Huffington Post on the book of Job;

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/joel-l-watts/abusive-theology-oklahoma_b_3322696.html?utm_hp_ref=religion

ugh, I’m not sure which is worse, Piper’s perspicuous presumption that God is uses tornados to punish the wicked or Joel Watts fundamentalist interpretations of scripture propounded under the guise of liberal Christianity.

First off there’s Piper who assumes, rather arrogantly, that God is yet again using the forces of nature to punish people. Of course Piper uses examples from scripture to justify this assumption. But examples of God displaying this sort of behavior doesn’t lead to the conclusion that God will continue punishing people in the same way, unless you assume, as Piper does, that God is predictable as He predicts every course of action and must do so according to His sovereign will. Nor does this justify the assertion that every natural disaster is an instance of God’s wrath (or that He has done so in any particular instance of a natural disaster).

Now for Joel Watt’s. This is the first I’ve read of Joel (as I don’t read Huff Post that often), but so far, I’m not impressed.

"There is serious doubt as to the originality of the prologue and the epilogue, as such genres as the protestations of the innocent are found in other literary groups of the time but absent the narrative structures.”

Clearly being the liberal “scholar” that he is Joel has chosen to not give any charity to the Biblical text and practically assume that a significant portion of Job has been added to the original text. As to Joel’s claim that Job’s epilogue and prologue were probably not in the original see the book; “Book of Job” by Andrew B. Davidson; here. In any case, Watts would do well to explain why a slight difference in genre between the beginning, end and body of Job lends serious doubt to their authenticity, as the entirety of his later points rests on this assumption.

"If you strip away Jewish and Christian interpretations along with the non-original narrative features of the Book of Job you are left with a story of a man who is struck with complete misery for no reason, afraid to cry out to his god because the same God may inflict more harm. What is more abusive than a God who only shows up to inflict more harm?”

Ok, first things first, Watt’s needs to make up his mind what he is going to argue. At one point he wants to critique Piper and conservative Christianity for believing in a sadistic God, but then to prove that he asks that we take away all context and Christian interpretations of Job to see that the God Job really believed in was abusive and evil. Yah that doesn’t work. If the author wants to show that Christians like Piper believe in an evil God and use Job as evidence of that assertion, then he needs to show how, on Piper’s interpretation, God is evil. The author could also cast doubt on the authenticity of the Bible by expounding on his argument that sections of Job are forgeries but trying to do both turns this article into an unfocused mess.

Furthermore, Joel points out that the idea that God would punish or put people through suffering at all demonstrates that Piper’s God has issues. This argument from outrage doesn’t hold much weight when emotions are put aside. Watt’s fails to question the underlying assumption here that the vast majority of people are innocent. Who says? By what standard? It seems to come to Watt’s secular conclusion we must assume first a secular and not a Christian standard of morality (as long as you don’t hurt others you shouldn’t be hurt yourself). If Watt’s wants to attack the Christian view of morality, fine, but he needs to do so first if his argument from suffering is going to hold any water.

Watt’s also mentions the classic “angry God only appeased through strict obedience” notion. Again this pulls on modern sentiments of being suspicious of authority. But Watt’s also fails to support the assumption that God has no right to punish us. He wants a God who lets us live the way we want to live but give us everything our hearts desire, and to be a cuddly teddy bearish sort of God. Any idea of God that carries any sense of justice is automatically cut down to a tyrannical dictator. Now I do agree with Watts that character’s like Piper do tend to think that they have a special connection to God through which they receive revelation and instruction and that this is unbiblical and downright silly, I also fail to see how, if Christians are right about everyone being corrupted towards wickedness by sin God would be unjust or evil in demanding strict obedience, especially when, according to Christians, that same God died for our sins and offers us grace to defeat our sin and obey Him fully. This applies both to Job and to Pastor’s like Piper.

Ultimately all Christians and non-Christians are forced to make a choice, is God a malevolent manipulator bent on sending as many people to hell as He can, or does He have our best interests at heart? Is it the case that we are evil and God is good? Or are we good and God is evil? A case can be made for both, yet many assume the former over the latter (I can’t imagine why).

Also see this article for a related critique of Job: http://christianthinktank.com/aecb.html