Professor, We are so thankful for your existences, the peaceful way you share your knowledge. I personally share your videos with as many people as I can. Your lectures should all be video recorded and shared world wide. Would be a lot les hate in this world from them.
Thank you, Dr Brooks. I'm about to launch myself into a study of William Blake, and this lecture was very useful, not to mention entertaining. I guess the Book of Job greatly predates Augustine's Original Sin stuff and the later 'problem of theodicy' and back in Old Testament times the question 'Why do bad things happen to good people?' arose only when that unidentified scribe wrote the prologue and epilogue to Job's song, implying that God introduced 'evil' into the world to test our faith. Prior to that, the answer to every question about God's motives was 'Don't ask!'
Why thank you. It is interesting to see the widely varied numbers of views on the lectures I've put up, reflecting the popularity of the subject in college courses, and perhaps the difficulty that drives students to seek online assistance. My Plato lecture is vastly outperforming all the rest combined--and based on the place of origin of the comments made, it seems like Plato is assigned reading in colleges across the globe. Cheers.
Dr Brooks, I really enjoyed your lecture. I am reading Job this week as part of my Education for Ministry class through the Episcopal Church. Do you have any other Old testament lectures on You tube?
Sorry, that's the only Old Testament lecture. I do have several on New Testament and early Christianity. I mostly just record the stuff that is straight-up lecture for students to watch at home...most of the material is better taught through classroom discussion.
Dude..! your lectures are brilliant! we the masses need more of this! especially in these darkened days where actors are adored and kings no more!! where man is surely devolving!if that is even a word! rhetorical question! I have never heard the story of job before Thankyou! I couldn't help but see similarities between Krishna and Arjuna! where Krishna is simply telling Arjuna to man the F..k up and just fight! To be concerned about the bodily conception of life is simply futile! Which job was it seems caught up in? His goodness just acts of ritual? your lecture just made a lot of sense to me! cheers!
So, the point of Job is that YHWH has bigger issues than what we deal with in our daily life? that is pretty eye opening, but it doesn't necessarily answer the issue of why suffering and evil continue in the world; if anything I think the author of the Hebrew version of Job is trying to argue that God does care about His people, he just isn't going to deal with or aid you in every single issue of your life as he has things he must do also.
I will be recording four or five more this semester, mostly from medieval humanities class. In a few months you can watch me do Christian heretics, feudalism, monasticism, and I'm making a more polished green-screen lecture on why the number "7" holds this mystical place in history--stay tuned!
Thank you for replying, Professor Brooks! I watched the lecture because I found it interesting and I'm on a journey of discovery. I want to understand things and see what other people think. I don't like the Job story because it presents a picture of god that is loathsome and because of the crappy happy ending they put on it, as if having another batch of seven children can compensate for the loss of the first seven children:(( Since when is that a positive ending?! I might have approved if god had given him his original seven kids back alive and kicking! At first glance, it seems you're right, and it's certainly a great way of ending a lecture, but if there is a good out there, it doesn't necessarily have to be (only) vast? It could take many forms and sizes:) It could see the greater picture, while at the same time seeing the details. I mean, intellectually it could overpower us by a scale of a million to one if not more, but emotionally and psychologically, it SHOULD be able to do AT LEAST as much as we can. It should be concerned about others and it should love and care about what happens to them. My point in a nutshell was that you gain responsibility for the creature(s) you create, just as you and I have great responsibility for our children. Even if, ESPECIALLY when they are tinier than us. That's all I wanted to say and from your reply, it looks like you agree with me:) Thank you again for taking the time to reply:)
Joseph Campbell felt that the Hebrews mistake as it were was to covert a tribal god into a universal god. For me Job 2:3 is the main focus of the book; for Job is innocent but thou satan movesdt me against him. The argument at the end is a might makes right argument. Carl Jung also wrote a book the Answer to Job. Jews today struggle with this in relation to the holocaust. Humility is the answer!!!???? Not even mention the destruction of the temple by the Romans.
No it isn't. This is a diatribe against the King of Tyre. Certain phrases are reminiscent of how Lucifer is described, but it is a huge stretch to remove this chapter from historical context and convince yourself it tells the story of the Fall. Is the name "Satan" or "Lucifer" mentioned anywhere in the text? No. And that's the point. If the Hebrew Bible wanted to tell a story as important as that, it would have done so without ambiguity.
@@georgebrooks7775 God IS speaking to Lucifer in EZEKIEL 28, he addresses him as the anointed cherub and says he was in the garden of eden in Ez 28:13-14. Lucifer is a fallen angel but the antichrist is the physical embodiment of Lucifer, being the Prince of Tyre, as Jesus was the embodiment of God.
Good, Just done with this lecture and my final take away is, don't be rationale to the God, he will sound rude when you do that(kinda shook my core), I always thought he is the one who answers all my calls and comfort me from suffering.. :(
when you make contact with the higher dimensional Divine Beings one comes to know truth. The Underworld is for the Evil Ones. Those who obey the Natural Law of the Creator ascend to higher planets. That is where the Ascended Masters have gone. Peace & Truth
Actually, Ecclesiastes provides two different answers (likely because there are two different contributors to the text, two priests both writing in the voice of King Solomon). One of them is in a dour mood, and declares that "FEAR of God, and turning away from evil" is the only wisdom. But the other contributor is a bit sunnier in disposition, and gives the secret to human happiness in Ecclesiastes 9:7-10: "Go, eat your bread with enjoyment, and drink your wine with a merry heart; for God has long ago approved what you do. Let your garments always be white; do not let oil be lacking on your head. Enjoy life with the wife whom you love, all the days of your vain (meaning, "empty" ultimately "meaningless") life that are given you under the sun, because that is your portion in life and in your toil at which you toil under the sun. Whatever your hand finds to do, do with your might; for there is no work or thought or knowledge or wisdom in Sheol, to which you are going." So, enjoy the simple pleasures of life while you have it...always seemed like good advice to me.
George Brooks Wow, that’s pretty powerful. Don’t take life too seriously and enjoy everything. Don’t let misery be wasted on the miserable. Any form of life is better than no life.
The part with the ant dialogue: It's not the same, because you didn't create that ant, you didn't want that ant to be, in that particular shape or size, exposed to all sorts of dangers, etc, you just HAPPEN TO share the same rock as it. And even if it were the same, what does that say about god, apart from its crushing size?! It would say there is no love, no kindness, no attention, no nothing! And that it's big fish eats little fish all the way up. Or down. It says, if I managed to humble you, I've sorted the problem and I'm not bothered by your sense of injustice. The story of Job is a crappy story, I much prefer to think there is nothing out there beyond death. Definitely not something worthy of my respect, let alone reverence!!!
Not sure all of this is really a response to the video, nor why you would want to watch this lecture. I completely agree that the Book of Job is a totally crappy story...but it is important Biblical theology and I do my best to make a really difficult piece of dour bronze age poetry interesting and relevant. As for the ant dialogue...the only point is to provide perspective on the vast gulf that separates mortals from any deity that might happen to exist. I am always baffled that people assume that god cares about what they do--how can us puny little creatures actually be interesting to a cosmic being? Cheers!
Jobs mistake is to assume there is an all powerful all benevolent God. He humbly accepts suffering as a mystery. Atheism is the other option but that takes humanity a long time to come to.
Good lecture but the underlying “wisdom” isn’t humility. It’s that, if we owe our existence to a God like this one, we’re fucked because He’s a psychotic sadist. Yelling at your own creation for being the way you created him is about as ridiculous as it gets.
So Satan is just a persecutor who goes and devastates the man, killing all of his children in one day! What kind of persecutor is and does that? Do Christians believe that Satan is in hell right now?! Totally wrong! Satan will be in hell at the end of it all when God will cast him there. Meanwhile, according to Christian theology, he is working so vividly in this world, being the prince of air and the dominion on it. Also another thing you failed to see, that God, through Christ, set the record straight of the question: what would God do if he was stripped of his privileged status? In Jesus God went to our battle facing this life as we do. He is not the arrogant power you're trying to portray. Actually, you need to learn more about Christianity professor, we are all still learning. But above all, you are a great professor.
The lecture isn't about Christian beliefs, but about very old Bronze Age Hebrew beliefs as evidenced in a unique folktale, one which captures an essential paradox of all religions that claim a good and all-powerful deity: "Why do bad things happen to good people?" I am not here to bestow answers, but to introduce students to the questions. Whatever answers you come to is your business.
@@georgebrooks7775 thank you, Sir, for your reply. I just mentioned things you said in your lecture.. I am a follower of all your great works. Thank you for being a great professor
Well said Dr Brooks. Some people just dont or dont want to get what you are doing in these lectures. It was clear to me. Im looking forward to hearing all of your unbiased lectures.
