From the Daily Lectionary for Tuesday in the Fifteenth Week after Pentecost
Job 40:1-24; 41:1-11
Then the Lord answered Job out of the whirlwind:
“Gird up your loins like a man;
I will question you, and you declare to me.
Will you even put me in the wrong?
Will you condemn me that you may be justified?
Have you an arm like God,
and can you thunder with a voice like his?
“Deck yourself with majesty and dignity;
clothe yourself with glory and splendor.
Pour out the overflowings of your anger,
and look on all who are proud, and abase them.
Look on all who are proud, and bring them low;
tread down the wicked where they stand.
Hide them all in the dust together;
bind their faces in the world below.
Then I will also acknowledge to you
that your own right hand can give you victory.
“Look at Behemoth,
which I made just as I made you;
it eats grass like an ox.
Its strength is in its loins,
and its power in the muscles of its belly.
It makes its tail stiff like a cedar;
the sinews of its thighs are knit together.
Its bones are tubes of bronze,
its limbs like bars of iron.
“It is the first of the great acts of God—
only its Maker can approach it with the sword.
For the mountains yield food for it
where all the wild animals play.
Under the lotus plants it lies,
in the covert of the reeds and in the marsh.
The lotus trees cover it for shade;
the willows of the wadi surround it.
Even if the river is turbulent, it is not frightened;
it is confident though Jordan rushes against its mouth.
Can one take it with hooks
or pierce its nose with a snare?
“Can you draw out Leviathan with a fish-hook,
or press down its tongue with a cord?
Can you put a rope in its nose,
or pierce its jaw with a hook?
Will it make many supplications to you?
Will it speak soft words to you?
Will it make a covenant with you
to be taken as your servant for ever?
Will you play with it as with a bird,
or will you put it on a leash for your girls?
Will traders bargain over it?
Will they divide it up among the merchants?
Can you fill its skin with harpoons,
or its head with fishing-spears?
Lay hands on it;
think of the battle; you will not do it again!
Any hope of capturing it will be disappointed;
were not even the gods overwhelmed at the sight of it?
No one is so fierce as to dare to stir it up.
Who can stand before it?
Who can confront it and be safe?
—under the whole heaven, who?”
Job has spent some thirty-nine chapters making his case to God. He has kept the faith; served the Law; given due praise; he is a “good” man, obedient, full of the fear of God; and yet, he has lost everything: his wife and family; all of his possessions; he has even been afflicted himself with disease and unbearable suffering. This is not as it should be. This is contrary to the Covenant God made with God’s people. Job is questioning the order of things, calling God to account.
And finally God speaks to Job from the whirlwind. Perhaps God is speaking to us, today, from another whirlwind! It is an unexpected answer. God doesn’t cite theology, nor does God quote from the Law or the Prophets. God, in effect, puts on a “nature show.” It is worth reading God’s answer in its entirety beginning in the fortieth chapter. This is far and away the longest speaking part God has in the whole of scripture. It seems a non sequitur to Job’s questions and protestations, but as Catherine Keller, author and theologian, puts it, “It is as if God is an artist exulting in her art.” God the artist is beside Godself in awe of the randomly improvisational beauty that is creation.
Perhaps God is saying that no manner of suffering can undermine the beauty of the world, the privilege of life, the gift of existence. But that would be a disingenuous answer if God didn’t know what suffering is like. Carl Jung, the great Swiss psychiatrist and philosopher, speaks of Jesus’ torture and death as “God’s answer to Job;” that Jesus on the cross represents a profound solidarity with human shame and suffering. That resonates with me. Perhaps in God’s time, God living in past, present, and future, the suffering of Jesus gives warrant to God’s response to Job.
But still the question persists… Why suffering? Perhaps God Godself doesn’t know the answer. Perhaps God is saying only what God Knows: that beauty is redemptive; that to love the world is an inestimable balm for the pain we suffer. Beauty is the face of mystery. I have always believed that it is not so much knowledge we seek in this life, but mystery… mystery being reality that is not so much understood, but felt, apprehended by our aesthetic sensibilities. We have gained so much knowledge and understanding over the course of human evolution, but mystery still persists, calls to us from a place deep within us, inhabits the very creation to which we are intimately contingent.
God’s answer to Job is not for understanding. It is more like a poem, even more like a song. God is singing to the soul of humanity, which, I think, prefers music rather than prose. Music moves us. God is motion. Trust the music, good souls. The suffering of this world is no match for it. Just look and see and hear and feel…. We are awash in the beautiful and mysterious music of God.
A Prayer for Joy on God’s Creation (BCP p. 814)
Most Holy God, who has filled the world with beauty: Open our eyes to behold your gracious hand in all your works; that, rejoicing in your whole creation, we may learn to serve you with gladness; through him through whom all things were made, your Son Jesus Christ our Savior. Amen.
