Zizek And Job - Learning Theology From An Atheist

Listening to a Zizek lecture before going to a church service is the probably the theological equivalent of doing acid before entering a boring work meeting. You enter the room like you have a completely different perception on how reality works. The above interview is probably one of the most challenging inspiring things I've heard in a long time. I recommend listening to all of it. My favourite part is when Zizek talks about the book of Job 12:57 to 17:30. As an atheist he had the freedom and space to re imagine what God might be like. If you've gone to the same kind of churches as me where God is talked about through the Greek Platonic frame of God as all powerful, all knowing, all loving, all everything, then there is really only one way to read Job. That is you read God as someone who berates Job like a cruel headmaster. The whole point of the first 37 chapters of Job is too show that the idea of someone's suffering being because they are being punished by God or that it is all part of God's divine plan is completely ridiculous or wrong. Despite that, this is still the dominate advice that people get about suffering. I could write more but I'll let Zizek speak for himself.

Why do I think this important? Because, people give up on a Greek Platonic God when I suspect they wouldn't give up on a Xn God. A classic case in point is David Bazan. I resonate so strongly with his classic "break up with God" album "Curse Your Branches" but I still have my faith, perhaps stronger than ever. This is the final track on the album and the final verse is all about Job.

When Job asked you the question
You responded, "Who are you
To challenge your creator?"
Well, if that one part is true
It makes you sound defensive

Like you had not thought it through
Enough to have an answer
Like you might have bit off
More than you could chew

Finally, It's Lent and something I'm going to be doing, which readers of this blog maybe interested in signing up to, is the "atheism for lent" course. The course starts Monday and as it's associated with Zizek fan Peter Rollins, I'm hoping it will more likely wrestle with the far more interesting critiques of Xy by people like Zizek rather than the more pedestrian critiques of people like Richard Dawkins.