On Job.

[theweaselking]

Job is a pious man who sacrifices greatly to God, and does not sin, and yet when Satan scoffs that he's only doing this for his reward, God is not confident enough to ignore the doubter and is either unwilling to or incapable of simply showing Satan the truth. Instead, he tells Satan to murder Job's family, destroy his possessions, inflict him with plagues, and make his life miserable. God not only allows but *encourages* Satan to torture and murder innocents. In the end, God finally recants and stops torturing the innocent man, giving him new children and long life and riches, but only after Satan has been allowed to do his will on Earth with God's explicit approval AND has convinced everyone around Job that God is unworthy, requiring God to step in personally to correct this.

It doesn't matter that Satan didn't get Job. Satan still came out *way* ahead - even assuming that all 10 of the murdered children went to Heaven *and* that God's personal and direct intervention saved all of Job's friends and his wife from their sins *and* that Satan didn't manage to convert even one single unmentioned bystander by showing that God would *order*, not just allow, Satan to torment a righteous innocent and murder his innocent children. He still got to run free and commit acts of murder and torture, not just with God watching but with God's *encouragement*.

Satan had nothing to lose, God had nothing to gain, and yet God still played Satan's game by Satan's rules at Satan's behest, and not only let Satan free on the world, he encouraged Satan to pick his own targets. It's only that Satan is megalomaniacal and overreaching, so he picked an incorruptible man, that prevented a tragedy.

The book of Job annoys me because it shows God to be a gullible chump.

[Poll #1368441]


EDIT:

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[eris-esoteric.livejournal.com]

Hurrah! Sanity finally makes an appearance!