The Unforgettable Job

Myths of a paradise lost in the past or a hell threatening us after death are myths corrupted by the anxieties of time. Hell is is front of us because we have put it there; paradise is missing because we have failed to put it there. The Biblical perspective of divine initiative and human response passes into its opposite, where the initiative is human, and where a divine response, symbolized by the answer to Job, is guaranteed. The union of these perspectives would be the next step, except that where it takes place there are no next steps.

--Northrop Frye, Words With Power (313)