The Theme Of Faith And Suffering In The Hebrew Bible

The theme of the Book of Job is the perseverance of the human spirit. Job loses everything but he does not lose his faith in God. “Job refuses to curse God” (Book). Job has not done anything to deserve this, but it is a test from God and Satan to see if Job is actually as

The purpose of this research paper is to compare the public view of suffering in the Old Testament with the public view of suffering in the modern world. In order to properly achieve this comparison, I will explain the relationship between God and His believers in the Old Testament. More specifically, I will elaborate on the opinion that God is the cause of everything, including suffering and relate it to the first poetic book in the Old Testament, the Book of Job. However, influenced by the changes in science, upbringing, and multiculturalism this commonly held view changes. Therefore, I will explain the meaning of each of these three factors as well as their negative impact on religion. Finally, I will use three television shows as examples

After these tragic events occurred one reads later in Job, that Satan began to attack Job’s health and Job continues to worship God. In chapter two of Job, Job’s wife asks Job, “Do you still hold fat your integrity?” In the ESV study bible the commentary suggests that the content of her question is significant for how it relates to the heavenly dialogue of God and Satan. She asks Job a rhetorical question that the doubts the sensibility of the very thing that God find commendable about Job, his consistent integrity. The latter part of verse nine expresses the anger that Job’s wife is feeling, she answers her own question saying, “Curse God and die.” Job’s wife lives in a culture where women did not have opportunity to obtain success in a

The Hebrew Bible’s allure and perseverance is due in part to the numerous gaps contained within the text; in these gaps, the characters’ motivations and emotions are left unclear. One such gap is God’s motivation behind his response to Adam and Eve eating the fruit of the tree of knowledge of good and evil. Despite God telling Adam that he will die if he eats the fruits of the tree of knowledge of good and evil (King James Version, Gen. 2.17), eating the fruit did not cause Adam and Eve to die; instead, God allowed them to live and cast them out of the garden of Eden (Gen. 3; 24). Why then did God tell Adam that he will die if he consumes the fruit from that tree if the fruit really doesn’t cause death? This gap between what God says versus what he does allows religious scholars to argue various interpretations of the reasons behind God’s apparent deception of Adam.

Much of the same can be said about Job, the book’s eponymous character. Like Shubshi-meshre-Shakkan, he is a righteous man. God goes as far as to call him “a blameless and upright man” and says he is a one-of-a-kind worshipper (Job 1:8). He also endures great suffering, which all came as the result of Satan questioning if Job’s worshipping was true and pure (Job 1:10-11). God takes Satan up on this bet and allows him to cause make Job’s life miserable (Job 1:12). At first, Job stays a righteous man, but eventually he breaks down and curses his birth (Job 3). Job becomes exactly the type of person that Shubshi-meshre-Shakkan was talking about (someone who questions God in bad times), and his friend Eliphaz tells him that. He says, “Your words have supported those who were stumbling, and you have made firm the feeble knees. But now it has come to you, and you are impatient,” (Job 4:4-5). Eliphaz also believes Job’s suffering is a direct

At the start of the book, I was struck by the idea that God would allow one of his finest worshipers to go through tragedy and grief so that God can prove a bet with Satan. God is supposed to bring happiness and greatness to all of his followers, yet he uses Job as a pawn. I believe that God allows suffering to occur to teach his friends and the readers a lesson. Suffering will happen to good people. Regardless of how good in nature we all are, horrific things will happen. The book uses this to appeal to skeptics. People who believe that there is no God because suffering occurs. God describes in chapters 38 and 39 that he is omnipotent and omniscient. He also, is the only force that can safeguard humans from the Leviathan. This shows that God

In The Book of Job, we can clearly get the idea of Job suffering because his faith is being tested. At the beginning, he thought he was a wealthy man and had found happiness. He had a “perfect” life. As time passed, Satan and God made a deal to prove Job’s loyalty towards God. Along the way, Job suffers different types of loses; he loses his children, his goods and he suffers physically. “Why is light given to him that is

In The Book of Job, the perfectly moral Job has everything taken away from him by God. He is the servant to God, a man of perfect integrity, and he did everything right even to the point of slight paranoia. For instance, he baptized his children every year just in case they sinned. Therefore, he strongly questions God when everything is taken away from him and even expresses his despair and curiosity to his friends. His friends believe he deserved everything because God is never unjust.

This is not a perfect world suffering is an inherent part of life in this world, both for human beings and for the earth itself sometimes because of human beings. The earth groan in labor pains even now waiting for its promised redemption. In the Book of Genesis chapters 2-3 the story of the fall, as we’ve come to call it attributes at least some of the suffering of the world to the original disobedience of Adam and Eve. Romans 8:18-23 also speaks of the creation’s bondage to decay and its groaning in labor pains suffering, it seems, is part of the fabric of creation itself, though it will not always be so. But suffering is not the end of the matter. God is among mortals. He will dwell with us he will wipe every tear from our eyes. death

At the forefront of Hebrews, I notice that suffering occurs in times of temptation. However, the author makes this known through Jesus’ example in his own temptation (2:18). This is later mirrored in Hebrews 5:8 and Revelation 2:10. Suffering also results from sinful actions. People sin and have consequences that result from it. The result of sin is also death which elicits pain and mourning (Revelation 21:4).

Job was the type of man that prayed and asked for forgiveness not only for himself, but also for all of his family that may have sinned throughout the day. "He feared God and shunned evil." (193) He was a very wealthy man and had everything he every wanted. Satan told

A Journey through the Hebrew Scriptures (2003) evaluates the major debate among scholars regarding the definition of ‘myth’ and its role in Christian society and literature today, particularly the Hebrew Bible and how that impacts the interpretation of God. Frick describes a ‘myth’ as a story with no grounding in fact, a pure fiction, falsehood, or fantasy. In basic terms something that is ‘not considered true in any sense’. This narrative literacy genre emerges in nearly every spiritual tradition. Yet, to many any ‘god-talk’ is considered a myth. For a text to qualify as a myth, it must be a traditional story that deals with a character(s) who is more than an ordinary human and treats events in isolated ancient times.

Job's friends are not enduring this unusual suffering, instead they are jumping to conclusions, based on their understanding and circumstance. Also, they are looking at from a rational(human) point of view, not from God's point of view. These men thought because of Job unconfessed sin that he and his family deserved the punishment. Consequently, their reasoning is a syllogism, which means that God only sends calamities upon evil or wicked people. In the end, Job friends were wrong about God's theology of suffering, and the ideal of righteousness. The bible clearly states that no one is good(righteous) besides God(Mark 10:18&Romans 3:10), and that God allows the good and bad things to happen according to His will and purpose(Genesis

The book of Job, featuring a fortunate man, his peers, God, and the Adversary, serves perhaps to show believers and non-believers alike that moral and natural evils can befall anyone, and require no explanation. In what can best be described as a cruel bet between God and the Adversary, Job suffers extreme evil and remains faithful to God, but in the end receives no explanation as to why he suffered. Though the Adversary was perhaps the intended antagonist, the book of Job seems to depict God as well as the Adversary as opponents of Job and the human race.

The Book of Job tells those who consider the bible to be a holy text, namely Jewish and Christian people, the story of Job. His story tells us that we, as individual human beings, are lesser beings than God and can’t know as much as God. At the end of the story, after hearing God mention the greatness of his creations, Job finally breaks and admits that he was wrong to question God, as Job, an individual human being, has a limited amount of knowledge compared to God. While God is pleased with this response from the previously dubious Job, he is not happy with Zophar, Eliphaz, and Bildad for claiming to know why God acted in the manner in which he did while they were consoling Job. God relents however, and forgives them after Job prays for them. God is so delighted with Job for withstanding all of the punishments Satan had put forth upon him that he rewarded Job with two times more of everything he had lost, including his children.