This was unironically the story that led to me no longer believing.
The all knowing, all powerful god made a bet with his literal arch enemy to prove a point that god already should’ve known and had no reason to prove it to anyone.
Basically the devil tricked god into needlessly torturing a man for no fuckin reason and that’s supposed to make him look good?
That said, it’s really not supposed to be god’s arch enemy in Job. Satan just means “adversary.” Really, he’s a rival god. It’s one of the (if not the, I don’t remember) oldest books of the Bible and it is very likely that the oral tales it was adapted from were from pre-monotheistic Judaism. So Job really could be more about two rival gods making a bet rather than one manipulating the other.
Not a specific one I can come up with at the top of my head, sorry. This comes from college decades ago… but a search for “book of Job polytheism” comes up with a lot of hits.
This was unironically the story that led to me no longer believing.
The all knowing, all powerful god made a bet with his literal arch enemy to prove a point that god already should’ve known and had no reason to prove it to anyone.
Basically the devil tricked god into needlessly torturing a man for no fuckin reason and that’s supposed to make him look good?
Get the fuck outta here
That said, it’s really not supposed to be god’s arch enemy in Job. Satan just means “adversary.” Really, he’s a rival god. It’s one of the (if not the, I don’t remember) oldest books of the Bible and it is very likely that the oral tales it was adapted from were from pre-monotheistic Judaism. So Job really could be more about two rival gods making a bet rather than one manipulating the other.
Makes sense, but do you have a source? /genuine_interest
Not a specific one I can come up with at the top of my head, sorry. This comes from college decades ago… but a search for “book of Job polytheism” comes up with a lot of hits.