2004 / 4
Introduction: Questions about a World without Justice
Ellen van Wolde
The book of Job is known for its courageous hero who does not give up discussing God because God has struck him with so many disasters. What kind of God is it who allows good people to suffer so much and who lets wicked people live their comfortable lives? And come to that, what kind of a world is it in which no balance and justice can be found? Why hasn't God developed a design and strategy to take better care of his creatures and their behaviour?
Job confronts his friends and God with this kind of question, questions that are still ours. Perhaps we are less inclined to be as persistent as he is. Possibly we might have given in or might have given up God altogether. Why do we need a God when he isn't helping us? What can a world without a righteous God offer us but that world itself? In order to receive an answer to these problems, Job wants to converse with God himself, because his own friends are worthless. He even finishes suing God in a legal case with God as the defendant. However, when Job finally meets God, it is not in the courtroom but in a thunderstorm.
In his whirlwind speech God gives an impressive account of his competence as creator and steward monitoring the universe and living beings on earth. His creation appears not only to be an action performed at the beginning but to happen every day anew; every morning an immense diversity becomes manifest both in the cosmos and on earth. Observing the skies, all kinds of stars and constellations become visible: sun, moon, planets, constellations, the Milky Way, all stars and systems in endless varieties. Observing the earth, different kinds of animal life become visible: the lion, the raven, the mountain goat, the wild ass and the wild ox, the ostrich, the horse and the eagle; it displays varied wild life in endless species. God's speech is specific, varied and sustainable, in both life and death. No human idea is present of balance or equilibrium, of simple justice and righteousness. Nor is any general wisdom defended or a general rule that explains everything.
Confronted with this broad picture, Job is overwhelmed. But does he also receive an answer to his questions? Is it suggested that human beings such as Job, who cannot have the same overview as God, should give up asking questions altogether? Or does it imply that they should decide for a strict separation between the heavens and the earth? Mightn't they and we join in with Psalm 115.16 which says, `The heavens belong to the Lord, but the earth he gave over to human beings'? Is this the solution the book of Job offers? If we are led to conclude that God's domain is of a completely different order from the human domain, then human beings themselves are the only ones responsible for their actions and for what happens on earth. Consequently, we cannot blame God for what is going wrong on earth. Moreover, if the variety and diversity on earth is so immense, we cannot arrange it according to our simple rules of justice.
This kind of question and answer is the topic of this issue of Concilium. In the first section the positions taken in the book of Job itself will be studied: the way God is depicted in the beginning, middle and ending of the book of Job and how he relates to retribution and justice. A variety of images of God will emerge: Job's and his views that show a certain development, his friends' images of God, and even the Satan's and God's own ideas will be scrutinized. So much is said about God in the book of Job, and will be said here. The second section deals with the philosophical, theological and ethical consequences of what is described above and of the problems and answers in the book of Job. The articles in the third and last section reflect on the way in which Job's questions are faced around the modern world. Starting with the views in Tolkien's The Lord of the Rings, so well-known now after being filmed, it will proceed with some Job-like questions raised in the present day's situation in Central America and in South Africa. In fact the closing article in the issue returns to the opening article, in that the opening article reads the problem of retribution and justice in Job 1–3 from a textual, and therefore theoretical, perspective, whereas the last article reads and discusses these very same aspects of Job 1–3 in the South African context of HIV / AIDS. The interaction between these and the other articles will become clear as soon as you start reading.
Concilium
English 
