Of­f­hand, the re­com­men­ded com­bi­na­ti­on of lo­gi­cal thin­king and in­tui­ti­on sounds like qui­te a pac­ka­ge. Take a lar­ge whole, di­vi­de it in­to smal­ler se­qu­en­ti­al pie­ces, and con­si­der one pie­ce at a time. Wha­te­ver can­not be di­vi­ded or se­qu­en­ced should be con­si­de­red as such.

Rec­li­ning on a sofa, we were re­a­ding aloud the inst­ruc­ti­ons for the use of hu­man re­a­son gi­ven by Des­car­tes in Étude du bon sens. We found them qui­te use­ful. Even so, we were not ful­ly con­vin­ced of how we should comp­re­hend each ot­her’s dis­pa­ra­te worlds.

We ope­ned the Bib­le.

We chose the Book of Job, be­cau­se the friend with whom I was re­a­ding na­med him as her fa­vo­ri­te cha­rac­ter. She said Job lists gui­de­li­nes for life just as well as do wo­men’s ma­ga­zi­nes, but does it much more be­au­ti­ful­ly.

Who enc­lo­sed the sea be­hind doors when it burst from the womb, when I made the clouds its gar­ment

and thick dark­ness its blan­ket, when I de­ter­mi­ned its boun­da­ries and put its bars and doors in place, when I dec­la­red: “You may come this far, but no fart­her; yo­ur proud wa­ves stop here”? (Job 38: 8–11)

The Book of Job is qui­te sa­va­ge, too, the grim des­ti­ny of a man for whom a good at­ti­tu­de did not gu­a­ran­tee a hap­py life.

If I said, “I will for­get my comp­laint, chan­ge my exp­res­si­on, and smile,” I would still live in ter­ror of all my pains. (Job 9: 27–28)

In the midst of his suf­fe­ring, Job wan­ted to be he­ard and seen.

I wish that my words were writ­ten down, that they were re­cor­ded on a scroll or were insc­ri­bed in stone fo­re­ver by an iron sty­lus and lead! (Job 19: 23–24)

This ac­tu­al­ly hap­pe­ned. The book that we were re­a­ding is full of both hu­man wis­dom and li­te­ra­ry gran­deur.

Look at Be­he­moth, which I made along with you. He eats grass like an ox. Look at the strength of his loins and the po­wer in the musc­les of his bel­ly. He stif­fens his tail like a ce­dar tree; the ten­dons of his thighs are wo­ven firm­ly to­get­her. His bo­nes are bron­ze tu­bes; his limbs are like iron rods. (Job 40: 15–18)

I was as­to­nis­hed to find so many ele­ments of old fai­ry-ta­les in the Bib­le. But the fa­bu­lous res­to­ra­ti­on of hap­pi­ness in Job’s life is ac­tu­al­ly true, true through faith.

So the Lord bles­sed the last part of Job’s life more than the first. He ow­ned 14,000 sheep, 6,000 ca­mels, 1,000 yo­ke of oxen, and 1,000 fe­ma­le don­keys. He al­so had se­ven sons and three daugh­ters. He na­med his first daugh­ter Je­mi­mah, his se­cond Ke­zi­ah, and his third Ke­ren-hap­puch. No wo­men as be­au­ti­ful as Job’s daugh­ters could be found in all the land, and their fat­her gran­ted them an in­he­ri­tan­ce with their brot­hers. (Job 42: 12–15)

The com­for­ting mes­sa­ge of Job is the same as that of the mil­li­ons of black marks on thou­sands of pa­ges of pa­per. We need not un­ders­tand anyt­hing more than we ac­tu­al­ly do, and ac­cep­tan­ce of the pre­vai­ling pre­con­di­ti­ons le­ads to sa­tis­fac­ti­on. We can use our re­a­son for things that are ma­na­ge­ab­le by re­a­son.

And sure enough, we can even find han­dy tools in the old phi­lo­sop­hies. If you en­ter a new open-plan hall and won­der: what on earth is this place? you may come up with this simp­le Car­te­si­an pro­po­si­ti­on > place is the in­ner sur­fa­ce of a body wit­hin which the thing is enc­lo­sed.

Vil­ja Paa­vo­la

Trans­la­ti­on: S-L.L.

The blog post was pub­lis­hed in on­li­ne Päi­vä­mies on 20 Nov. 2015