Book of Job -- Little help here

First off, the idea that the Book of Job cannot be true because it is so horrendous, as offered by jar, is not a sound argument since horrendous things are part of reality, and if such horrendous things rule out God, then one would have to dismiss the idea of God, which may be where you are heading.I'd like to offer a more nuanced view. First off, Job is not sinless. He is righteous and "has not sinned" in the context of having a done a sin to warrant God's judgment against him.Next, Satan more tellingly is the destroyer. Keep that in mind, but God is involved in allowing Satan to attack Job and nearly destroy him, and indeed God instigates the process in a way by asking Satan to consider how godly Job is. There's a lot that can be drawn from that, but too much to get into now.The message though is not that faith will get you through. The message is that God has His own plans, that it's His world, and for His own reasons He allows misery and destruction but that faithfulness to God does pay off, and the message is that not only the ungodly suffer but the godly do to. Job and all of us belong to God, and it suited God's purpose for Job to be tested by Satan, and to show how through that suffering He could endure.The New Testament indicates it shows us the effects of patience as Job was rewarded more once his trial is over.Jesus takes the issue of reward further and tells us that we will be rewarded infinitely more with treasure in heaven.My answer for the ones that were killed is that they died in a way in service to the purposes of God, and part of a righteous man's family. Some say they may have sinned, banqueting so much, and since Job seems to have suspected that in continually offering up sacrifices for their sin "in case they have sinned." Read that way, perhaps the judgment was on them, but not Job, and there was sort of dual-purpose involved.But let's assume they were innocent.The message of the Bible is not that God rewards us eternally, and that some men that never recieved a just reward here will receive therefore an abundance of reward in heaven. If they were innocent, they gained more in death than they lost in life.

The end of the book, as you state, shows that Job recognizes he is not sinless.The "without sin" comment then I take to reference, in context, without any sin as to anger God or incur God's judgment. The idea that the Old Testament, Job, or any part of the Bible concludes men, other than Jesus, are sinless is just wrong.But he is "without sin" in the sense of any sin being held against him. That's how I read it, and believe it's the way the text was written.On the part of Job testing God, I don't see that as Job did not and would not originate that level of suffering on Himself. You are right that the message is God is saying, hey, you are just a creation so how can you dare claim I am wrong, or something like that.God's response to Job is just to point out He is God, and never really explains it to Job.I love that personally because God doesn't always explain Himself, or maybe rarely does, to us. The message of Job is great as it fits with reality. Bad stuff is going to happen, even to those pleasing to God and without sin. Moreover, and this is a beautiful but painful point, the suffering of the righteous is for God's glory, and since our lives are for Him, we are to expect it, recognize that, and when we don't understand it, still understand God is God; He cannot ever be wrong, and there is a purpose in it, and we will be rewarded in the end.It's not that I want to overemphasize the reward. It does go deeper than that, and we serve the Lord because He is the Lord, period, not just for the reward, but God is just, and things do even out in our favor at the end, more than we deserve if we were judged without grace and mercy.That's faith, but it's not unreasonable imo.

I don't want to waste time. The comment "without sin" is in a specific context. No one is absolutely sinless. You even admit that is the case "compared to God" so you hold a contradictory stance here.The book works, and of course, all of us deserve far worse than we receive. That's why God is a God of grace.You can try to blur the complexities if you want with simplistic reasoning, but it makes sense only if Job is not absolutely sinless, compared to God, not the other way around.He is relatively "without sin" meaning the terrible things happening to him did not occur due to sin in his life or rejecting God, and comparitively he is faultless, but he is not faultless nor sinless in an absolute sense.

But trying to dismiss spiritual experiences as mere psychological/chemical hallucinations is just biasness.We are gifted with an intuitive ability to "hear" as the Bible says, to understand that something is real, and that's where faith is born, and though being "a beleiver" in the general sense probably entails being more prone naturally to erring on the side of believing people and reports, and it can take a bit to balance that out, when one couples that basic trust with intuitive knowledge and assessment of that knowledge with reason, then faith matures and becomes more discerning and less doubtful.

Ramos, that doesn't stop Satan from trying to use the law to his own advantage. It gets a little complex, but the OT also talks of the angel answering Daniel's prayer being held up fighting with a principality opposing the angel getting through. Read the passage because it's pretty clear that there is a spiritual war going on, and note the angel is aware that as this principality of darkness is thrown down, a new one is going to take it's place.So your description is not quite right. It's a bit more nuanced than that.

It's not just merely a psychological function. That doesn't mean there isn't some biological aspect to it, in a sense, since the experience involves the total man.To delve into this though, we would have to discuss the evidence man has a spirit as well as a body, and that gets us off-topic. For me, it's a matter of biblical record and personal experience. I suspect there is nothing in science to contradict that view, but at the same time, I'm not waiting around for scientists to tell me how to worship God, believe Him, etc,..

I'd be interested in a thread like that, but I posted way too much last week and am maxed out. It's be a good topic for me in about a week or 2.

A righteous Buddhist monk or any righteous person is not condemned to hell.But if anyone rejects the sacrifice and gospel of Christ, he is no longer righteous because he is telling God that he is pure enough to not need such atonement. Let's say you were in debtors prison years ago, and it was an awful lot of money, and I paid for you to get out, except this costs me much more than money. I took your place in fact.Then, you get out and say, hey, I didn't need that. Rejecting the love and sacrifice of Jesus Christ is like spitting in God's face when he went to great lengths to ensure your forgiveness and blessing.The penalty for such a crime is great indeed, and justly so.Now, the only issue then is whether the Buddhist monk has a credible witness from God, either through a person, directly, writings, or what have you so that from God's perspective, the monk knowingly rejects Christ, or should have known if his heart was right, and thus reasoning pure enough to discern the truth.I do think a wicked man not seeking after truth is judged even if he unknowingly rejects Christ because had he been following after truth, he would have "heard".So no one can say the monk is going to hell. It doesn't work that way, but at the same time, rejecting Jesus Christ is a much more serious offense than you realize.