The Zero Zone
“Where were you when I laid the foundation of the earth? Tell Me, if you have understanding,” Job 38:4 NASB
Understanding – Job has no answer for God’s question. Why didn’t he say, “Well, I just didn’t exist before You created the world.” That’s how we would answer. But our answer depends on having a concept of nothing, and humanity took a long time to come up with that answer. Genesis 1:1 didn’t include ex nihilo until the prophets. In the ancient world, the idea of nothing was inconceivable. Perhaps you didn’t know that this same development process took place in the history of mathematics. You might find it amazing that zero was invented.[1] Maybe you’re thinking, “Who really cares?” Let me suggest something interesting. If the idea of nothingness and the place holder of zero are rather late developments in human thinking, then what do you think the world was like before zero? Would that change the way you interpret Genesis 1:1-2? Would you rethink your understanding of Job 38? Oh, just one more question; one that we will investigate today. When Moses offers the people a choice between life and death, do you think he imagined a world with a neutral position? Welcome to the zero zone.
In our world, zeros are important. Wouldn’t you rather have a few more zeros added to your savings account? What’s better: 5 followed by 1 zero or 5 followed by 10 zeros? For us, zeros matter. They matter even when we are not talking about mathematics. Existentialism is a philosophy concerned about nothingness. It has had a dramatic influence on modern culture. We often agonize over the apparent nothingness of our existence. We pray for purpose. We want to count. We don’t want to be a zero. But the world of Moses was a bit different.
Moses’ challenge to the people rests on a choice between real alternatives. Obey and live. Disobey and die. There is no middle ground. Yeshua reflects the same hard distinction in his comment about two masters. The biblical world appears to be binary. Yes or No. This or that. One or the other. Black or white. But we have inserted a third option—the zero, the place where we choose not to choose, the ground in the middle, neither forward nor backward, neither hot nor cold (ah, John’s vision comes to mind). Unfortunately, because we are the product of centuries of zero, we’ve gotten used to living in the middle. We decide not to decide. I know that sounds paradoxical. After all, deciding not to decide is a decision. It has consequences. It’s useless to pretend that we can just put the biblical binary world in abeyance (I like that alliteration). Zero might work for mathematics but it doesn’t work in living. No matter what, I must decide. There is no life without choice. When we attempt to play the zero zone game, we are really just fooling ourselves, aren’t we? We imagine that there is a space in life that holds nothing, but the reality is quite different. We are either going forward or backward. Neutral is not a gear. Job can’t answer God because Job doesn’t live in a zero world. In reality, neither do we. So what’s your choice, and it better not be zero?
Topical Index: zero, Job 38:4, understanding, bînâ, Deuteronomy 30:15-19
[1] Cf. https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/what-is-the-origin-of-zer/
I think stuck is the arch paradigm of the human condition. False religion (I sound like a broken record, but false religion has pervaded ALL religions today, unfortunately) mirrors that condition: it promises us stuck folks that we don’t have to change; to get unstuck. (Good thing; because we can’t, anyway.) From greasy grace to gyrating gurus we are offered a palette of ways to be stuck and be alright. I think humanism – as our premier false religion today – promises the same. Humanism tells us that, because choice is supreme (which is true; we were created in that reality) that choice BY ITSELF has power (not true). Little children are assured that, if they CHOOSE TO, even they can become president, and the Renaissance gave us the fiction that there is such a thing as My Way; all that is required is that I seize the power of choice and make it so.
I think what conveniently gets ignored is that choices – like I think Skip is pointing out- are powered by one or the other of the two kingdoms: choices of obedience to God get powered (implemented) by God, and choices of obedience to the other kingdom get powered by that one. This is why bad (as well as good!) people get the illusion that they are powerful just by making a choice when they actually have no power: they are just choosing a power from beyond them to either use them (the good side) or abuse them (the bad side).
The power of the paradigm is that we have to continue to choose what that paradigm consists of. If my paradigm is I am stuck without any real choice, then the only thing I can ‘choose’ is to continue to be stuck. Making choices that do not work in reality – choices of illusion – is a great way to do that. The illusion that there is a ‘My Way’ deludes many a person into believing that they are getting it, even though that way merely involves, like Skip says, “choosing not to choose”. Isn’t that brilliant?? (Wait; maybe it is just stupid.)
and then there is Pi…
It always amazes me when the beauty of the accuracy of scripture is pointed out. The term “bn” and all its cognates as used throughout scripture is one of those terms we often just “cruise” by and never appreciate the depth it contains. Some of the ideas that it contains is, “to build”, a son, (as the house builder) between and understanding or wisdom. It is the term used to designate the place between things that work is performed. In Genesis 1 the between space (bin) is placed in the middle of the light and another “between space” is placed in the darkness, but theirs no “space between” the light and darkness. Light interacts with light and darkness with darkness and there’s never an interaction or relation between the two. Darkness is the “natural” state and either the light is rising and driving the darkness away, or, it’s setting and the darkness is reclaiming it’s space. (the laws of clean and unclean) Either we’re overcoming evil with good or we’re adding to the evil, it’s the only choices we’ve been given. The sooner we realize what Skip has laid out here, the sooner we will become effective in the building (bn) of the Kingdom. Thank you Skip, for this one.
…… and then there is the white space in the Torah scrolls, the fishhook to take you into the EMOTION of the Torah – God’s white space in which the meaning of the Torah is located – notwithstanding that you have to have the white spaces in order to read the black spaces.
This assumes that I understood Skip properly in New Orleans two weekends ago of course. If not, I am sure he will correct me.
You got it.
Interestingly, zero was invented before it was discovered ?
I think this might apply to how we look at “time” as well. Is there a present? Or is it strictly either past or future. How small a designation of time does it have to be to differentiate the past moment from a future moment? Just wondering.
Michael, I’m stuck right there, too!