Sibylle Toeller: Hybrid Hearts. God's call to come home. All rights reserved by author. Chapter 3: The undivided heart- becoming righteous through faith. Noah, Abram, Job.
The Book of Job is not one of the history books of the Old Testament, unlike the Genesis narratives. There are countless older, ancient writings that can be categorized as 'writs of complaint' and that show numerous parallels to the story of Job. An astonishingly similar structure of the lament before God can be found, for example, in the Sumerian Job, a cuneiform inscription dating from the 3rd millennium BC. The similarities between the texts are astounding. In Nineveh, too, clay tablets were found with a motif of lamentation over the suffering experienced by the worshippers, the summary of which resembles that of the Book of Job. However, this overlap of historical sources is only confusing if one seeks the origin of the story of Job outside the cultural environment of the Early Bronze Age: In the Book of Job, there are numerous indications that the story takes place in the time of the patriarchs. Job's wealth is counted in flocks, just as it was with Abraham, Lot and, later, Laban and Jacob. Job makes sacrifices, so there is neither temple service nor a Holy of Holies nor the Mosaic Law, which would have been established by that time. Even the land of Uz, which is named as Job's place of origin, is not an area that was in Canaan, Bible scholars agree. This is not unusual when you consider that Harran was also a place under Assyrian rule outside of Canaan. Terah and Abram's origin from Ur in Mesopotamia has also shown that the starting point of God's story is not the Holy Land. And why should it? The people of Israel did not even exist at that time; Abraham's heirs were yet to come. At that time, God chose only individual people. The logical consequence is that the vast majority had no personal revelation of God and thus no clear orientation towards him. They were born and died without even recognizing him. God does not hold this against them; after all, the Ten Commandments had not yet been revealed. As we shall see later, it was anything but easy for people to follow the invisible God who seemed so far away to them. Nevertheless, there was a yearning in each of them for the God who created them – an echoing, inner truth and search. These are reflected in the Sumerian and Babylonian Job as well as in the finds in Nineveh. The God who is sought and implored for answers in these texts is clearly not one of many gods. Rather, it is the Most High, who sovereignly directs the destinies of life. Only a creator god can answer such questions as those posed by Job in his inner distress.
The Bible in its present form was not written as a testimony of the time, but compiled from a wide variety of sources. There was no angel standing next to Moses with a dictation machine in his hand; nor was there one next to Noah or Abraham, however much we might wish it. The biblical contents that make up the Torah were increasingly collected, organized and written down during the Babylonian captivity to preserve Jewish identity. They were finally summarized under Ezra from 516 BC, in parallel with the reconstruction of the temple in Jerusalem, with the utmost care and reverence. The material that would eventually make up the Torah and form the basis of our present-day Old Testament consisted of old scrolls and text fragments.[1] In addition, there were orally transmitted myths, legends and stories, such as the Book of Job. These were passed down from generation to generation.[2] This approach explains the different time frames, name changes and also other, subjectively colored narratives of the same story from different perspectives. You can look at an elephant from above, from the left, from the right, from below – with aversion or reverence, with fear or love – but in the end it remains an elephant. Neither the human perspective nor the passage of time changes the fundamental message; the essence of the truth is preserved over generations. We have already seen how accurate and detailed the traditions are, based on the effortless embedding of the stories of Noah and Abraham in the corresponding eras. Of course, the writers were exposed to the influence of their world and the oral retelling will have included personal coloring. Most of the Israelite and Canaanite population could neither read nor write at the time – so there were oral traditions, bards and storytelling methods aplenty.
When knowledge is passed on in this way and only later written down, we Westerners are left with an uncomfortable feeling of “only cash is real!” We want to have every piece of knowledge documented, trust the written word more than the narrative, and do not really believe in the reliability of oral tradition. We are so accustomed to writing that it seems impossible to us that truth could have been preserved through narrative tradition, much less through word-for-word retelling! Oral tradition seems vague and unpredictable to us – although date, signature and seal print are no guarantee for the truth content of a historical source and our correct interpretation of it. No one can tell us with certainty whether the Gilgamesh Epic was actually an ancient religion or perhaps an epic, a poetic, artistic achievement... like Peer Gynt or A Midsummer Night's Dream. We cannot simply ask the author about his intention, but only assume the most likely.
Because of these uncertainties, many prefer to assume, contrary to all the facts of biblical research, that God wrote it with his own hand. The same applies to original texts: they prefer to ignore what does not correspond to their own beliefs and includes influences from the Hellenistic period, for example. But the fact is that as late as the 1st century AD, 90% of people were illiterate. Knowledge was passed down largely through repeated storytelling, memorization, proverbs and rituals, and thus as part of popular memory.
It is up to us to concede to God the sovereignty that He ultimately had exactly the right scriptures compiled. Why should it not be possible for Him to guide the respective approaches of the writers in such a way that ultimately His story, His message, emerges across the books like a puzzle? Why should not, for example, an unconsciously chosen word of the writer have produced a deep allegory without the writer intending it? The author J.R.R. Tolkien and his trilogy The Lord of the Rings is one such example: by his own admission, he never intended or consciously created the numerous allegories. So how much more must it be possible for God to reveal himself through fragments that create an overall picture? This approach to understanding the Bible understands it as divinely inspired scripture – to put it casually, this approach corresponds to the statement: “Man proposes, God disposes”. How he disposes, what he uses and how his epic is created: well, we don't ask any novelist in the world that, so why ask him? In the end, what is important is the message, the story – the origin is at best interesting.
One approach to understanding the writing of the Bible as a whole, and on this basis also the basis and revision of Job, is to take a closer look at oral tradition: even in our modern times, illiteracy is not uncommon. In the 1950s, there were still many small villages in the Middle East where the majority of the population was illiterate. Even today, there are numerous people who can neither read nor write: the total number of 13% of the world's population may sound negligible, but it actually corresponds to 770 million people![3] How did and do illiterate people preserve their knowledge and insights? How do they learn and teach, and is this kind of transmission reliable at all? Or is it nothing but quicksand?
The pioneer and founder of cultural inclusion and understanding of oral reproduction and dissemination in relation to Bible study was (and is) the late Presbyterian Dr. Kenneth E. Bailey. Born in the United States, he spent most of his life in the Middle East, more specifically in Egypt, Israel and, for many years, in civil-war-torn Lebanon. There he founded the Institute for Middle Eastern Studies and held a professorship in the New Testament.
He taught and lived together with the almost forgotten Arab Christians. He repeatedly emphasized how much he was enriched by this cultural heritage, which was rooted in tradition. According to Bailey, it gave him a completely new understanding of the cultural world of Jesus, the relationship structures and linguistic peculiarities of his time. In addition, he learned about and came to appreciate the oral transmission of national identity and historical events during his time among them. Kenneth E. Bailey brought into focus the fact that the village structures and customs in countries like Lebanon have hardly changed in some places since Jesus' time. In their village seclusion, the old familyand social structures to this day in these old, traditional ways. According to Bailey, this provides an invaluable insight into the world in which Jesus lived.[4]
How accurate the oral tradition is, how well the preservation of knowledge works in a non-technological, illiterate society, has fascinated him throughout his life. In a podcast by the Trinity School of Ministry, he shared some anecdotes from his life and work.[5] He talked about the early days of his ministry after graduating from his seminary. In 1957, he and some colleagues set out for some remote Egyptian villages, which were mostly Christian. The rate of illiteracy in these places was immense. The goal was to teach the inhabitants to read their own language, Arabic. He was confronted first hand with the ways in which knowledge was preserved without the ability to write it down.
Bailey stated that someone who can neither read nor write develops a memory similar to that of a blind person reading braille, without us really understanding how it works. He also said that the less information and events we take in, the more intensely individual memories are recalled. For example, he met a taxi driver in Israel who recited two psalms a day and actually knew all 150 psalms by heart – without a mistake! He had a book of the psalms at home to check against – he did it to pass the time while he waited for his customers. Bailey called this form of oral memory 'formally controlled oral tradition' because it is poems, Bible verses or other writings that are remembered and passed on orally in this way. Conversely, this means that even if written documents are lost over time – so the taxi driver loses his book of psalms, so to speak – the written word would be passed down 1:1 through his memory and could be recalled again. An amazing feat, an unusual way of preserving knowledge!
According to Bailey, rumors and news circulate in every society and are retold over and over again. In times of war, more and more horror stories are added, which become deeply ingrained in the memories of people whose lives are otherwise uneventful, he stated. Bailey called this kind of knowledge dissemination 'informal uncontrolled oral tradition' because it cannot be verified neutrally and is not based on any original text or corrective. Proverbs and statements about people, rumors, etc. also fall into this form of oral tradition. They are the campfire stories, the 'marketplace radio', the 'village gossip' of a society that was not nearly as distant from each other as the modern, largely urban, westernSociety Today[6]. However, the form of knowledge preservation that was most fascinating to him was public remembering and storytelling in traditional weekly village meetings. In these meetings, stories that shaped the identity of the village were publicly recited and told so that they would be permanently remembered. He explained that these stories were so important and fundamental to the respective ethnic group that they were subject to public correction: if someone was affected by such a correction, it was equivalent to a loss of face for the storyteller that should not be underestimated; misrepresenting the central content was a shameful failure. In this way, he had been told stories that the village still identified with, dating back to the 3rd century AD – in all their details. The most overwhelming surprise for him, however, was that when he returned to one of the villages for the first time 48 years later, he heard stories about himself. He himself had become a village memory, passed down orally. The stories were easily verifiable for him – and correctly told.
So we don't know for sure whether Job really existed as a person, because the book of the same name consists of original sources, oral tradition and was passed on as a legal complaint. It was frequently revised and reassembled. But someone must have lived who passed these experiences and thoughts on to us today! We have no exact archaeological evidence that fully reflects the individual original writings that have been collected.
Nevertheless, his painful story, his struggle with God and His answer, echoes through the ages and has never lost its relevance. The question of the reason for personal and general suffering and whether it makes sense is as old as the history of mankind beyond Eden. Equally old are the attributions of good and evil, blessing and curse, preservation and temptation to two different forces. Linked to this is a third question: Is suffering personal punishment for sin? Is God cruel? Does he deliberately let us suffer? And how can we trust in him then?
Whoever Job was, we sometimes find ourselves sitting in the ashes, like his friends, seeing and experiencing suffering we don't understand. In those times, like Job's friends, we try to find explanations and answers that are neat and simple. Yet like Job, we also wrestle with God, challenging him for revelation in a shrill, echoing “Why?”
Come with me as we see what Job's story and accusations are, and what God ultimately says to him. I have no doubt that God wanted it in the Bible, because Job casts by far the most hopeful shadow over the promise of the new covenant. Let us find him!
Footnotes__________________________________________________________________________________________
[1] Note: For example, a much older, completely preserved scroll of Isaiah was reset and added to the Torah.
[2] Cf. on this: https://www.orient.uni-freiburg.de/.../uniseum/tafel4_tora, as of: July 6, 2024.
[3] Cf.: https://www.ardalpha.de/wissen/analphabeten-alphabetisierung-lesen-schreiben-lernen-100.html As at 15/08/2024.
[4] Note: For a deeper understanding of this approach to biblical interpretation, I recommend the book: Kenneth E. Bailey (ed.): Jesus was not a European. The Culture of the Middle East and the World of the Gospels, translated by Doris C. Leisering; SCM R. Brockhaus in the SCM Verlagsgruppe GmbH, German edition, 2018.
[5] Note: The following statements are translated and summarized interview statements by Dr. Kenneth E. Bailey. The complete podcast for comparison is available in Spotify at: Trinity School for Ministry; Archive Recovery 29- The Reverend Dr. Kenneth E. Bailey- Quaint Relic or Bright Light? Published January 2021. I refer in particular to his personal statements from 24:23- 43:10. Last updated: 08/15/2024.
[6] Note: We can understand this to a certain extent when we look at social media platforms today: they have a similar function to the former direct 'village gossip': in the end, everyone knows what happened, the stories spread, and there is no objective verification of the truth because there are umpteen versions of the same story. Individual colouring and opinion also overlay the rumours.
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