[MD] Quality and Chaos

[Krimel]

[John]
I'm very interested in the book of Job, which is completely different than
the whole rest of the Bible.  For one, the book is cut off from the whole
rest of the books, which deal with the seed of Abraham.  Job ends with
mention of his three daughters, but we never find anything about their
descendants.  For another, nobody knows who wrote Job.  For another, it
seems to be the oldest book.  The first book of the Bible isn't genesis,
it's Job.  In fact, I like to say the Bible is composed of the old testament
(Job) and the new (the whole rest of it)

[Krimel]
Yeah, I wrote a short commentary on the Book of Job a while back. The
essence of the book is Job sits bitching about his fate and his buddies tell
he that in a "just" and "causal" world. His tragedy is the result of his
personal failings. Job keeps responding, "Hell no, it ain't" Eventually God
comes along and says Jobs friends are full of shit and that God fucked with
Job because he felt like. Job can like it our lump it.

What I love about many of the Old Testament tales and the wit and wisdom of
the Jews is that they are blatantly personifying chance. There is good shit
and bad shit and God makes it happen. We relate to this whimsical chaotic
God by making him a character in our stories.

You mention authorship of Job. The fact is no one is sure who wrote ANY of
the books of the Bible. In fact for a great many of those books, we aren't
even sure how many authors there were. Isaiah which we both quoted earlier
may have as many as five separate authors woven together. Some parts of Job
and a few of the Proverbs may actually date to the Egyptians. You know, the
place the Jews left right about the time the world's first monotheist was
deposed...

But the Jews were situated at the cross roads of empires and every western
empire in history has at one time or another made the Jews its bitches. Much
of the Bible is a record of this bitchery and the lessons and tales the
bitches learned while being bitch slapped. In the end, patience and
submission, playing the hand you're dealt wins out and all that is left of
those empires is the tales their bitches tell.