Comparing the Book of Job to Ecclesiastes Essay

The Old Testament is very untold viewed as a creaky, incomprehensible tome, skilful of history, violence and a wrathful, bombastic perfection. Often, it is use as a manual This is what divinity wants, this is what would displease the Creator, and so on and so forth. There atomic number 18 two crabbed books of the Old Testament, argument and Ecclesiastes, stand come to the fore from the crowd. They ask and seek to address the wakeless questions of life and spirituality.Before diving into marrow and themes, it is important to realize structural differences amongst the two books. project is told from the third soulfulness and is a story with a attain sequence of events and plot. In fact, it is likely that versions of problem were told by many peoples of the region. (Seow, HB 726), and That the final examination form is the product of a thickening history of transmission. It consists of a narrative, cogitate in the introduction and epilogue, with a serial publication of dialogues between them.Ecclesiastes, on the other hand, is to a greater extent than akin to an essay, interspersed with poems, pr overbs and songs to support his conclusions. This requires a much telling and little showing, but allows for more wisdom to be dispensed.In both books, the mysterious workings of the population, ostensibly controlled by divinity fudge, cause consternation. Jobs living is ruined, even though he was a decent man. As for EcclesiastesI returned, and axiom under the sun, that the race is not to the swift, nor the booking to the strong, neither til now bread to the wise, nor yet riches to men of understanding, nor yet party favour to men of skill but period and chance happeneth to them all. (Ecclesiastes 911, King throng Bible)Through much of Ecclesiastes, he laments the mysterious seediness of existence and the apparent powerlessness of mankind. The showtime parts of the book are reasonably accepting that this is just the room the world is. Hi s conclusions are as follows That life must(prenominal) be enjoyed when it can be, for they are some that we are largely powerless over our own destinies, and that God is in an immeasurable and entirely separate, wonderful realm without death rate or time. Ecclesiastes also contended that the only accredited judgment of worth was from God itself.Jobs plot makes for a slightly different conclusion. Job, bewildered, speakswith his comforters, who sourer that varied interpretations of the events that transpired, which Job argues against. God enters the scene and speaks, chastising Job, who had disputed Gods will. Additionally, Jobs friends, who had so far been speaking on behalf of the deity, were punished. The essence that no mortal can dig up the will of God, and that to do so is an discourtesy to the Creator, is stronger than in Ecclesiastes. While Ecclesiastes warns against false religion and talking as if champion knows when one does not, direct justice is applied to a specific case to cap off the book of Job.The final lessons are, for the most part, unoriginal and oft repeated in tidings That good deeds and worship are the only sure resolution. Both of these scriptures project at the fundamental senselessness of the way the world works and put God in charge of it both acknowledge the relative powerlessness of the individual. Both also acknowledge that an individual cannot transcend our frustrate state of being without turning to God.Sources CitedAn commentary of sourcesI am aware that sanctified texts would normally count as best-selling(predicate) sources, but the Oxford Annotated is garnished with ample commentary from haemorrhoid of theologians Footnotes and essays consume about half of the text. I am considering the King James discrepancy a popular source, which is the only saintly text that does not require note in the Sources Cited page (Raimes, 158).Raimes, Anne. Keys for Writers. Fourth. New York, capital of Massachusetts Hough ton Mifflin Company, 2005.The New Oxford Annotated Bible with the Apocrypha (NRSV) Ed. Coogan, Michael. Oxford University Press. 2001.