This essay was written as a research paper for a final exam.
Although suffering occurs throughout the Bible, different books offer a variety of perspectives as to why we suffer. The Old Testament offers types of suffering such as suffering as judgment in Isaiah 1:4 and suffering as a test of character in Job 1:7-8. The New Testament has different perspectives on suffering: suffering as a necessity for salvation in 2 Corinthians 4:16-17 and the suffering of Jesus as atonement in 1 John 2:1-2.
In the Book of Isaiah, Israel suffers as judgment for their sin. In Isaiah 1, Isaiah is prophesying destruction on the Israelites if they keep refusing to “shape up.”[1] The Lord tells Israel, “Ah, sinful nation, a people laden with iniquity, offspring of evildoers, children who deal corruptly! They have forsaken the Lord, they have despised the Holy One of Israel, they are utterly estranged” (Isaiah 1:4). Isaiah 1:1 presents an image of a well-cared for vineyard that has “yielded wild grapes,” and God removes the “hedge,” or protection, around the metaphorical vineyard that is Israel for it to be “devoured” (Isaiah 5:5). Israel inflicted suffering upon themselves because they “rejected the law of the Lord of hosts, and have despised the word of the Holy One of Israel” (Isaiah 5:24). Herbert M. Wolf says “The sinfulness of the nation left its mark on the surface of the land. Punishment involved invasion and devastation at the hands of cruel foreigners like the Assyrians.”[2] Israel’s punishment occurred due to the corrupt dealing of Zion, as Christopher Seitz writes, “Election comes with a special cost, not just with a special benefaction.”[3] This “special cost” was the punishment of the people of Israel, such as desolation (Isaiah 24:1) and terror (Isaiah 24:17). The people of Israel “were asking for punishment to be imposed by God, the divine lawgiver and judge”[4] due to this breaking of the promise with God. Although this crushed the Israelites (Isaiah 3:15), this was God’s purpose for their suffering all along. Christopher Seitz explains, “…it is significant to note that the book opens, not with the visions of reunification and the limiting of Assyria, but with somber calls for repentance and obedience (1:20). Israel can refuse such calls, but with the same dire consequences as they experienced in the aftermath of the Syro-Ephraimite crisis.”[5] If Israel would have repented, they possibly would not have suffered as they did.
In contrast to the Israelites in Isaiah suffering because of their sins, Job innocently suffered because of his righteousness. Job 1:7-8 says, “The Lord said to Satan, ‘From where have you come?’ Satan answered the Lord and said, ‘From going to and fro on the earth, and from walking up and down on it.’ And the Lord said to Satan, ‘Have you considered my servant Job, that there is none like him on the earth, a blameless and upright man, who fears God and turns away from evil?’” Because of Job’s blamelessness, God let “the satan”[6] test Job’s piety and cause him to suffer (Job 1:12). Throughout the early chapters of Job, his goodness or integrity is mentioned multiple times (Job 1:1, 8; Job 2:3, 9). Describing Job’s morality, Steven Chase writes, “In the mind of God in the prologue, Job is perfect, complete, finished, moral, and above all a man unequaled in righteousness.”[7] Job’s friends blamed him for his suffering, accusing him of committing a sin that he has not done (Job 8:20; Job 11:14), but as Edward J. Kissane writes, “The doctrine that suffering is the result of sin is not true in his case.”[8] The purpose behind God letting the Satan test Job is to examine more closely his character: “At the first level, they [God and the Satan] ask about Job’s behavior, his conduct, under fire; but they are also asking what lies behind the behavior. The Satan asks why Job serves God, what for…”[9] God was not merely letting Job suffer to place a kind of wager with the Satan, but also to exemplify the meaning of being a servant of God like Isaiah 53:10-12 describes. Job’s innocent suffering and Israel’s consequential suffering demonstrates that there are two different kinds of suffering: one as judgment for sins and suffering to show “God’s ways are higher than human ways.”[10]
Paul writes about “suffering and death” as “integral aspects” of the salvation process.[11] In 2 Corinthians 4:16-17, Paul writes, “So we do not lose heart. Though our outer self is wasting away, our inner self is being renewed day by day. For this light momentary affliction is preparing for us an eternal weight of glory beyond all comparison…” Paul converted from being a “persecutor of the church” (Philippians 3:6) to being called “in order that I might preach him [the Son] among the Gentiles…” (Galatians 1:15-16). Anthony C. Thiselton explains, “The Christian life, as well as Paul’s, is marked by death and suffering in this world, but by life and resurrection in the new order.”[12] Paul certainly saw much suffering, as described in 2 Corinthians 11:23-28, but still, Paul proclaims, “For the sake of Christ, then, I am content with weaknesses, insults, hardships, persecutions, and calamities. For when I am weak, then I am strong” (2 Corinthians 12:10). His ability to still declare contentedness stems from the knowledge of the future glory as stated in Romans 8:17-25, meaning “although suffering is inevitable, it is not final.”[13] Dorothea Bertschmann writes, “Believers suffer ‘not because of sin, but because of the sin of the world and those who still rebel against God.’”[14] The inevitability of suffering comes with the idea Paul states in Romans 8:17-18 in which we suffer with Christ. James D. G. Dunn speaks of the “eschatological tension,” and that “Paul regarded suffering as an integral feature”[15] of this. Through Paul, the New Testament offers a different voice of suffering – one of suffering for our salvation.
In contrast to Paul’s suffering due to being a Christian, Jesus suffered for atonement for mankind’s sins. His suffering paid for our sins, as explained in 1 John 2:1-2: “My little children, I am writing these things to you so that you may not sin. But if anyone does sin, we have an advocate with the Father, Jesus Christ the righteous. He is the propitiation for our sins, and not for ours only but also for the sins of the whole world.” The reason for his suffering was a fulfillment Old Testament prophecy from Isaiah 53:3-5, “pierced for our transgressions” to bring peace and healing. Because suffering is a part of sacrifice (Leviticus 17:11), we are redeemed through “the precious blood of Christ” (1 Peter 1:19). James D. G. Dunn explains the meaning Jesus gave to the death: “He would suffer as part of God’s will, as others, the faithful and righteous, had before him. Perhaps he cherished the hope […] that his death would mark the final end to Israel’s suffering.”[16] This suffering is different to Paul’s; Paul was suffering because of our salvation, but Jesus suffered because he was our salvation. Michael Tait explains, “It is the consensus that his suffering death is for the soteriological benefit of human beings and necessitated by human sin.”[17] Hebrews 9:26 speaks of the sacrifice that Jesus made “to put away sin.” Craig Keener writes, “Jesus was offering himself as a martyr to turn away God’s anger from Israel, as Jewish tradition understood some other martyrs. His death was no unfortunate or unexpected accident.”[18] A payment had to be made for the sin in the world, and Jesus paid it.
These different Biblical perspectives give a context as to why the world may suffer, whether it is suffering as judgment for our sin, suffering to see God’s bigger picture, suffering as an aspect to salvation, and suffering as atonement.
Bibliography [1] Carol A. Newsom, Sharon H. Ringe, and Jacqueline E. Lapsley, Women’s Bible Commentary (Louisville: Westminster John Knox Press, 2012), 257. [2] Herbert M. Wolf, Interpreting Isaiah (Michigan: Zondervan Publishing House, 1985), 74. [3] Christopher R. Seitz, Isaiah 1-39 (Louisville: Westminster John Knox Press, 2012), 32. [4] Rima Vesely-Flad, “The Social Covenant and Mass Incarceration: Theologies of Race and Punishment,” Anglican Theological Review 93, no. 4 (2011): 543-544. https://search-ebscohost-com.ezproxy.samford.edu/login.aspx?direct=true&db=a6h&AN=ATLA0001866042&site=eds-live&scope=site. [5] Seitz, Isaiah 1-39, 30. [6] Newsom, Ringe, Lapsley, Women’s Bible Commentary, 209. [7] Steven Chase, Job (Louisville: Westminster John Knox Press, 2013), 18. [8] Edward J. Kissane, The Book of Job (New York: Sheed & Ward, 1946), xxiii. [9] John T. Wilcox, The Bitterness of Job: A Philosophical Reading (Ann Arbor: The University of Michigan Press, 1989), 45-46. [10] Daniel C. Timmer, “Job, Suffering, and the Gospel,” Puritan Reformed Journal 9, no. 2 (2017): 17. https://search-ebscohost-com.ezproxy.samford.edu/login.aspx?direct=true&db=a6h&AN=ATLAi9KZ190330000867&site=eds-live&scope=site. [11] James D. G. Dunn, The Theology of Paul the Apostle (Grand Rapids: William B. Eerdmans Publishing Company), 482. [12] Anthony C. Thiselton, The Living Paul: An Introduction to the Apostle and His Thought (London: Society for Promoting Christian Knowledge, 2009), 33. [13] Michael J. Gorman, Apostle of the Crucified Lord: A Theological Introduction to Paul and His Letters (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2017), https://search-ebscohost-com.ezproxy.samford.edu/login.aspx?direct=true&db=nlebk&AN=2012644&site=ehost-live. [14] Dorothea H. Bertschmann, “’What Does Not Kill Me Makes Me Stronger’: Paul and Epictetus on the Correlation of Virtues and Suffering,” The Catholic Biblical Quarterly 82, no. 2 (2020): 267. https://search-ebscohost-com.ezproxy.samford.edu/login.aspx?direct=true&db=a6h&AN=ATLAiA14200331000508&site=eds-live&scope=site. [15] Dunn, The Theology of Paul the Apostle, 484. [16] James D. G. Dunn, Jesus Remembered (Grand Rapids: William B. Eerdmans Publishing Company, 2003), 817. [17] Michael Tait, “The Meaning of Jesus’ Death: Reviewing the New Testament’s Interpretations,” Reviews in Religion & Theology 24, no. 4 (2017): 800. doi:10.1111/rirt.13101. [18] Craig S. Keener, The Historical Jesus of the Gospels (Grand Rapids: William B. Eerdmans Publishing Company, 2009), 302.
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