B242 Pentecost 20

[00:00:07] Speaker A: You're listening to by the well, a lectionary based podcast for preachers recorded on the land of the Wurundjeri people. [00:00:20] Speaker B: Greetings everyone. I'm Monica Melanchthon, and today my conversation partner is Professor Miguel della Torre, an ordained minister of the Southern Baptist Church in the United States and professor of christian ethics and Latin and Latinx studies at the ILEPF School of Theology in Denver, Colorado. Doctor de la Torre came to deliver the northe lecture here at Pilgrim Theological College last Thursday, and I thought it was a good opportunity to have him comment on the text for pentecost 20. So welcome, Miguel. I'm really honored that you are here and are willing to share your insights on these lectionary readings. Today we shall focus on two readings, namely job chapter one, verse one, and chapter two, verses one to ten, and mark chapter ten, verses two to 16. So, Miguel, how are you this morning or afternoon? [00:01:21] Speaker C: Thank you for having me. [00:01:22] Speaker B: Thank you so much for agreeing to do this. I thought we will begin with Job, chapter one and chapter two, the first ten verses. So what are your thoughts on this particular story? But before that, let me just say that this book raises questions that are universal in nature. So the topic of suffering is a hot topic in most religions as to why. What causes suffering in the world? Why do we suffer? What have we done to merit this kind of suffering? And this book that was written, some say 9th century, some say later. But in any case, it's a big debate about the date of the book of Job, and what it reflects is a human attempt to understand suffering in the world. And obviously this was a question that ailed the communities in ancient, in the nearest, sorry, in the ancient Near east as well. So, yes, what's your take on this text? [00:02:30] Speaker C: Well, this particular text and the whole book of Job has always troubled me to a certain degree. If indeed it's a book on theodicy, how can a good and loving God and powerful God allow such suffering and horrible things to happen to individuals and to the world? It provides a very poor answer. I mean, firstly, after you read these two chapters for the next, what, 40 chapters, we're trying to figure out why job is suffering. And at the end the answer is, well, I'm God and I do whatever I want. And of course I'm paraphrasing, but we don't get a satisfactory answer. Job suffers because God does whatever God wants to do. And even to question God becomes problematic because he goes to job. Are you there? When I created the foundations of the earth, were you there when I did all these things, how dare you even question it? So that is not satisfactory. And it's also not satisfactory in the way God is portrayed in this first chapter. You know, God is gambling with Satan, comes along and says, hey, I can make job cuss you. And God says, oh, okay, I'll take that bet. And poor job is like, it's just used by these beings. [00:04:04] Speaker B: Yeah, I mean, yeah. You see, in most christian circles, of course, people believe there's always a cause to suffering. One doesn't suffer without cause. And therefore, here, I guess, the test is, how does a person who hasn't merited suffering respond to the experience of suffering? And so in a way, that this is the test that Job is being put to. And Job's initial response, as most scholars or commentators and interpreters say, is that job maintains his integrity. I guess in this text, this narrative, the title is jobs integrity. And it is not clear to me what they mean when they say this is about jobs integrity. His initial silence to the suffering, our acceptance of the suffering or the lack of. Therefore, because of the silence, in the silence, he doesnt question God. Whether he is thinking about it, we dont know what is it that is, that is integral about James? I mean, sorry, Job's behavior here. [00:05:18] Speaker C: See, I don't see that as integrity. I mean, personally, he should question God. He should argue with God. I mean, God is not afraid of our arguments. God is not afraid of our questioning. If indeed God is love, then God could handle whatever questions if they're asked with integrity, you know, and we don't see this here. I mean, I like to give the example. I mean, I have to now, they're grown up kids, but when they were younger, especially during those teenage years, they said some horrible things to me. I mean, they cursed me and they, and they questioned my intelligence and they questioned my very existence. That did not change how I loved them. You know, I still loved them even through that, because love is that powerful. And I understood that their questioning and their wrestling was something greater than just me. [00:06:22] Speaker B: Yeah, I like that. Because in my classes I come across students who have been conditioned to think that questioning is not an act of faith. You know, you read the scriptures and when questions arise, you don't particularly ingest relation to God. You don't ask them, because that is what scripture says, and we just need to accept it for what it is. And I try to impress upon them that questioning is also an act of faith, because it is in the questioning that we discover something new about God or about ourselves or about each other, about the world and so on. So questioning is an act of faith. And here the initial response of job is silence. Yeah. And I guess there is a place for silence because we need to sit in it to absorb what is happening, to reflect upon it, and to think deeply before we raise. But we raise questions. So, Martin, I think I have read in one of the reflections on this particular text that Martin Luther King has said that our lives begin to end the day we become silent about things that matter. So maybe avoiding that silence, perhaps, is a good beginning toward integrity. What do you think? [00:07:47] Speaker C: I think silence could be highly problematic in that it prevents us from truly wrestling with the situation that we face. At least if we're gonna talk about integrity. Probably misses. Jobe had more integrity than job, this nameless woman who just happens to appear and tells him to curse God and die. At least she was wrestling with what was going on. [00:08:15] Speaker B: Right? [00:08:15] Speaker C: Because let's not forget everything that job has lost and suffer, she has lost and suffer plus. [00:08:24] Speaker B: Yes, that's true. [00:08:25] Speaker C: Also lost her riches and her house. She also lost the children that she gave birth to. And now she has to take care of this man who is full of sores and ill and be the primary caregiver, which in itself is a form of suffering. [00:08:40] Speaker B: Right. That's true. And I think. I think, you know, she, too, perhaps, began with maintenance of silence, you know, accepting what was being done. But she has come to a point where she's not able to watch this any longer, is not able to endure it any longer. For those of us who have very traditional notions about what a wife's role is, and particularly at a time when a husband is unwell, I know in my culture, the indian culture, they would expect the woman to just hold her husband and comfort him, expressing patience and forbearance in the situation. We would expect the husband, sorry, the wife, to stay by the husband and pray for him, perhaps perform rituals and pujas and bargain with God for the healing and the well being of the husband. And this is what women are expected to do while attending to an ailing husband or relative. And any expression of a lack of trust in God and God's mercy and faithfulness is met with censure and reproach. And because of the fact that here she raises a question or instructs job to curse God and die, traditional reflection on this statement has always rendered her as a woman with questionable faith when compared to Job's integrity. Right. And so. But of course, in the recent past, there have been more and more feminist scholars who have uplifted this character in the story and have been sympathetic towards her and to have attempted to redeem her and reclaim her as someone who offers a different vantage point from which we can deconstruct male hegemony. And her statement, therefore, has been understood as one that moves Job from passivity and compliance towards a more assertive and resistant relationship with God. In fact, it has been said that she assists job by proposing a theological method of committing euthanasia. Okay. It's a type of God assisted suicide, which I think is really, really powerful. But does she really want her husband to die? I mean, like you said already, she has lost more than what Job has. And so she now has come to the stage where she thinks Job has had enough. She has had enough. And if he dies, she can die as well, because the life of a widow was not an easy one. Yes. Yeah. So with her questioning, this process of resistance begins in the belief systems that have governed Job's life. And. And in a way, her approach is similar to that of the psalmist who will say, why and what and when? And use these questions to reproach God. And this kind of questioning, therefore, is a response of faith. [00:12:07] Speaker C: Yes. And I think Job and God learns something from this woman. [00:12:14] Speaker B: Yes. And that is why another feminist scholar by the name of Rachel Magdalene writes about, writes, saying she moves both Job and God. In the process, she becomes a quiet hero both in the story and beyond. Job's wife serves as a model of resistance for all those whose suffering is both terrible and unacknowledged. And she teaches us all that compassion, generosity, generativity, and edification are still possible even under the worst of conditions. Job's wife joins the ranks of the wise, she writes. And I guess in many ways, this statement also reminds me of your lecture on hopelessness last week, and in a way, and I would like you to say something about, yes, Job, and at least Job's wife is more perceptive or seems to be aware of the hopelessness that surrounds her. And it's almost as if God has abandoned both of them. And. Yes. [00:13:18] Speaker C: Yeah. I mean, what do you do when the God of liberation does not liberate? Okay, what do you do when the God that's supposed to be there, it's not there. So these are real questions. It's easy to believe in God when everything is going great, but when you find yourself in a situation where you have lost everything and God is silent, you know, and it's just hopeless. I mean, what do you do then. And I think that's the point that she has gone to where she has nothing to lose, as you said earlier. [00:13:51] Speaker B: Yeah. So basically, one of the major foci of this particular or focus of this, of this narrative would be this importance of overcoming silence or living sitting in the silence for a bit. But there should come a stage when you begin to question, I don't know, or interrogate your own experience and God. So would that be something that ministers should wrestle with? [00:14:20] Speaker C: I would say two things that I could pull from this. Number one is just that God is not afraid of our questioning, of our doubts, and of our cursing. God is okay with that. That's part of human nature. And secondly, for those who embrace some kind of prosperity theology, that nothing wrong is going to happen to you if you are a child of the king and God is taking care of everything. Yeah, that doesn't work, at least not in the Bible and definitely not in real life. [00:14:53] Speaker B: Yes. Okay. That's a good place to stop. And before we go on to the gospel lesson. Okay, so we come to the gospel lesson, which is the gospel of Mark, chapter ten. And here there is a question about divorce and about who does the woman belong to if she has been married multiple times. Now, this is a text that is a little beyond my scope of understanding, it seems like, because divorce is, of course, a very sensitive issue and a controversial one in many cultures, and where women are more or less coerced into staying on in marriages. And in India, we have a very famous, not famous, well known, popular saying, just adjust. Adjust to what is happening around you and it'll all work itself out. But anyway, this is a story that is being. In this story, the question is being raised if it is lawful for, first of all, a man to divorce a woman. And so Jesus is responding to that question. Any insights? [00:16:17] Speaker C: Yeah, this is one of those passages that I find highly problematic. Mainly it's because the assumption is that the woman is property, that the woman is a piece of property. Kind of like the 10th commandment, thou shall not covet thy neighbor's house, ox, donkey or wife. Wife. Like the house, donkey or ox. Or just a property. Just another property that you shall not covet. It doesn't say, thou neighbor's spouse, but specifically his property. So the question. And of course, it makes sense. If she is property, then whose property does she belong to when she gets to heaven and she dies? And that's a legitimate question, if a woman is property. But the response of divorce continues to, you know, continues this idea of women as property. Because what happens when you abuse your property? What happens when you are violent towards your property? Does that property have a right to break the lease and leave? [00:17:29] Speaker B: Okay. [00:17:30] Speaker C: You know, again, using that metaphor. Yeah. If anything, if I was ever, you know, if I was ever counseling anybody who was being abused by a spouse, male or female, my comment would be, leave as quickly as you can. Get a divorce. That's lawful and that's. And that's the right thing to do. Ideally, maybe, yeah, it'll be great if people meet their soulmate and they live happily ever after, but that's not reality. And then again, that's nothing you pointed out before. What happens when in the same gender loving relationship and it's not male or female. What do you do with this passage? [00:18:13] Speaker B: Right? Yeah. Because in Jesus response, Jesus says, this law was written because you are heart of heart. But at the beginning of creation, God made them male and female. And so, yeah, when I read it, that was one of the questions I had. How do people with different sexual orientations and are in different kinds of relationships, you know, male, male, female, female, transgender, you know, how would they read this verse or this. This text? [00:18:48] Speaker C: Well, I mean, I can't speak for them, but I would imagine what they'll see is that this has nothing to do with them and maybe the Bible has nothing to do with them. They are excluded just by the language that's being used. [00:19:01] Speaker B: Yeah. So what do we do with text like this? I mean, you said there were, I think in another conversation, you said there are some stories you would rather not read. [00:19:10] Speaker C: Yeah, I mean, I don't read the book of Joshua, you know, genocide everybody in that country. No. You know, when Paul writes, wives, obey your husband and submit to him again, I ignore those verses. There's certain verses that I think are just wrong, and this is one of them. And I think truly worshiping God with all your mind is being able not only to question, but to say, yeah, whoever wrote this got it wrong. [00:19:44] Speaker B: But would you also agree. Would you agree if I said that some of these texts, difficult as they are, controversial as they are, complex as they are, of course, written in a totally different context, can also become conversation, play the role of conversation starters. [00:20:07] Speaker C: Absolutely. [00:20:08] Speaker B: Okay. So these, you know, I wouldn't want us to completely eradicate them or cut them out of the biblical text, but if they are there, they do have a purpose. And the purpose is that, yes. It enables you and I to talk about some of these issues that you are raising. And so within a congregational setting, these texts can become good conversation starters, at least, even if they don't give you a. An answer that is acceptable. [00:20:41] Speaker C: And again, you know, we could look at them within the context that they were written, which is a very different context from today. [00:20:49] Speaker B: Yeah. Is there anything that links these two texts together just from a lectionary perspective? I. Yes, there's something about women in both the texts. [00:21:00] Speaker C: There's something about women, and there's something about women as property and women as silent and women as nameless and women as just being there for men. [00:21:10] Speaker B: Oh, right. [00:21:11] Speaker C: So I think all these texts have. These two texts definitely have that in common. [00:21:16] Speaker B: Okay. Okay. So there's a lot to think about, at least on those issues that you've just named the story. I mean, the narrative in Mark ends with a statement about children. Children, too, are often classified along with women as being nameless, as being passive or innocent, and so on. And here Jesus says, let the little children come to me. They should be innocent like children. Do you have a comment on that? [00:21:53] Speaker C: Well, I mean, I like the innocent like children, because children have to be taught to hate other people. You put children of different races together, and they'll just play. They don't think about those things. We're the ones that have to teach them to hate the other. [00:22:10] Speaker B: Right. [00:22:11] Speaker C: So that innocent as children, I think, is something we need to recapture to that time, as opposed to being childlike, thinking in where we don't question, we don't wrestle, we don't worship God before our mind. [00:22:29] Speaker B: Right. Okay. Yep. Okay. A lot to think about, folks, as you prepare for your. For your sermons on these two texts, perhaps what I would like to take away is to give a voice to these women and children who have no voice. And imagine, use your imagination to determine or to understand why they said what they said, why they don't say what they don't say. And. Yeah. And enable that to fuel your own imagination and your writing of your reflections. So, thanks again, Miguel, for your time and for your voice and for your insights. Thank you. [00:23:17] Speaker C: Thank you for having me. [00:23:22] Speaker A: By. The well is brought to you by Pilgrim Theological College and the Uniting Church in Australia. It's produced by Adrian Jackson. Thanks for listening. [00:23:33] Speaker C: There. We got it. Yes.