|
Calvin's teaching on JobIncomprehensible?CALVIN'S TEACHING ON JOB Are you looking for a book on Job which has 416 pages, of which 60 pages comprise the introduction, the bibliography and notes? Would this book contain 225 pages of detailed references, roughly half of which are in Latin or 16th-century French (albeit Calvin's deliciously vigorous prose)? Would you like about 40 of the remaining 135 pages of text to be from a translation done in 1574 to ensure that the quaint spelling is a distraction from the argument of the author. Then this is the book for you! The book began life as a doctoral dissertation, and is not for the faint-hearted. Derek Thomas claims that studies on Calvin's understanding of divine providence have tended to focus on the systematic approach of the Institutes and overlook the 159 sermons he preached on the book of Job in the years 1554-55 while a minister in Geneva. The author concludes that, for Calvin, God's incomprehensibility is the hermeneutical key for understanding the book of Job, particularly from the pastoral point of view. As someone engaged in communicating the gospel in post-modern France, I find this opens up some interesting vistas among a generation who think it's not possible to know anything completely, and who prefer to live with this uncertainty. Yet at the same time, the conclusion of the book left me dissatisfied with the tantalising issues raised. For example: 'Calvin's resort to the incomprehensible righteousness of God leads to suggestions that our knowledge of God is both quantitatively and qualitatively different from God's knowledge of himself. If this were true, it would appear to lead to the death of all theology'. We have no option but to struggle to maintain mystery along with God's self-revelation. I'll gladly read a book of 416 pages on that topic. David Brown, © Evangelicals Now - August 2004 |