A Guide for Spiritual Refugees (Book of Job. Pt. 8 with David Gushee) | Ep. 87
===
[00:00:00] Before we start, a quick word about something I wrote. Have you ever wondered what you'd say if one of your kids told you they were gay? Do you know what the Bible actually says about this topic? Check out my first fictional story called Loving God More. It's available as an audiobook read by me. It's a short story you can finish in a single sitting, and it will change how you hear some of the passages you thought you knew.
Loving God More is available as an audiobook now. Download it at jeremyjernigan.com or find the link in the show notes. And now, our episode.
Jeremy: Welcome to another episode of Cabernet and Pray, where we drink good wine and we explore the deeper story of Christianity. And today you are in for a treat, my friends. If you've been with me the last few months, you know that I have been going through a study of the Book of Job, and in particular, breaking down a book that's, that's just releasing called Job in [00:01:00] Exile by Dr.
David Gushee. I heard him give this lecture at a conference, and it just ignited my imagination. And then I asked him, "Hey, would you be willing to do an interview about it?" And then I decided to do seven episodes of my own just unpacking the things that he talks about. And today is part eight of our Job in Exile series, where we actually have a conversation with the author, with Dr.
Gushee, and this is gonna be so good, so helpful. This is going to reframe some things for you. If you've grown up in the church like me, this is gonna offer you some perspectives that maybe you've never heard before, and it's gonna be really good. Dr. Gushee really needs no introduction if you know him. I had him back in episode eight, and, the podcast has changed a lot since episode eight.
But first had him on that episode. Dr. Gushee was essentially America's leading, evangelical ethicist. Then in [00:02:00] 2014, he wrote a book called Changing Our Minds, and it was about rethinking homosexuality, the LGBTQ+ conversation, rethinking all of that, and inviting people to read the Bible differently as they rethought that.
He ended up getting pushed out of the community that he had helped to build. And then he later wrote a book about that, a memoir called Still Christian: Following Jesus Out of American Evangelicalism. As you're probably suspecting, this is a guy you relate with. This is a, a guy that knows this story, knows this journey, knows what it feels like to ask the dangerous questions and then to pay a price for it, which is what we find in the Book of Job.
And today, he helps people rethink much of the theology, much of the structure that we were handed, and to rethink it toward something better and more beautiful and something that looks like Jesus. So this is an [00:03:00] absolute fascinating conversation with Dr. Gushee. This is a guide for spiritual refugees
I've never shared this with anybody publicly If this was SportsCenter, that would be like such a hot take. Skip Bayless would have no idea. Stephen A. Smith would have no idea what to say if you drop that down. That is so good. The joke I always say is like, "How'd you learn so much?" Gotta drink a lot.
Resistance to change is hurting the church. I'm not in the camp that God has a penis or a vagina or a body at all. I'm in the camp that God is a universe spirit. This is the strangest podcast that I have been on. I don't even know what to do. I'm kind of geeked up about this wine. So this is my second glass, and it delivers a little more of a punch than I expected.
So if I get a little loopy, it's your fault. You told me to drink on this show. I will also say as a confession, I am a lightweight. So I've had like three sips of this wine and I'm already feeling it, so this is fun. You've uncovered the mystery. You've exposed the [00:04:00] formula. You've just duct-taped together a number of things that aren't normally hanging out together, and I'm here for it.
We're gonna sit down at table, we're gonna have a glass of wine and some food, and we're gonna talk about the beauty of Jesus. Thanks for what you're doing with this podcast and for the creative way you're doing it, and the beautiful, positive spirit in which you're doing it. I really appreciate this venue, what you're doing.
It is fun, and yet you dig into the deep stuff. I've heard about your podcast for a long time, and I love that you're a pastor and that you explore the world of faith through wine. That's very unique. I never thought of church history in terms of wine drinkers. I love this question. You had me with herbaceous notes, I want you to know.
I'm ready to just stay here and live in the wine tour. I will never forget the first time I bought a bottle of wine by myself, which was yesterday. If you're familiar with Drunk History, I thought it's like drunk theology. So I, oh- I got a little spicy there. It's the peach wine. Apparently the [00:05:00] wine is... But here we are.
Queer we are. Here we are. No, it's wine, Jeremy. I'm an emotional guy. Paired with a half a glass of wine, I'm beet red, sweating, and about to cry here. By the way, drinking this Pinot Grigio at 3:00 in the afternoon is making me even more direct in my communication than I normally would be. I know why you had your guest drink wine.
It makes sense now. Yeah. I get it. A little bit of liquid courage to really unleash the beast. I think you've got a good podcast. Th- throwing the wine bit in there, that's nice. Cabernet and pray, yeah.
Jeremy: Well, Dr. Gushue, the last time I heard you speak, you prompted me to start an eight-week series about a book that you're writing. So I am excited to see the effects that you have on me today. Welcome back to the podcast
David Gushee: Thank you, Jeremy. I remember that crowded room in Boston and you listening intently, and so I'm so glad that here we are
Jeremy: And w- this is like round two of that. I just couldn't, I couldn't quit you, so I had to, I had to read the book and I had to, had to have you back [00:06:00] on the pod. I'm so excited about this conversation, for the people who have been listening to this pod for the build-up, this is gonna feel like, yeah, you've been talking about this for so many weeks, and now we actually get to, to get here.
So this is exciting. Before we dive in, let's talk about the wine that we're drinking today. I have got... I brought out a big boy for you. This is a 2019, Castello di Neive
Santa Stefano Barbaresco, which I had to practice saying that because that is a tongue twister. This is 100% Nebbiolo grape, and it's incredible. I'm getting rose, cedar notes, and I'm coming off of a cold, as you may be able to tell in my voice, and so I'm also getting cherry syrup, but I don't know if that's psychological.
Might be a little bit of a lot of what I've had lately. So it's actually delightful. The color surprised me. It is almost a little [00:07:00] bit garnet, for those of you on video, and so it's got this, like a little brown note to it, which, you know, usually implies some aging there, which I was surprised. It's a 2019, not super old, but just a delightful glass for a delightful conversation.
So that's what I'm drinking today. What have you got in your glass?
David Gushee: Uh, I have here a Preme 2021 Navarra from Spain. Um, we hosted my sister, brother-in-law, uh, had a family reunion and, uh, last or two nights ago, and this is, this is what we had. It was a, um, joyful family reunion. I found this to be-- I'm not any kind of s- expert on wine, but, um, and I actually almost always like white wine more than red wine. But I really like this. It's, um, goes down easy [00:08:00] um, I am glad to give it another round. It has good associations in my mind because, uh, because I got to hang out with my, with actually two of my sisters and my brother-in-law, which happens maybe every couple of years. So cheers to my family and to you, Jeremy.
Jeremy: And to all of our listeners, cheers. Hopefully you're able to enjoy a glass with us
All right, let's dive into this incredible book while we enjoy our wine. The subtitle of the book is A Guide for Spiritual Refugees, which you are one. You, you have been one. You probably still consider yourself one. I'm curious, as you were sitting with Job on the ash heap, as you so vividly paint in the book, do you think this was, this was you writing from your ash heap?
Are you writing from Job's ash heap? Could you distinguish them? Were there moments where you felt like you were back and forth? What was [00:09:00] this like to write for you with your journey?
David Gushee: Well, me, uh, let me give a little bit of, of a little more background, maybe even more than I put into the book, I think. Um, so I was a fire for Jesus, born again Christian in high school, right? Sixteen years old, I converted, didn't know anything. And people gave me a couple of Bibles I absolutely had to read, and, um, "Read it through."
So at some point, I got to Job. And Job, even then, struck me as an absolutely unique, very challenging biblical book. 17-year-old me, 18-year-old me, why in the world is this book in the Bible, right? Okay. Um, to college, a, a Judaism class, [00:10:00] and Job is back. a wisdom literature class. Job is, Job is there. I went to seminary, to study the Holocaust. Turned out that Job is very important in Ho-Holocaust theology for the Jewish community. Um- And I said, "Wow, every time I turn around, Job shows up." And Job shows up in complicated and hard places, you know? Um, I had a Sunday school class that I taught. I talk about this class some, um, in a lot of podcasts, and is the context out of which I wrote Changing Our Mind. Um, big old Sunday school class at a Baptist church filled with LGBTQ people. And I, the good old Baptist way that I had, I would just like teach [00:11:00] through biblical books. So about, I think it was maybe two thousand and seventeen, I said, "Friends, we're gonna study through Job," big old Job. And we-- I think we took almost a year on Job. And one of the things I really love about group Bible study, if you set a good mood, set a good environment, is will see things that the teacher inevitably had not seen. And so really believe it was studying Job with a lot of LGBTQ+ people that, um, made it come alive for me in a different way. And It, it kind of went like this: yeah, we know what it's like to be on the ash heap. Yeah, we know what it's like to have questions that people are not willing to listen to. Um, and [00:12:00] Job began to feel very, very relevant, um, not just for LGBTQ but also for what was increasingly during that time we were coming to see there was a community developing called post-evangelicals. And, um, so but I identified with Job in some unexpected ways the writing, um, in the sense that I, I identified with Job, the person who had been respected, who had a central place in his community, who people used to look to for answers. And then he started asking questions and raising doubts, and, and then all of a sudden he's a problem. So I identified Job as a kind of exiled leader type, [00:13:00] which, um, which was a new and unexpected reading for me. Um, so and also there's a lot of talk in Job when you read verse by verse and you look at the Hebrew and you discover stuff, a lot of, a lot of talk in Job about honor and status. Job has had his honor and status stripped from him, and I identified with that. So I would say to your question, long answer, invariably, I was on the ash heap with Job, experiencing the reading of Job in a new way and, uh, really identifying with him and also kind of finding a way forward listening to him
Jeremy: Yeah, when I, when I've been going through these different episodes, I think it was my second week, [00:14:00] you know, I'm, I'm writing about the, the different things and the way his friends showed up, and silence, and just different parts of this. And I, I can't help but think about my own journey, which was, you know, similar to what you're describing, where, you know, I, I was a lead pastor, and everything made sense, and I had the respect, and I had the community.
And then, you know, when I stepped away from that, I, I lost all of that, and it was this whiplash. And, you know, I'm trying to just teach through the Book of Job, and I got choked up in episode two just because I couldn't help but see these parallels. And that's why
David Gushee: Yeah
Jeremy: book, and the way that you're bringing it to life, I think so many people are gonna find themselves in this story.
'Cause it's, it's not some like, "Hey, let's go learn this Bible lesson, and this is a cute Bible story that then makes us feel good." This is a raw ... Like, this is going to bring out pain in your own story that you're gonna go, "Oh, I know what that feels like." And yet I think [00:15:00] you're, you're inviting us to go there, but like you said, it's, it's, it's almost using Job then as a guide, like, to help us navigate through it.
It's not just to wallow in it. It's like how, how does this story go? And I think that's such a beautiful invitation for all of us into our own pain of our journeys.
David Gushee: You know, Jeremy, maybe this can be an aspect of post-religious trauma therapy.
Jeremy: Yeah
David Gushee: I'm not, not promising therapy here, but, um, actually think Job was written-- I say this in the book, Job was written in a context of trauma, and the trauma was personal and national both, I believe. And, and I think the Book of Job is working out trauma at both levels. And part of the trauma is religious because the answers available tradition at that time for [00:16:00] interpreting that suffering were actually worsening the trauma. And Job offers the articulation of the traditional answers and deep challenge to it. Um, and I actually was just looking at a book that describes Job as essentially trauma therapy So, so if people connect and if, "Yeah, I get this. Yeah, Bible gets me here by giving us the Book of Job." that sense, I think the Book of Job is a subversive part of the canon actually offers help other people bruised by the tradition, by religion, by Christianity. I think that's amazing that it's even there
Jeremy: Yeah. As, the way I've described it is, you know, you, you point out it's the Bible challenging the Bible, you know? And
David Gushee: Yeah.
Jeremy: and yeah, it's very, it's very interesting. Now, [00:17:00] one of the things that you do in the book that m- might be, I don't know if a deal breaker for an evangelical Christian, but certainly would rock them, is you read this as a realistic narrative rather than history.
And so a lot of evangelicals probably would, would have a, you know, a strong reaction to that. For someone whose faith might be coming apart because they were taught to read everything in the Bible as literal history, how do you think this reading affects the way that they make sense of a book like this or of the Bible as a whole?
David Gushee: Um, realistic narrative means It's a story. It's a story, um, like the way parables are stories, um, where religious and moral and spiritual meaning can be profound [00:18:00] even if, even if story is not a historical account. Um, I think of the Book of Jonah in the same way. Um, is a story, maybe a parable, about God saying even to the brokenhearted and aggrieved Jewish people, God cares about even Assyrians Which is incredibly important that it's there in the Bible. Um, I don't need Jonah to have been in the belly of a whale for three days for that message to be what it is. Here, um, the fact that there are other narratives and other traditions and, um, uh, of an innocent person suffering extreme and unfair [00:19:00] suffering, um, that it's kind of part of an ancient Near Eastern, um, tale that, uh, that clearly a lot of people are wrestling with the problem. Um, the problem is real, very real. As real as why did my five-year-old get cancer? It's
Jeremy: Yeah
David Gushee: Um, you don't need the Book of Job to be the story of a, of a guy named Job who lived at this place and time for, for it to be meaningful in addressing the issues that it is attempting to address. So just read the story as the story. Look at the way we find great meaning in all kinds of stories. Um, you know, Tolkien and, you know, that universe or the C.S. Lewis Narnia universe we used to all read back in the day, right? You know, or, um, you know, the Harry Potter universe or the Star Wars universe or the Marvel Comics universe, right? [00:20:00] Um, human beings are storytelling creatures, and our stories matter deeply to us, and they also...
they, they usually evoke human dilemmas. So let the dilemmas be what they are and, and, and live there
Jeremy: I love that. You're, you're reminding me of a time I was in seminary getting my masters, and I'm, I'm reading some textbook that had been assigned, and there was a line in it that... And I, I'll never forget. The line was something like, we were talking about the Book of Daniel, and the line was, "Since Daniel is obviously a fictional character."
And it, it just jolted me, you know, 'cause at that point I'm like, "What do you mean Daniel is obviously a fictional character?" And again, this isn't some, you know, hippie te- This is, like, the s- the seminary textbook that we were assigned to read, and I had to sit with that and, you know, this textbook said the same about Isaiah, you know, and all sorts of things of, like, hey, this isn't literally the way you [00:21:00] think of it.
And that's a journey I've had to go on. I suspect a lot of people are on different stages of that journey, right? Of like, wait, we can still see this as true. I think the, the reaction they have to that of like, okay, if Job didn't literally happen, then Job's not true, and what you're saying is it can be both.
It can be Job didn't literally happen, and it's communicating a truth. But just, I mean, to defend M- Job a little bit, there's not like there's a claim in there that's saying this has to be viewed as literally true in order to read the book. You know what I mean?
David Gushee: No. No, there isn't. It's just kind of a once upon a time
Jeremy: Right
David Gushee: You know, literally it starts that way essentially. Once upon a time in, the ancient Near East, there was a man named Job, and he was blameless and devout. Um, and then the story rolls from there, you know? Um, once a time, once upon a time in a land far, far
Jeremy: Ja
David Gushee: that's really how it reads. And in fact, [00:22:00] most scholars believe it was intentionally written to sound ancient. Um, like, you know, uh, the way that the Star Wars, you know, a long time ago in a land far, far away sounds really ancient even though it was Steven Spielberg in
Jeremy: Yeah, yeah
David Gushee: You know. it takes you back, it, it, it takes you, your imagination back, you know?
Jeremy: Well, that's what I grew up being told and believing for a long time. It was the first book ever written because it does have that feel to it, and yet I agree with you. I think it's written to have that feel. And, you know, even the thing you talk about in the book, the whole primeval time, you know, there are no Jews.
There is no Hebrew Bible. So to read a book of the Bible that takes place in this setting is kind of a funky thing to begin with,
David Gushee: It really
Jeremy: and I, I mean, I can't think of another book that is like that the way Job is
David Gushee: Um, yeah, there's a technical word for this. Um, the book is not archaic, but it is [00:23:00] archa- archaizing or, or archaisizing, which means basically the author wants to take us back to the primeval past, um, to take our imaginations there. So we think of it's before Abraham, it's before Moses. There's not Mosaic law we're dealing with.
Um, part of the fun of the book is it's before the Hebrew Bible, and yet the Hebrew Bible is being quoted, or
Jeremy: And debated.
David Gushee: and
Jeremy: Yeah
David Gushee: know, that's, that's just so cool. It's so creative. By the way, I think post evangelicals, post whatever it all was, if we're going to still love the Bible, we're gonna have to be given reasons to love the Bible. were just told to love the Bible before. Now show me. To me, this is a book that I love, and it has earned it. It has earned it with its cleverness, creativity, and genius. And so, [00:24:00] I'm all in with Job, know?
Jeremy: I would, I would s- I would say this, my own experience. I have always liked the Book of Job. I would never say I loved the Book of Job. After hearing your lecture, I had like this intrigue that I couldn't stop thinking about, and then after reading the book, I'm like, I officially am a Job fan. Like I, I love the Book of Job.
And again, it... The more you dive into it, the, the weirdness and the quirkiness and the beauty of the messiness, it i- it is so unique and so beautiful and, yeah, I, I think you do a great job of showing why we, we should fall in love with it. A- and you have a number of hot takes. I'm gonna get to one of them,
David Gushee: Okay. All right.
Jeremy: this is the f-
David Gushee: take on the
Jeremy: this is the first time I'd heard this, and I'm gonna, I'm gonna...
I want, I want you to go down as getting credit for this, 'cause this is, this is good. Okay, so I was thinking every time I've ever heard the Book of Job preached, like [00:25:00] every single time, the, the preacher makes a joke about Job's wife. I mean, it is like you have to make a joke about he loses everything but he keeps his wife.
Ha ha ha. Everybody laughs. It is the token joke. You offer a defense of Job's wife, and you say this. This is the question. "What if it is Job's wife, based on her embodied experience as a grieving mother, who has simply gotten ahead of him in processing her trauma?" So she's the one dialed in. Job at, you know, is a slow, slow learner here.
Why do you think she gets the punchline in every sermon and what do you see here that the jokes are missing?
David Gushee: Um, well, is actually a pretty good avenue into thinking about the patriarchal dimension of scripture, right? Um, the [00:26:00] book almost certainly written by a man centering a male character, um, gives us an aggrieved wife who has one line Uh, why are you still holding on to your integrity? Why don't you curse God and die? My more fulsome hot take on her is that she rather immediately apprehends that the reason this is happening is because of his exalted reputation for integrity piety, that he is being sublimely tested, supremely tested as he is, and that this test has cost her all of her children, her prosperity, and her husband and his health. Um, [00:27:00] in-- Did you catch that I, I discovered that in the the Greek translation of the Hebrew Bible, she's given more words?
Jeremy: Yeah
David Gushee: Um, the Septuagint was written by the-- or edited by the rabbis from about the second century BC into the first century. It became the Greek translation of the Hebrew Bible. It has some freeness to it.
It doesn't always do exactly what the Hebrew does. But here, is given like three more sentences in the Septuagint, and she basically says, "While you're sitting here on the ash heap, I'm the one who carried these children in my womb, and I'm the one who is having to provide for us now." So she is a grieving mother who is unable to be disabled by her grief.
She has to come up with their livelihood. in [00:28:00] a legendary story The Testament of Job, a further development of the legend of Job, she dies of hunger of grief, and he marries somebody else who becomes the mother of the replacement children, uh, at the end of
Jeremy: Oh, man
David Gushee: of the book of Job. Yep. Um, so
Jeremy: break
David Gushee: that's called The Testament of Job. So the Christian tradition, uh, people like Augustine and so on, treated her as one of the tempting women of the Bible, like Eve or Jezebel or, or Delilah. Um, that's such an unfair take on her. I actually did a whole sermon w-- uh, on the book as a preview in which I talked about three layers to the story of Job's wife. There's you get in the Hebrew Bible, what you get in the Septuagint, and what you get in The Testament of Job, and what we can learn from [00:29:00] this wrestling with this story in the Jewish tradition.
Jeremy: So it makes sense then from a patriarchal culture that it's written in that that's the angle. Would you say then the fact that we continue to preach it that way shows that we still have that same way of thinking?
David Gushee: Right. That, um, let's just say if-- I would be very surprised if there were very many women preachers who would just do that kind of dismissive, yeah," laugh her off, you know, "A lot of help she is." Women's em- women's embodied experiences would lead, I think, to a different reading of the s- of Job's wife Yep. And, and interestingly enough, the rabbis must have been uncomfortable with the depiction of Job's wife, so that even in the Septuagint, they expanded the narrative to give her lines and a more understandable position in relation to what's happened
Jeremy: [00:30:00] That's so fascinating. So, I mean, when this is being written, 'cause again, if it's not a literal Job was a guy and his wife was a woman that lived, the, the writer of the stories is depicting a very one-sided version of this wife and giving her one line. So, I mean, this... it's like why? Like, why? There's so much m- Of, of this beautiful story, there's so much missing there that you point out.
Like, she would have had all these involvements, and she loses everything, too. And yet
David Gushee: She
Jeremy: there's no e- there's zero empathy for her, and then the text sets it up to dunk on her today
David Gushee: Right. I mean, think about this. The rabbis were the conservers and, and trustees of the rabbin- of the, uh, Jewish textual tradition. The rabbis who translated the Hebrew Bible into the Greek [00:31:00] They did not, as far as I know, I'm not an expert on the Septuagint, but I don't think there are many examples where they expanded on the text because they thought there was a problem with the text
Jeremy: Interesting So just that fact alone, they knew something was up
David Gushee: Uh-huh. So, um, and the line she's given humanizes her. In the testament of Job, she s- she sells her hair to, to buy a few more days worth of food for Job, and then eventually she dies.
Jeremy: Gosh, that's so heartbreaking.
David Gushee: Yeah
Jeremy: Even though I don't think she's real, I still
David Gushee: See, it's a story and it matters, right?
Jeremy: My heart just breaks for this fictional woman. Like, oh, man
David Gushee: But it also matters that it, that wife, who was unnamed, in, in, in the tradition she's [00:32:00] given a name, we get her name. Remember, say their name.
Jeremy: Yeah
David Gushee: you say somebody's name, the character matters more. Uh, her name is, uh, Sitis or Sitados in different versions. Um, she has a name and she has a story, and we care more about her because of that.
Jeremy: Hmm. I love that.
David Gushee: know
Jeremy: Okay, so Job's friends start as comforters. They have one, one good week, and then they lose it, and the rest, the majority of the book is them screwing it up. You've written that you came to prefer the company of the bullied over the bullies. I'm curious, in your own story, as you look at all of these examples of Job's friends, have you been on both sides of that in your own life?
And I suspect you would say yeah. What did it take for you to see it from the other side, from the other chair?
David Gushee: Um I would say that, [00:33:00] um, Job's friends vary a little bit. They're not all exactly the same in the approach that they take, but they all major on offering answers and on defending the tradition. Um, they're unable to say something like, "You know, Job, what has happened to you does raise questions to our tradition. You know, Job, you must really be suffering right now. Let's just sit with that for a while. You know, Job, it sucks that this happened. You know, I miss your kids too. Tell me about them. What do you need, Job? Um, are you hungry? Can I get you some food?" None of that. don't get any of that. argue with him about his questions and his doubts and his, his accusations. Um, I know that there was an earlier stage in my career where, [00:34:00] in my life, where I was the answer man. You know, um, here is what we believe Um, I remember I, I, I was a co-pastor at an evangelical church over 20 years ago, 25 years ago, where we worked a church discipline process on a woman, and it was terrible, and it, was not nuanced and I was part of the resolute all-male elder board, had all the answers, and here's what you did wrong, and here's what you need to repent.
And so in that sense, I have sat in that chair. It's been a while. But I mean, even an ethicist, I'm often asked to offer something like [00:35:00] authoritative judgments about this or that. What does the church believe about this or that? What does the tradition say about this or that? I play that role some. Reverend doctor, right? Reverend doctor. Um, so, um, what I, I have a sermon. I'm, I'm actually preaching Sunday on Job, kind of the mena speaking gig where it's Job, Job, Job all the time right now. Um What the friends needed to do was to sus-- was to be willing to go with Job into his pain and suspend the answer giving for a while and just listen. But they found his questions so threatening that they couldn't do that. I also believe, I think you, you probably picked this up, after a while, maybe from the beginning, the conversation is a public conversation. It's not just three friends in a living room. They're out in the open air. People are [00:36:00] listening. So they feel like they're representing the community and trying to protect the community as a whole. Kind of like if you had-- like when we used to have these debates over LGBT inclusion, and if it was public, everybody was listening. I remember being invited into churches, "Okay, you can take the affirming position and you can-- we'll hear you." But you got everybody listening and think of all those nervous pastors, "Oh, these people are listening to heresy from this guy," you know? Um, I think that's their worry. They're listening to heresy. They're, they're allowing heretical questions to be raised. It's destabilizing the community. He needs to stop. It's kind of that community leader anxiety thing. Sound
Jeremy: Yeah
David Gushee: Um, and so I think that's part of what explains the friends
Jeremy: You know, what's interesting about that is the two things you said, you know, they, they wanna defend the tradition and, you know, they wanna offer answers. Neither one of those [00:37:00] are villainous intentions, right?
David Gushee: Right
Jeremy: I think to people who that is their stated goal of, you know, faith, it can feel very moral to say, "This is what I'm doing."
Absolutely, and yet what you're pointing out is there's a whole bunch of other things that were missing because they focused on this. And I wonder, you know, it's like can this book be used to soften some of those people who feel like it is my job... And again, you know, this is, for those of us that have these conversations, we get hit with those people, you know, on social media every week, and those are the people, you know, who are concerned that I have a following, concerned when a video of mine goes viral because it's public now and people, more people are hearing this, and I start getting the fear.
You know, "You're, you're gonna be held accountable," this and that, and
David Gushee: Uh-huh. I've had that
Jeremy: Yeah, it's the same reaction. But I wonder, like can a story like this soften them at all to realize that [00:38:00] maybe you don't need to hold those as tightly as you thought?
David Gushee: Well, there are online people, very online people, who gig in life is to police orthodoxy, right? That's what they do. gets them followers and
Jeremy: Ya
David Gushee: I met a lot of them in 2014 when my book
Jeremy: I bet you did
David Gushee: Uh, there are some names I could, I could give you. You probably had visits from the same people, right?
Um, so, uh, they're not really necessarily working in good faith. That's just their, their shtick, and they're, they're going with it, right? But I, I really do try in the book, as you know, to, to express sympathy with, with what defenders of tradition think they're doing. And what they think they're doing is preserving theological truth and [00:39:00] moral order Um, the vibe I, I get from the, at least especially once you get about two-thirds of the way through the book, is they're feel-- they're afraid that the young listeners are going to be destabilized in their ethics because Job is saying that God doesn't really preserve a world in which the righteous are rewarded and the wicked are
Jeremy: Yeah
David Gushee: That it doesn't really work that way. God doesn't do that. Which might lead the hormonal 18-year-old to make some bad decisions because, oh, well, if Job, who used to be the leader of our community, the most devout and holy man, says, "Yeah, actually, God allows wicked people to get along just fine," then maybe they're gonna go out and ha-have some serious partying that weekend because, hey, it doesn't matter anyway, right? [00:40:00] think that's their worry They as people still sometimes believe today, if people don't fear God and don't fear that God will bring down the hammer if they out, just move into chaotic patterns of behavior. Job is risking that by all of his questions. He needs to be shut up. He needs to be silenced. I actually think Job is at risk of being murdered by the crowd by, by the-- nearly the end of the
Jeremy: Ja
David Gushee: uh, because he's threatening the moral order of the community. He's a heretic an inciter of rebellion against God. Um, so... And I say in the book Moral order matters. Stability of worldview matters to people. [00:41:00] Young people need to be taught some things to make good decisions. People who don't have fully developed frontal lobes really need to have certain things communicated so they won't
Jeremy: I, I have a few of those in my house, yeah
David Gushee: Right? So even if you have to simplify the message a little bit, you want them to know what the boundaries are. is threatening the boundaries.
Jeremy: I do,
David Gushee: So I
Jeremy: I do think you were fair to the friends though, because
David Gushee: Okay,
Jeremy: the way that you talk about their week of silence, you really were honoring to them i- in a way that
David Gushee: I tried
Jeremy: kinda caught me off guard how much you honored them of like, these are real friends. They're really there. They're, you know. And it's like, oh.
Like, yeah, 'cause I, you know, I'm so quick to think about what happens the rest of the book that I, I kind of skip over the one week, but you invited me to think about these are good intentioned people, but ultimately what Job is doing, like you're saying, is [00:42:00] so threatening to everything that they hold dear that their friendship i- isn't big enough to, you know, with- withstand that
David Gushee: That's right. It's not big enough. Um, and so those of us who lost friends the way, especially who had friends who felt the need to correct us. "Now, David, it's time for us to have a talk so that I can correct you bring you back to God's Word. Um, and if you don't just repent, our friendship is over." Did you notice that sometimes towards the end of the book, I call them ex-friends or parentheses ex-friends or whatever? Um, think there was much of a relationship left, uh, by the end of the book
Jeremy: You actually, I think you turn on that pretty early, 'cause I, I remember, like, reading Ex-Friends, I was like, "Oh, wow. We've already, we've already changed [00:43:00] categories," you know? And it wasn't too, too deep into it. You know what it also reminds me of, listening to you talk about that? It reminds me of the parent who has a child who comes out to them and says, "Mom, Dad, I, I think I'm gay."
And the parent decides it's more important for me to honor my faith than to be here for my child. And they say, "You have to leave. You ... I can't be a part of this." You know. And they do it not because they're heartless; they do it in their pursuit of what they think God is asking them to do. And I think this book is showing why that's a bad choice
David Gushee: Yeah. see how Job is speaking? the LGBTQ experience is all in the, is in the, the texture of this book. It's, it informs the entire book. I'm not sure if there has ever been a published book where that has been such a factor on the Book of Job, you know, a commentary on [00:44:00] Job. Um, but that exact thing happens. And a couple times in the book I, I, I step back and say, "Now, consider this LGBTQ experience." You know, um, "Mom, Dad, I think I might be gay. In fact, I'm pretty sure that I am," says the 18-year-old And the parents say, "Does not compute, does not compute, does not compute, doesn't fit with the tradition, doesn't fit with scripture. will be s- perfectly happy to be in a relationship with you if you will renounce what you just said." But if, if not, then we head down a different path. Happens every day
Jeremy: And the, the, the heartbreaking thing, 'cause I've, you know, I've walked that road with people, is these parents do it and then at the end of the day lay their heads on their pillow at night and think, "I honored God today. I followed God today
David Gushee: it may be one of the things that the Book of Job teaches when read this way [00:45:00] is that maybe that's, that approach is not fundamentally what honors
Jeremy: Yeah. Well, it's a story that invites you to have a bigger imagination
David Gushee: I think so
Jeremy: Okay. Another hot take that I had not heard before. You spend a chapter essentially contesting the repentant reading of 42:6, which is a big verse. Anybody who's read the Book of Job, this is a big verse, and you are contradicting... I preach out of the New Living Translation, and you are going right up against the way that translation reads it.
So first off, can you explain the different outcomes? So if someone's listening to this, maybe they, they're like, "What are you talking about?" Just kinda give us, uh, what are the different ways we can read that verse? But then I'm curious, do you have any sense of, like, worry when, when so much hinges on one verse and how we read that verse?
Do [00:46:00] you worry about how we then preach this book and how we interpret this book when this one verse seems to hold a huge ability to sway us one way or the other? That's a big question, so go.
David Gushee: uh, oh, that's lovely. Um, I do think Job forty-two, six, uh, is pivotal. Um, and by the way, isn't it nerdy, isn't it wonderfully old school biblically nerdy that, like, we're gonna dive in on one verse like back in the old
Jeremy: Yeah, yeah.
David Gushee: Like, um,
Jeremy: It's kind of a big verse
David Gushee: it's that important. It's that important, right? Um, I read enough commentators, I mean, I read dozens of commentators who said the Hebrew here is so elliptical that it is impossible to have one authoritative translation. And then the idea that that may have been intentional [00:47:00] so that, so that there is not a definitive single interpretation of the Book of Job is again, amazingly, wonderfully funky.
You know what I mean? And not what we were taught. I'm looking at, um, these variations. Job forty-two, six, "Therefore, I despise myself and repent in humiliation." That's the main reading that most people would think, right? "Okay, I'm sorry to have asked these questions, I repent." "Therefore, I despise myself and consider my mortality." That's-- it's about what we make of dust and ashes there. "Therefore, I retract my words and repent in humiliation." Therefore, retract my words and reject the symbols of mourning So it's partly about is the first, is the first part of, of [00:48:00] 42:6 about self-loathing or is it about retraction? Is the second part of it about repentance or is it about mortality? Is it about humiliation? Is it about mourning? Is it about vulnerability? Um And then there is the Ed Greenstein reading that I pretty much embrace. "That is why I am fed up. I take pity on dust and ashes." Boom.
Jeremy: There's your hot take, ladies and gentlemen
David Gushee: there it is. which would basically be something like this Job is saying after God's big speeches in 38 through 41 I know that you are bigger than me. I know that you're the creator and I'm not. I know that there's a lot that I don't understand [00:49:00] I know now that human beings are not as central to your plans as I thought we were I guess I know that I'm never gonna get an answer as to why this happened to me, that you're never gonna answer my questions, and you're never gonna say sorry about the kids that you lost. So I resign from fighting you, and I take pity human beings for all the things that we suffer
Jeremy: Which is a crazy different reading than most of us were ever given
David Gushee: It is, yeah. Um, and then later when Job is restored and the narrator has God um, that to the friends, "You have not spoken right of me the way that my servant Job [00:50:00] has." Um There's a lot of different interpretations of that too. Um, the traditional reading is because Job repents, God restores him But my reading is, well, we don't really know what to make of the end of it, but something more like because never pretended know things he didn't know, never lied about certainty that he didn't have, never stopped asking his questions, but he asked them to God over and over, he is actually honored by God. Um, and I, I think my take, it's just provisional, is that Job is a model for moving ahead with living, family, children, [00:51:00] faith, friendship, community, even though the human condition is precarious, and we don't get answers a lot of the time. I think that the, that the earlier Job had all kinds of answers.
Jeremy: Yeah
David Gushee: This Job doesn't have answers, um, but he has a readiness now to end his mourning period and to move forward into the rest of his life, accepting the human condition as it is. of mystery, there is a God, but God's relationship to the moral order is not as clear as it was, there is a moral order, and, um, he's gonna move forward with his life. He's gonna have more babies. He's gonna,
Jeremy: a, with a new woman
David Gushee: with, maybe with a new woman, though it doesn't say that. It says wife, but, we assume that this, that in the traditional version, something has happened that they're able to have children again. Um, there [00:52:00] was... They're reconciled enough to have children. Um, oh, it's just such a great book. But yes, my, my hot take on Job forty-two, six is that it is at least open to multiple interpretations. Um, and modern readers of Job, especially post-Holocaust and Jewish readers, are less satisfied with the, "Okay, sorry for all those questions.
My bad. You're right. All good. Thank you for the Tor of creation. That settles everything,"
Jeremy: Everything's happy now
David Gushee: uh, that's why he's restored and gets to have all those babies and be rich again and everything. I don't really like that ending, and a lot of the people that I respect, like Elie Wiesel and so on, they don't read it that way either. Yeah
Jeremy: It does strike me, you know, as like you, you watch a really good movie, and then you get to the end, and we've all had this, where you're like, "That is how you're gonna end this movie?" You know, and you're like angry, like you just [00:53:00] obliterated the story with this ending. And I think of the last season of Game of Thrones.
Uh, but like, you know, like you had such a good story, and then you, you just butchered it. That's how this has felt. So let me give another out maybe. Uh, do you see room for this? So rather than Job saying, "I repent of asking questions," and that, could Job be repenting for the view that God gives and God takes willy-nilly, that God is the source necessarily of evil and good?
Or do you see it as you have to kind of assume if he's repenting, he's repenting of all of it?
David Gushee: Well, the first question is, what would he have to repent? Um, and the tradition has said he would have to repent of the kinds of accusations and, and questions he raises to God. Like moments where he says, "God, you let the wicked prosper, and you don't, you don't act on behalf of [00:54:00] the poor." And, um And that he's kind of retracting all of that But to me, that would butcher the book the kinds of issues he's raising, especially when he goes beyond himself to talk about the plight of the poor, those are really legitimate questions to ask. Where is God when people are shivering in the cold because nobody will give them a place to live? You know? Um, so if he's retracting those questions, then I don't respect him as much. Then he's just been bullied into silence I think people who like an authoritarian God like a Job who retracts all his
Jeremy: Oof!
David Gushee: Dang, put
Jeremy: Wow, that's a social media clip right there. [00:55:00] Holy cow. Yeah, that one will preach
David Gushee: But, but people who like a God who wrestles alongside us and who will be in dialogue with us, and a God who can say, "Yeah, yeah, there is a lot of brutal injustice in the world. Um, but I'm not going to tell you exactly why I don't intervene to fix it all Um, there's a, there's a lot you don't understand about how I've organized the world. I, I looked very closely at the speeches from the whirlwind. There's almost nothing that can even remotely be construed as answering his questions about the evil in the world. Um, it's more like God is bigger than what you thought.
God is doing other things. While you're paying attention to this, I'm paying [00:56:00] attention to the, you know, to the jackals and the leviathans and the ostriches and, and the wild horses and stuff. I care about them. By the way, it's a lot of good resources here for eco-theology. A about, you know, God's engagement with the wild creation and all of that, right? Um, and a God who's, who is maybe not... How about this as a idea? A God who is maybe not really numbering the hairs of our head to make sure that we're taken care of, but who has set up a, a big, beautiful, dangerous, complicated world that we find ourselves in, and who, who wants us to live in the right way, even if we don't have all the answers as to how it all works
Jeremy: Gosh. So don't give the Book of [00:57:00] Job to a baby Christian. They're not ready for it.
David Gushee: I don't think they're ready for it, and that's why, uh, I was certainly never taught Job in high school youth group, you know? I mean, but, but give the Book of Job to a post-evangelical Christian who was told some kind of oversimplified version of a univocal Bible that doesn't have any, any texture to it, doesn't have any arguments in it. As you saw in the book, I think the Book of Job is an ongoing argument within the book and with the rest of the, of the Old Testament. So,
Jeremy: sounds so good
David Gushee: yeah
Jeremy: Okay. You land your book on this. You say, "The moral order of the world is what we create in response to the travail of our neighbors. It is up to us." So for someone who just watched their old theology come apart, that can read two ways at once, [00:58:00] right? It can be very freeing, and it can be very terrifying, like God has left the building and the whole weight is on us.
When you say it's up to us, what is God still doing in that picture?
David Gushee: Let me tell you, I, I rarely write like eight drafts of something, but I wrote like 10 drafts of the ending Do you like old movies, Jeremy? Have you ever seen Casablanca?
Jeremy: I don't think I ever have
David Gushee: Humphrey Bogart, um, Bergman. I understand that they filmed, like, multiple different endings so that the actors didn't know how it was gonna
Jeremy: Oh, wow
David Gushee: Um, and they had to act the various... You sh- you have to, you have to promise me you'll see Casablanca, okay?
Jeremy: I respect you enough, I'll do it for you.
David Gushee: okay. Um, we can talk about it next time. So just as I think maybe there were multiple endings [00:59:00] attempted with the Book of Job, in fact, some people would say that Job was intended to end at 42:6, that the epilogue was just tacked on, and it really doesn't add anything, right? I, I tried different endings, but Here's, here's picture. The Book of Job is not the only resource in scripture for thinking about God's involvement in the world, right? Um, gotta take the whole canon seriously. Gotta take what Jesus said most seriously of all. Jesus did say, "God cares for you infinitely Um, but I don't think he ever said that we were, um, free from any-- needed to be free from any fear of having any harm come to us, harm came to him Terrible harm. Um The, [01:00:00] the starting point of the Book of Job is the theology that I call the just world fallacy in the book, that the world is set up and superintended by a just God who regularly intervenes to punish the wicked the righteous. That worldview already coming apart by the time the Book of Job was written, and I think that's one reason why it was written One thing that Christianity did to push justice off into the eschaton, into the future. So while we may not have justice here in this world, but there will be a judgment at the end where justice will be meted out. Hitler will finally get what is due him then, right? That is still not a live option in the Book of Job. That's in the future. It hasn't been developed yet, that idea. So Job leaves us [01:01:00] with, I think, a decisive refutation of the idea that in this world, God consistently protects the innocent and punishes the wicked. And we nod our heads. When we pay attention to the world, we see plenty of evidence that it doesn't work that way Can anybody think of any wicked people who are doing just fine right now? I mean,
Jeremy: A few come to mind
David Gushee: A few may come to mind, right? Can anybody think of any good-hearted, innocent, decent people who have bad things happen to them? Right. Um, but the Book of Job does not replace that theology with a different one Um, it leaves us with the questions I do push a little hard [01:02:00] on, on some things I see in Job that may give us some clues as to how we can proceed. Like, did you notice how I, I said Job was always a person who exercised proper patriarchal benevolence towards those who were in need? But after his experience on the ash heap, he seems to have a deeper sense of solidarity with the poor. And when he is restored, his children are named, and the girls are given a share of the inheritance, which was very unusual. And he no longer has any slaves, according to the
Jeremy: I, I did a whole episode talking about the slave thing because that was another thing that blew my mind I've never thought about with the Book of Job
David Gushee: Yeah. So what if Job, both in the, in his speeches and in that brief epilogue, is giving us clues Um, and this has also been a very [01:03:00] important theme in post-Holocaust theology. The Holocaust shattered what had survived of a Jewish theology of divine providence superintending the world. Um, and it's Abraham Joshua Heschel I think I quote in that conclusion, and Elie Wiesel gets quoted in, um, strong and heightened emphasis on us doing the work of justice. one can say, where does our sense of justice ultimately come from? It comes from the God who made us. We didn't create it ourselves. Um- But if detention centers for ICE where people are dying at a disproportionate rate are to be closed, we are going to be the ones to do that. Now, we can say that God is the one who gives us a sense of outrage, is the one [01:04:00] who empowers us to acts of justice, is, is the one who knits together movements of, um, social change, whose spirit calls us to higher ground. I could say those things. Um, but still in the morning, somebody has to get up, send emails, march in rallies, for office, speeches, write laws. So I wanna heighten human responsibility. Um, and I think that Job, you might say, leaves a vacuum by the end of the book where there had been kind of a complacent theology of an orderly world. And the vacuum seems to me to leave us with no alternative but a heightened sense of personal and collective responsibility to do justice ourselves.
Jeremy: So [01:05:00] if someone's like, "This just sounds like deism with better values," how, how is it not?
David Gushee: Um, if I were a better process theologian, I could talk about God's cooperative co-emergence with us in building a more just world and stuff. That kind of theology is not really my native language, right? It's, um I mean, and my Pentecostal and Charismatic friends who I've talked with about this say, "Your Holy Spirit is too small" Um, of course, Holy Spirit is not a factor in the Book of Job, so, um, so then, uh, and there's a, there's a distinction between what I think you can draw from Job what you can draw From the whole Bible. And I would make that distinction clear. What I'm trying to do in the Book of Job [01:06:00] book is to engage the Book of Job. Um, I'm not attempting to say this is the only text that matters. Um, but I, I do think it's suggestive. It leaves us with some Some directions, maybe in some, some, um, deconstruction.
There's a fair amount of deconstruction that is done in the Book of Job and by the Book of Job.
Jeremy: It would be interesting if this was the only book you had to go off of, right? Like, if this, like you, the rest of the canon is erased, we don't know it anymore, we just have the Book of Job. It would be an interesting way to interact with, with God
David Gushee: It would. Um, I mean, and Job is embedded in the wisdom literature, which is embedded in the Hebrew Bible, et cetera, et cetera, you know. I don't know. It's interesting that I've been doing a little more reading on the history of interpretation of Job [01:07:00] Both leaders and Christian leaders the beginning have expressed discomfort with Job. And for example, some have butchered the Book of Job so that really all you get is the patient Job of chapter two Um, or the handful of verses that point to, I know that my redeemer lives or there's a mediator. So Job is really more a prophecy. It's like that, you know? No, the book of
Jeremy: Or purity culture. I made a covenant with my eyes, and Job was the,
David Gushee: there
Jeremy: Job was the architect of purity culture
David Gushee: There you go. There's a lot of things you can do with Job if you're trying to avoid the main thing that he
Jeremy: Ja
David Gushee: which is to slash and burn just world You know, just world theology dies hard. It, it was present in Jesus's time where somebody asked him about the man born [01:08:00] blind, "Who sinned?" Him, him or his parents. The assumption was it had, had to be somebody because this just doesn't happen otherwise. We really need the world to have that kind of order, and Job reveals it doesn't have it
Jeremy: All right, as we wind this down, let's say someone hits this series, they're freshly wrecked in their own journey. They're angry at God. They're angry at their old church. They're working through all the emotions of that. They're not sure God is still there. What do you want them to take from the Book of Job and from your book?
David Gushee: Um, 2,500 years ago Somebody equally wrecked wrote a great [01:09:00] book and they They knew the old answers didn't work for them anymore. And, and so in a work of genius, they took an old story about an innocent man who has all kinds of bad things happen to him, and they made magic out of it. And along the way, they challenged what was understood to be bedrock biblical truths about God bringing justice and human beings being the pinnacle of creation and all kinds of other things, they got away with it. They were allowed to do it. It got in the Bible
Jeremy: that. They pulled it off
David Gushee: they pulled it off because the book was that important, and because the Jewish [01:10:00] tradition was able to stretch to in- to include kind of questioning. need to be in traditions that are, are able to stretch to make space for questions. If you... I say to this person, this imaginary person who exists who you're telling me about, "Don't ever go back into a Christian community that will not allow you to ask your questions."
Jeremy: That's good
David Gushee: Job was-- Job asked his questions. Are you looking for a role model in the Bible? Consider Brother Job, kept asking his questions and who wouldn't lie about his experience, and who wouldn't be intimidated into silence, and who wouldn't give up on God, who wouldn't kill himself, who wouldn't exit the dialogue.
He stayed in it Um, and him a model of integrity and honesty, [01:11:00] and try to pursue that path for yourself. Find a community where you can ask questions with others who are asking questions. Um, and you'll discover you don't have to have all the answers to move forward in your life. Um, but you need to, you do need to have a safe space To ask your questions, to process your pain, and to arrive at some kind of convictions that you can build your life on. And I think Joe can be a part of making that process happen
Jeremy: That was so good. All right. As we, as we wrap this up, is there anything I haven't asked you that you're like, "Look, I gotta say this. This conversation's not complete unless I say this." Anything you wanna get in there?
David Gushee: Um I would say we've said it briefly, but [01:12:00] for the person that you've just described, that it may be that, that they can understand better the authorities in their lives, their parents, their youth ministers Who just seem to only be able to defend the tradition And maybe you can look and see why they feel that that's what they're supposed to do. Um, and so maybe it can help towards something like reconciliation eventually. I know that's why you felt you needed to do that It didn't help me But I met Job, and Job
Jeremy: Ja
David Gushee: And I learned that you, you had that role to play, but the role that I had to play for my own health was the role of asking questions and [01:13:00] telling the truth as I saw it. And, um, so thanks, and maybe we can construct some kind of a relationship going forward that does not involve you correcting me all the time and telling me all the answers
Jeremy: Or maybe we need to be ex-friends
David Gushee: Or maybe we need to be ex-friends. That could
Jeremy: As I read about in Dr. Geshe's book, Job in Exile
David Gushee: You could say, uh, you know, "Are we friends or are we," parentheses, "ex-friends?"
Jeremy: There comes a point where you wonder, do we still use this word? I like that. All right, so if someone is stoked and they just came into this interview, they had no idea, what's the easiest way for them to find you, your work, the book online? How do, where do you want them to go?
David Gushee: Uh-huh. would send them to my Substack at dpgushee, uh, to my website, davidpgushee.com. for this [01:14:00] book, either to Orbis Books that is publishing it, uh, or to Amazon or either your local bookstore. Um, I am also very eager to hear people's, like, feedback on the book. It was born in community and I'd like there to be a community of readers to tell me what you've learned and what you saw in the book.
So, um, and if you want me to come talk about this at your church, I'm wide open to that
Jeremy: Very cool. And if you are a pastor listening to this, you should take him up on that. That would be very healing for your community. Well, Dr. Gushee, I am, number one, just forever grateful for your work. Your, your books and your teachings and your insights have continued to help me on my own journey. This latest book is, is a gem, and it's gonna be so helpful and such a gift for so many people.
So thank you for writing that. Thank you for modeling what it looks like to do this well in, in our day to, to ask the bigger [01:15:00] questions and to be willing to sacrifice for that. And obviously, thank you for coming on the podcast again and, and enjoying a glass of wine and talking about it with us
David Gushee: Thanks for having me, Jeremy, and thanks for reading the book so closely. I mean, spending all these weeks on your own podcast on it, that means a lot to me. So um, let's keep the conversation
Jeremy: well, everybody, I know that you have enjoyed this conversation as much as I have, and your head is probably spinning and you need to go read the Book of Job all over again, and we encourage you to do that. Pick up Dr. Gushee's book, and let's follow Jesus in a healthier way with our questions.
I'll see you on the next episode of Cabernet and Pray
