal metaphor of an oath of innocence inappropriate. He opts for a new middle course in which he seeks to present a single comprehensive and coherent interpretation that preserves the moral integrity of both God and Job. Sutherland alleges that interpretations calling Job’s integrity into question, or those questioning the propriety of Job’s question, must be ruled out as illegitimate. Within his own parameters of interpretation, he elects to address four issues: Satan’s speech; Job’s oath of innocence; God’s two speeches to Job; Job’s two responses to God. A proper handling of these, he maintains, will unlock the treasures Job.

Chapter 2, ‘A New Look at Genesis’ is an argument from a canonical perspective that the author of Job reworks Genesis with Job as a new Adam. In a series of dramatic scenes, Sutherland outlines the drama that moves from earth to heaven, back to earth, and back to heaven, where God confesses to causal responsibility for the evil Satan inflicted on Job and then back to earth for Job’s response.

Chapter 3 introduces what Sutherland proposes is the second act of the drama, which addresses ‘The Truth about God that No One Wanted to Hear’, that is, that God is the author of evil in the world. Here we enter a wasteland to hear Job’s three friends and a discussion of the three cycles of speeches. Central to this chapter is the presentation of Job’s oath of innocence involving the statement, proof, and enforcement of his claim. Elihu, who is perceived as speaking for God, receives brief mention toward the end of the chapter.

Chapter 4 presents the third act in the Joban drama, which involves ‘Putting God on Trial’. Arguing from a canonical perspective, Sutherland claims that this section of Job is a reworking of the Revelation story when the oath of innocence trumpets a final judgment on God just before God appears in the whirlwind. Proposing the Babylonian myth of creation as the mythological background for this scene, the whirlwind as the powerful mythological symbol for the divine control of evil, Sutherland claims that the author of Job is rewriting the Babylonian myth and Genesis on two points. God creates evil. Evil is in the world before the fall of humanity.

Chapter 5, ‘A Philosophical Analysis’, argues that Job is a myth in which the characters of God, Satan, and Job dramatize aspects of the final cause of evil in the world. Job, Sutherland suggests, exemplifies the potential for moral integrity that all human beings possess. He advances this analysis by proposing, developing, and examining ten ‘truth claims’ that describe the human condition particularly as represented in Job. Sutherland concludes his book with a reflection on Job as an attempt by the author to address the problem of evil and its role in the world. Moving into theological mode, he advocates being as patient as Job by enduring suffering that is not understood; being as honest as Job by refusing pat answers; being as devout as Job by exercising faith in the midst of pain. He concludes this advice with the assurance that God will answer all questions in eternity. This assurance appears to be at odds with the text of Job, which never speaks of an afterlife for human beings.

This volume contains two very helpful appendices: ‘Appendix A: The Babylonian Myth of Creation’, and ‘Appendix B: The Canaanite Myth of Re-creation’. The selected bibliography reveals what is evident throughout the book: that Sutherland is familiar and conversant with research on Job. The endnotes are detailed and unobtrusive. An index would have been very helpful in this volume.

Many scholars have examined issues of law and trial in Job, but few bring to it the perspective provided by Sutherland with his legal training and expertise. Regardless of whether one is in agreement with his argument as a whole or in part, his perspectives and analyses must be taken into consideration in any study of the book of Job. Sutherland’s work is unusual, self-assured, and a noteworthy treatment of a biblical text that continues to puzzle and intrigue. His work on Near Eastern sources is significant, and his attention to studies on Job by biblical scholars and others is admirable. This book is a thorough and rigorous presentation of the legal arguments of Job, to which the author has added a breadth of information set in the contexts of Canaanite and Egyptian legal frameworks, with Job’s oath of innocence as the pivot. Sutherland explains clearly the philosophical basis for his argument and articulates his case carefully. His commentary and conclusions make eminent sense if one accepts his starting points.

The proofreader failed to notice several printing or typographical errors, such as, page 99, ‘in’. for ‘its’; ‘whether’ for ‘where’; page 105, ‘shutter’ for ‘shudder’; page 106, ‘pseudi-epigraphical’ for ‘pseudepigrapha’. The consistent use of ‘he’ throughout for God and the use of ‘man’ throughout this text may be perceived as offensive and exclusive by many readers in a time when inclusive language is generally expected. A number of headings are separated from the text to which they relate, as in page 31, .Trial By Ordeal.; page 40, .A Whirlwind Of Righteous Indignation.; pp 44, .Job’s Road to an Oath of Innocence.; page 88, .God’s Second Speech.; page 90, .The Mythological Worlds.

Although some of his assertions and conclusions may need to be tempered, Sutherland’s main thesis is arresting and challenging. In this clearly written, thought-provoking text, Sutherland successfully defends his proposal that the court metaphor is central to the book of Job. His portrayal of God as the source of evil will shock some readers, but his persuasive concentration on and development of his theory of the oath of innocence is impressive. Through sustained legal reasoning, Sutherland effectively proves that at the end Job does not sin, confess sin, or repent of sin, and in the same way he persuades the reader that God never really answers the charge of unwarranted suffering. By following this line of reasoning, he demonstrates that Job is innocent and implies that God is the cause of Job’s suffering. Reading Putting God on Trial may demand reconsideration of beliefs and understandings of God and the text of Job.