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It's Not Fair!

Writer's picture: Ian CatterallIan Catterall

I was listening to a podcast that talked about how easy it is for us to become angry about the world - often our place in it, that things don't work, that we can be made subject to random injustices and bad faith. That we don't get the fortune we deserve.


It went on to talk about the Bible story of Job and how for most of that book he fights and resists his fate. And of course if you know that story it is a deliberate act of harm by God. What happens to him seems to be unjustified and Job is a pawn between God and the Devil. Often this is seen as a startling and unusual book in the Bible given it paints God as quite malicious.


However, there is a more humane lesson in this I think. It is that as long as Job resists his fortune - that bad things happen for no reason and that they can continue to happen - he cannot change them. Ultimately things change for him when he says "I repent". Its interesting that the Hebrew word translated to "repent" can also mean "I am reconciled" in its orignal language. This gives perhaps more of a sense that this, for now, is how things are and I need to live with that - that I am frail and vulnerable and therefore things can happen to me that I may not like.


I think this kind of acceptance does not have to be resignation to our fate. I think it can mean this is how things truly are in this moment...so what can I now do about it? I suspect to some extent this Bible story is about accepting that sometimes things aren't fair but generally they are not personal. Its perhaps at the point where we say "I see the limits of my power and also the extent of it - I am reconciled to this." that we can grow. We stop lashing out at personal injustice and see how we might be able to change things for the better.


We realise our strength and capacity's to shape our world and that around us.








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