The transformation from secondhand religion to firsthand religion, from living in accord with what one has heard to life centered in the Spirit, is central to the alternative wisdom of Jesus and also to the Jewish tradition in which he stood. One of the most powerful expressions of this transformation is to be found in the book of Job.57 At its climax, after Job has experienced a dramatic self-disclosure of God, he exclaims: I had heard of thee by the hearing of the ear, but now my eye beholds thee.58
