"Curse God and die!"
Good advice from Job's wife
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In the book of Job, his wife appears only in chapter 2, and is mentioned in passing later on, but delivers one of the most profoundly helpful pieces of advice that Job, of course, ignores, as do all the theologians down through the ages who treat her words with scorn.
She tells her husband (who is beset by boils at this point): "Do you still hold fast your integrity? Curse God and die."
As my former Candler School of Theology seminary professor Carol Newsom points out, these words are "radical and provocative." The "integrity" Job's wife (who you may remember has also lost her children, though the story focuses solely on Job's grief and struggle) calls into question is his devotion to what the world calls piety and righteousness. What has that gotten him? Dead children, poverty, and case of the boils, apparently.
Instead of encouraging him to renounce his belief in God, I believe she's telling him to give up this ego world's idea of any religion that could conceive of such an angry, bet-making deity that allows terrible things to befall us. Terrible things befall all of us, not because some God outside of ourselves creates it or makes a bet with some evil being, but because we do. In our egoic system, pain and suffering is a feature, not a bug.
What Job's wife called her husband (and calls us) to do is to forgive, or as A Course in Miracles puts it: "Swear not to die," which means "stop swearing to die."
This is the deal we made when we installed our ego as our god and seek to follow its precepts instead of the direction of the divinity that lives within us. We all swear to die when we refuse to forgive anyone and everyone for whatever perceived slight (large or small) that we hold against them.
Forgiving the unforgivable
Forgiveness is a tricky beast here in the ego world. We feel justified when we hold grudges. We argue for our right to do so! We would rather die than forgive.
"What they did to us was unforgivable!" we cry. We can trot out a laundry list of grievous offenses from the personal: rapes, murders, assaults, molestations, physical abuse, to the corporate: oppression, discrimination, state-sanctioned murder, and genocides. Forgiveness, especially in these instances, is for chumps, our ego tells us. Nobody wants to be a doormat, forgiving some of the worst abuses we can think of.
Nobody's asking you to do that. Instead, what Job's wife, and A Course, asks is for you to make a choice. When you choose to be unforgiving, you are choosing death. You are choosing to saddle yourself with a grievance that will kill you. It may not kill your body (though science suggests it can be the core of bodily illness) but it will kill your spirit. It will kill your sense of wonder. It will kill your sense of beauty. It will kill your kindness. It will kill your gentleness. It will eventually kill everything that makes you capable of being a loving human being.
Instead, as Job's wife suggests, we can abandon the so-called "integrity" of our unforgiving spirit, and instead curse this god of ego and die to it. Only then will we be reborn into our true spirit – the spirit of Love and forgiveness.
A different kind of forgiveness
This kind of forgiveness asks us to step outside of the world's idea of what it means to forgive. We're not letting our ego say, "You did this to me, but since I am the more spiritual of the two, I will deign to forgive you." Instead, we are saying, "I know that I am not this body, and neither are you. We are both guiltless in our eternal formlessness. Whatever has transpired in this bodily world is an opportunity for us to see through it together, as part of the illusion of time. Forgiveness has come to lift the veil of separation between us. We are one, no matter what the physical circumstance my seem to be."
That. Is. Not. Easy. No one says that it is. It is, however, the only path out of pain and suffering. It is the only choice for Heaven that is available to us. Clinging to our grievances equals death. Releasing them to the light of forgiveness is life.
We are not these bodies. We are living extensions of love – an energy that will go on when these bodies are laid to rest. This is the existence we should concern ourselves with – not what our body perceives as injustices.
Does this mean we just let the world trample us? No. Make no mistake: We are here to save the world. What renouncing our grievances and perception of another's guilt means is that we begin in a different place whenever we act to confront the injustices of the world. When our starting point is forgiveness and Love, then there is one less person in the world acting out of their ego, out of their grievances, anger, or sense of offense. We become the peace, love and joy that is missing in the world because all of our doing in the world comes not from anger or control, but from a quiet center that is grounded in unconditional love. Instead of "settling the score," we become the presence and force for Love in any and all circumstances we face in this bodily world.
In this way, we may become exactly like Job. Becoming a force for true forgiveness by finding the inner ability to forgive even the most horrendous atrocities done to us and to the world – will be the end of our ego world. By embodying forgiveness in the world, we will lose much of what the ego treasures. Perhaps we lose our overwhelming sense of wanting to be right, but perhaps we also lose prestige or power in the egoic world of holding grudges. Perhaps we lose family and friends who can't understand how we can be so forgiving in the face of so much pain, suffering, and horror.
As A Course tells us, the "world has marshalled all of its forces against this one awareness (that forgiveness leads us through our egoic death into our true eternal existence), for in it lies the ending of the world and all it stands for." (P-2.II.3:3-5)
Take Job’s wife’s advice
This is the core of the advice Job's wife offers – curse the god of the ego and be willing to allow its world of grievance to end. That is the only way out of all of this world's pain and suffering. It is not a denial that physical circumstances are painful and can cause great suffering, but it is a complete transformation of that pain. The ego means it for death, but spirit means it for life – for a life of love to emerge from and through us amid even the most painful and devastating moments of our lives.
The only question is: Are we willing to allow the ego's world to end, so that spirit may build a life of Love out of our bodily existence? That is the question being asked of us each moment.
When you feel the unforgiveness of the world pressing in, I urge you to consider taking the advice of Job's wife – renounce the ego's "integrity," curse that tiny god of the ego and die to its demands to be angry and unforgiving forever. In short, give up your promise to die. You cannot keep that promise anyway, because you – like all of us – are an eternal being that consists of infinite light and energy – that does not and cannot die. That is a world that can never end.
Music for the Journey:
“It's The End Of The World As We Know It (And I Feel Fine)” — R.E.M.
Looking for a guest speaker at your spiritual community? Contact me!
I have some speaking engagements coming up:
January 7, 2024: Clayton Memorial Unitarian Universalist Fellowship, Newberry, SC - 11 a.m.
January 14, 2024: Jubilee! Community, Asheville, NC. 11 a.m. Online viewing will be available.
January 28, 2024: Unitarian Church in Charleston, Charleston, SC. Online viewing will be available.
About the Motley Mystic:
The Motley Mystic is an online community for people who have realized that the truth speaks with many voices. There is no one religion, philosophy, institution, or dogma that captures the whole Truth and nothing but the Truth. No one needs to swear allegiance to one line of thought or belief to discern Truth, because Love is the only thing that’s real. That’s what we explore at the Motley Mystic - all the tools and strategies we need to remove our barriers to Love and live fully as our true Divine Self.
Candace Chellew is the founder of Motley Mystic as well as Jubilee! Circle, an interfaith spiritual community in Columbia, S.C. She is also the author of Bulletproof Faith: A Spiritual Survival Guide for Gay and Lesbian Christians published in 2008 by Jossey-Bass and the founder and senior editor emeritus of Whosoever: An Online Magazine for LGBTQ People of Faith. She is also a musician and avid animal lover.