HCE, Job and the Guilt of Everyman, Part 5 (fifth part of seven), by Ann Cavanaugh

Job cannot understand God’s sense of justice but through opening to the vastness of creation he sees and accepts his inability to comprehend and in this moment comes to a place of faith. It seems the narrative points to Job’s sense of faith as resting in the vast ordering of nature and the cosmos as the signature of a mighty God. Job’s so called faith at the end of the tale seems to be of a different stripe from what is called faith at the beginning. His need for a hearing in order to voice his case, if you will, seems to be based on a faith in a contract that he feels is breached. His faith at the end seems based on the sense of covenant or a mutual agreement of commitment wherein he holds faith in a God that could act against him at any moment but essentially it would be understood now as all to his and to a greater benefit. One can’t help but think of that old saw from a disciplining parental authority “it’s for your own good,” all while the switch may be coming down. 

 I was struck by how similar the ultimate relationship between an unknowable and all powerful God and Job’s acknowledgement of ignorance and accepting on faith his subservient position is to the traditional marriage contract wherein the wife or bride accepts her husband as the Lord, if you will, and her role as one of duty to obedience and service. In the Wake this is changed up to the degree that ALP is one with the Life Force and is the active party in her defense of her accused husband. The Feminine is at the center of Life and honored as such. It is she who is the one who bestows many gifts upon her multitudinous children. 

From a political standpoint adhering to a covenant with a single God can obviously lend coherence to a community and create the potential for nation building and thus security. Ironically we face a not dissimilar challenge to our “secular faith” in our own Supreme Court in this moment. We as the body politic are being called to have trust and faith in our highest social contract and yet the requirements/power of the parties here seem unbalanced or mismatched. A so called secular faith can only work if the body is assured that its needs are being met. We are not an enslaved people being led by a more enlightened prophet (Moses) in the form of present day conservative judges, some of whom have strong religious leanings, and who presume to know better what the majority needs. Our relationship to our highest secular authority is not a covenant as described. However, when present day authority believes it is divinely inspired it can begin to look a little too close to a coming down from the mountain with an unchallengeable decree. When this occurs one runs the risk of enslavement to what is now the new order.