Dialogue Between Satan and God in the Book of Job

In the same place as the hint of God authorizing Satan to run tests on the loyalty of one of his human subjects.The 'hint' disappears after the prologue, though, as I noted. After that the theology in Job is strictly monotheistic. God represents the all-sufficient cause of both good and evil. The conflict is Job (humanity) versus God.This is why you can quote from later chapters of Job to refute the picture shown in the prologue.__

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ArcherAll species are transitional.

Interesting rationalization. Unfortunately, to say 'the law is the prosecutor' is to make a hash of the extended King & Court metaphor the Hebrew scriptures present.The existence of law implies the possibility of transgression. With that comes trials and judgments--and, by extension, judges, defenders and prosecutors.To say 'the law is the prosecutor' is like saying 'the jury is the defender' or the 'the bailiff is the law' or 'the defender is the prosecutor.' It muddies the picture to the point that its explanatory power is nil. You're better off not using it. But the Hebrew scriptures do.A series of anthropomorphic images presents God as a sovereign in the ancient Near Eastern mode. He holds court, he hears cases, he commands armies, he dispatches couriers. The 'law' in this picture does the same sort of work any law did then in any monarchy._

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ArcherAll species are transitional.

I agree that God allows Satan to test Job. But it is not to prove anything to God. Such test was to make Satan see his accusation and slanders become null and void.The benefitiary of the test should be we human beings. The test taught exactly nothing to God that God did not already know. That is an interesting summary. But I take Job in conext of the whole Bible. So my view of it might include some of what you say perhaps. But I see else.The answer to Job's questions are never answered in Job. God neither apologizes nor explains His actions to Job. He leaves Job with no explanation. This fact alone fascinates me and leads me to believe that the writing is indeed divinely inspired.The first few times of reading Job I expect God to finally come on the scene and explain to Job what is happening to him. THis would be what I would expect from human prose. The fact that God appears and scolds Job rather than explains things to him impresses me that the writing is not mere human imagination.God finally appears and scolds Job that he knows very little. Job repents. Job is satisfied simply by finally having God come to him period. That was enough, just to see God and know that God knew what was happening. This also impresses me.God does further bless Job and more than replinishes his fortunes - but still with no explanation whatsoever. God furthermore rebukes Job's three "comforters". Without Job's prayers on their behalf it appears that God would discipline them because they have not spoken rightly about God as His servant Job has.It is very interesting. After all of there attempts to insist that Job must have some secret punishable sins somewhere, God was angry at them. He says they did not speak rightly.The answer to the riddle of Job is not found in the book of Job. I believe that it found in another book of the Bible - the book of Second Corinthians. It is there in Paul's "autobiographical" epistle that we may gain insight into why bad things totally allowed by God happen to good people.But for now I will confine my comments to the book of Job. Humanity verses God? God verses Humanity?With this I can only agree partially. It is not the created humanity that God breaks down. It is the Satanic poisoned humanity after the fall of man, after the sin of Adam. There are foreign elements in that humanity which God wars against and breaks down.So you see I take Job in context of the whole Bible. It is not the created man that God breaks down. It is the created man with the foriegn element of the Satanified Self which God breaks down.Edited by jaywill, : No reason given.

Where do you see the "Satanic poisoned humanity" or the "fall of man" in the book of Job?

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I see why you need to consult other writings to get this. The book of Job does not support it.Nowhere are we told that Job is foreign, poisoned, or 'Satanified' in some way that God has to 'break down.' The book presents him as an exemplar from start to finish.The view you express--that if God makes us suffer, it really is for our own good, you know, so we will become better people--is the one argued by Job's friends. Job and God both reject it.Job's suffering is unjust. He says so. God agrees.__

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ArcherAll species are transitional.

The law was called by the Apostle Paul "the ministry of condemnation" He was a trained Pharisee. He's devotion to the Hebrew religion was an obsession. It was an obsession to the point that he persecuted to the death the disciples of this new "sect" of Jesus.He also wrote: "Christ has redeemed us out of the curse of the law .." (Galatians 3:13) The law of Moses was an instrument of condemnation and as so a curse to man from which we needed redemption.Furthermore we have Jesus saying "Do not think that I will accuse you before the Father; there is one who accuses you Moses, in whom you have set your hope" (John 5:45)The law of Moses will accuse man before God. It does not twist the truth as Satan does. It does not slander God as Satan does. The instrument of prosecution on God's behalf is His holy law which He delivered to Moses.In a nutshell, man after to fall into sin from Adam, still feels that he is Okay. Man does not realize his distance from God. He feels its only a minor problem. Surely man can do better and approach the Holy God. So God in order to help man to realize his distance from God gives the law of God.In essence God says, "Since the fall into sin you think you are Okay? Alright, here, keep this law."The law exposes the depravity of man in his fall into sin. Though the law of Moses is itself holy, spritual, just, and good, it becomes an instrument of comdemnation. It exposes the Satan saturated fallen humanity.Just as the physician causes the cancer patient to drink a liquid which under X-ray exposes the cancer inside his body, so the law of Moses causes the cancerous sin nature to be exposed under its light that we may see that we are sick with sin.The law is the instrument of God to righteously expose, prosecute, and condemn man's godless actions. Satan's slanders, though often with some element of truth in them, are warped and twisted defamations of both God and man.Satan is also not appropriate to be labelled as God's attorney because Satan tempts man on one hand. And on the other hand once man sins Satan turns around and accuses the very man who he has tempted.He accuses man to God. He accuses God to man. He hates both parties utterly. And his destiny is the have his lying mouth shut and his being punished eternally for his slanders and rebellions against God.Edited by jaywill, : No reason given.

Actually, we are pretty much told that. For instance here:" ... Even the heavens are not clean in His eyes. How much less one who is abominable and corrupt! How much less a man who drinks wrong like water!" (Job 15:16)And a number of similiar utterances in the book of Job reveal that the speakers understood man as having become sinful in his very nature.

No explanation = divinely inspired. Okay. No explanation = divinely inspired. Got it. But you just said that no explanation is the thing that convinces you a book is divinely inspired.By that standard, Second Corinthians is ordinary. It explains.

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ArcherAll species are transitional.

That is not exactly what I said for one thing.Suffering will not make you a better person just because you suffer.What Job rejects is mostly that he must have sinned in order to have been so treated.What God really rejects is the Job has enough understanding to speak of anything of God's doings at all. At the same paradoxical time he rebukes Job's three friends becuase they did not speak rightly about God as Job did.Chew on that one for awhile.
Oh, He makes no apologies for something being confusing to us also. Edited by jaywill, : No reason given.

In the beginning of the book God says that. He tells Satan.Did he tell Job that? No. If you disagree please show me where he tells Job that.Are we disagreeing over this point or over some other point?
Anyway, God never explains to Job what Job has gone through.

Clever fellow.I didn't say it was the ONLY thing that contributed to that view of divine inspiration.

God doesn't tell it to Job in the narrative. He says as much to Job's friends, with Job standing there.You mention the moment yourself, one post up: Chew it more slowly. It's better for digestion. But that's a detail. We agree that Job's sufferings are unjust and that the narrative shows Job and God recognizing as much. We agree that God offers Job no explanation. We agree that the discussions in the narrative never mention Satan. We both see that Job does draw satisfaction--though he never says why--from God's response.The issue I raised is that the book of Job does not support the view that Job is being purged of some moral weakness. This is the view you put forward based on your understanding of Paul's epistles. That view is, in the book of Job, explicitly rejected.__Edited by Archer Opterix, : extension.

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ArcherAll species are transitional.

Actually, you did. Message 108 Emphasis mine.

Tudwell, "This fact alone" Hmmmm. "only" / "alone". Okay, I see your point. So then let me rephrase. This is one of the facts which leads me to believe that the book of Job is God's speaking.Now I also said that the "fact alone fascinates me". Let me also rephrase that. This does not mean that this is the only fact in Job which fascinates me.So then, to clarify, other things fascinate me in Job. And other things pursuade me that the book of Job belongs in the canon of books inspired by God.

I can go along with this. That is the book of Job does not have God say definitely why Job suffers so. I think I wrote that in essence already. I think I recall that Job does at one point have a hope that he will come forth as tried gold before God when it is all over. So his hope is somewhat along those lines.We do see that Satan's slanders are proved false. Job never does curse God. That much is clear. It is explicitly rejected by you. So what else is new?Second Corinthians includes some very detailed discussion on why the saints of God must undergo trials. And I believe that the book of Job both supports those truths and sheds Old Testament light to confirm those truths.But since the revelation of truth in the Bible progressively unfolds it is clearer (to the saints of God) in the latter stage of revelation than in the earlier stage.Perhaps I should open up a discussion on Second Corinthians. For example:"Therefore we do not lose heart; but though our outer man is decaying, yet our inner man is being renewed day by day.

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For our momentary lightness of affliction works out for us, more and more surpassingly, an eternal weight of glory,

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Because we do not regard the things which are seen but the things which are unseen; for the things which are seen are temporary, but the things which are not seen are eternal." (2 Cor. 4:16-18)Edited by jaywill, : No reason given.Edited by jaywill, : No reason given.Edited by jaywill, : No reason given.