Quote:
Originally Posted by zeek
Concerning Job, Jack Miles, Jesuit seminarian and Distinguished Professor of English and Religious Studies at the University of California, Irvine, commenting on the book of Job, said “If God occasionally becomes a demon, mankind must disobey him. If God is capable of testing mankind by masquerading as a demon, then paradoxically mankind can only please God and pass the test by defying God.
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Not to put too fine a point on it, but this is a load of silliness.
God neither becomes a demon nor masquerades as one.
What Job is about is God stripping Job of everything but God himself. No matter what happens, God remains good, and if you cling to God you will eventually experience ultimate, infinite, eternal good. But if you fall for the line of the short-sighted unbelievers who blanche at the stripping process, you will be deceived and miss out.
Under no circumstances are we to view God as a demon. Jesus didn't, and he suffered more than anyone.
We are allowed to ask "why" though. As in "My God, why have you forsaken me?"
God knows better than us. The sooner we figure that out the sooner we'll drop these man-centered interpretations of Job.
Don't get me wrong. If what happened to Job happened to me I'd be screaming about it, too. But eventually the correct response is "Holy is the Lord, Amen!" That's just the way it is.