Nature in the Book of Job – part 1

I have recently been reading through the book of Job using the new translation of Robert Alter that I received for Christmas.  The writer of Job obviously had a keen eye and deep appreciation of nature as is evident in much of the language used throughout the book.  Here is a classic example in Chapter 4, where we have an obvious allusion to farming — plough-plant-reap — wrapped up in a standard moral teaching:

As I have seen, those who plow mischief,                                                                        those who plant wretchedness, reap it. (Job 4:8)

We then move to the animal kingdom, where the lion is used as another line of evidence in the case for the traditional system of retribution:

The lion’s roar, the maned beast’s  sound –                                                                     and the young lions’ teeth are smashed.

The king of beasts dies with no prey,                                                                               the whelps of the lion are scattered.  (Job 4:10-11)

Apparently there are five different words in Hebrew for lion and the writer of Job demonstrates his impressive lexical wealth by using all five within two sentences creating a headache for the translators!

 

Jesus, God and Nature in the Gospels

I recently read and enjoyed the book “Jesus and the Eyewitnesses: The Gospels as Eyewitness Testimony“.  The author  Richard Bauckham is an eminent Biblical scholar and theologian (see his wikipedia link and his own website).

His thoughts on the Environment can be found here [video] with his lecture at the Faraday Institute for Science and Religion, Cambridge.  The seminar is entitled “Jesus, God and Nature in the Gospels”.

He also has a recently published book “The Bible and Ecology: Rediscovering the Community of Creation ” which should be worth checking out at some point.

 

Psalm 134

I often do a Sunday morning activity with the youth that attend our church service.  A recent project has been to rewrite sections of scripture in the words and phrases used in our own culture and in particular to use the shorthand prose used in text messages and to endeavour to synthesize the passage into the length of a twitter (i.e. 140 characters).

Here is the NIV version of Psalm 134 (by all accounts the second shortest of the bible):

“Praise the LORD, all you servants of the LORD who minister by night in the house of the LORD.  Lift up your hands in the sanctuary and praise the LORD.  May the LORD, the Maker of heaven and earth, bless you from Zion.”

We reworked this as follows:

“Prz GOD aL u Gs of GOD hu rap aL nite on da graveyrd shift. Put ur h&z ^ in prz. mA da GOD hu mAkz hvn&erth bls u frm paradize.”

Psalm 134 (the final psalm in a series of “songs of ascent”) talks of blessing (both us blessing God – praising him in the NIV version and God blessing us).  It talks of a people serving all night in the temple, presumably keeping the lamps lit, or on guard duty or perhaps praying through the night.  In our version we took on this sense of being on the graveyard shift (cold, lonely, tired, …) but then suddenly it dawns on you where you are (in the sacred temple) and your filled with a tremendous urge to praise the LORD and lift your hands in prayer and are filled with an awe for him who made heaven and earth.

 

Psalm 117

I often do a Sunday morning activity with the youth that attend our church service.  A recent project has been to rewrite sections of scripture in the words and phrases used in our own culture and in particular to use the shorthand prose used in text messages and to endeavour to synthesize the passage into the length of a twitter (i.e. 140 characters).

We started off with the shortest Psalm (in fact the shortest chapter in the whole bible), that of Psalm 117.  Here is the NIV we took as our basis:

“Praise the LORD, all you nations; extol him, all you peoples.  For great is his love toward us, and the faithfulness of the LORD endures forever.  Praise the LORD.”

And this is our reworked version:

“Prz GOD, all u Gs. Big em up, all u thgs. His luv is awsom 4 us omies cuz He’s got ur back 4 eva. Prz GOD.”

Although this is the shortest Psalm it has a gigantic scope urging “all nations” and “all peoples” to praise the LORD.  The justification for this praise are the divine attributes of his steadfast love and faithful towards “us”.  Now this presents an interesting puzzle for interpretation, should the “us” incorporate Israel and the “all nations/peoples” or is it that the “all nations/peoples” recognise the overwhelming love and enduring faithfulness that God has shown Israel and will therefore be compelled to praise God!?  Is the psalmist encouraging the reader/worshiper (in my case a non-Israelite) to take a look at Israel’s salvation history and join with them (Israel) in praise at God’s saving works.  Notice that it doesn’t give details … this is if you like the minimalist statement of thanksgiving possible … bare bones stuff.  It could even be possible that this psalm was composed in the return from exile or after the rebuilding of the temple and that there is a hint at goading the enemies (other nations) … ‘you can try and destroy our nation and burn down the temple in Jerusalem, but God’s love for us endured and he had our backs as he promised and now we return and even you must pay tribute to that!’  It can be read as a beckoning cry calling us to acknowledge the incredible kindness God has shown us and take heed of his steadfast truth.  Let us join and become full participants in God’s salvation plans for the world.