Jordan Peterson is a cultural phenomenon. His books are bestsellers (12 Rules for Life has sold over 10 million copies!). His online video lectures and in-person lecture tours have captivated audiences around the world.
And over the last couple of years, he’s spoken more and more about the Bible, even producing whole video courses on the specific Bible books. As a result, many Christians have become huge Peterson fans, with some even contending that he’s a Christian now.
Which brings us to the subject of this review: Peterson’s latest book, We Who Wrestle with God. It was released in November of 2024 and has generated all sorts of buzz online.
The book offers Peterson’s take on several of the foundational stories in the Bible. He explores the accounts of creation, Adam and Eve, Cain and Abel, Noah, the Tower of Babel, Abraham, Moses, and Jonah. According to the table of contents, each of these stories shows us something about God, but as you’ll see in the review that follows, God lies more in the background. Peterson focuses more on humans.
There are plenty of evaluations of the book itself online, so in this review I want to do something else. I want to examine Peterson’s theology and hermeneutics. What does he believe about God, humanity, and the Bible? And how does he approach the Bible?
Theology
God
In We Who Wrestle with God, it’s never really clear exactly who or what Peterson thinks God is. What is clearer is that whatever “god” is to Peterson at present, it’s not much like the God of the Bible (a bit ironic in view of the fact that the book is about the Bible and supposedly about God).
In the foreword, Peterson uses the story of Elijah in the cave and describes the conscience as a manifestation of God: “Conscience, important as it is—the conscience that makes itself known to Elijah [as the still, small voice]—is not the only manifestation of God” (p. xxx).
In the conclusion to the book, Peterson’s god sounds almost pantheistic; he/it is the great unity. In the Bible, he contends, “God is presented as the unity that exists at the foundation or stands at the pinnacle” (p. 504). Without “god” there is no order or harmony, and everything deteriorates into “anarchy and chaos.”
And throughout the book, god is described in various ways. He is “the voice of inspired adventure” (p. 241). Or, “the impetus to develop, personally, is to be regarded as identical to the monotheistic Hebrew God” (p. 242). He is the “true unitary animating spirit” (p. 315) and the “spirit of being and becoming” (p. 325).
At times, Peterson uses words that sound like he means the orthodox God of the Bible, but most of the time he speaks as if god is a generic and impersonal spirit that moves humans along.
“In We Who Wrestle with God, it’s never really clear exactly who or what Peterson thinks God is.”
Humans
And what are humans? Humans are creatures who need to develop and transform so that they can become mature and good. “We are oriented in the world toward becoming, toward what is changing and what can be changed” (p. 31). Peterson uses biblical language about humans but gives his own definitions. Humans are created in the image of God, but what does that mean? “It means that the human spirit exists in its essence, on the border between order and chaos; that it serves as the mediator of becoming and being” (p. 27).
Being human means being creatures who bring order out of chaos and who must grow and transform into maturity, according to Peterson. Because of that, here is the essence of the biblical story in his thinking: “What answers emerge from the biblical corpus, piecemeal, step-by-step? It is all on you—with God as Guide” (p. 86, emphasis original).
And in conclusion, he summarizes the message of the Bible in this way: “If we tread the properly sacrificial path, offering upward, what is best, keeping to the straight and narrow, maintaining nothing in reserve for ourselves, in the narrow sense; if we heed the call of conscience and calling—we can have the redemptive romantic adventure of our life, transforming ourselves as we do into the Giants, who once walked upon the Earth” (pp. 504-505). This is the purpose and goal of our humanness, according to Peterson.
“Peterson uses biblical language about humans but gives his own definitions.”
The Bible
What is the Bible?
The Bible is a collection of tales about human potential. It preserves and passes on the collective wisdom of humanity about what it means to be human and how to become a mature and good human. Its stories show the patterns for being and becoming fully human. They aren’t true in the sense that they necessarily happened but in that they are archetypes—universal patterns for human behavior and experience.
To summarize, Peterson’s reading of the Bible is very human-centered. God is there, of course, but it’s never really clear exactly who or what God is to Peterson. He’s more like the animating spirit of life and human experience, not the personal God who knows and loves us and whom we can know and love in return. So, the Bible is collective portrayals about what it means to be human, profound and insightful to be sure, but a human book about human beings.
Peterson’s Hermeneutics
We’ve looked at some of Peterson’s conclusions about biblical topics. How does Peterson interact with the Bible? How does he arrive at those conclusions?
Before answering, I need to say that Peterson takes the Bible very seriously. As you’ll see in what follows, his approach to the Bible is deeply flawed but it’s not because he discounts the Bible’s importance. He has a deep admiration for it. But because he misunderstands what the Bible is. He fundamentally misunderstands what it’s about and how to read it accurately.
First, what you don’t find as Peterson explores the Bible is any studied interaction with the original meaning of the text. There’s virtually nothing about the original context (though there are occasional references to Hebrew or Greek words). There seems to be little to no interest in the work of serious biblical scholars.
Rather, since he understands the Bible as a collection of tales about being human, Peterson reads the Bible through a moralistic and psychological framework about the human experience, both the good and the bad. These stories are like didactic myths which provide governing principles and guiding patterns for mature human experience. So, Peterson’s book is a wandering journey that moves from short summaries of biblical stories to reflections on the “moral of the story” to offering a psychological analysis for humanity, and so on.
“Since he understands the Bible as a collection of tales about being human, Peterson reads the Bible through a moralistic and psychological framework about the human experience, both the good and the bad.”
For example, according to Peterson, at the heart of what it means to be male is competence, while the heart of being female is to be caring. Therefore, the essence of the story of the fall, and the core of man and woman’s issues, is pride in these two areas specifically. “If you presume to be much more than you are—if you presume a caring (Eve) or a competence (Adam) beyond that which is properly yours—then you have taken upon yourself more that you can rightfully manage.” Then the “complexity of the world” will overwhelm you and “you will suffer”; you will “experience anxiety, grief, shame, and pain” (65). This is the meaning of the nakedness, pain, and suffering mentioned in the Adam and Eve story.
What about the angel and flaming sword barring the way back into Eden? What does that mean? For Peterson, it’s a symbol that “everything unworthy must therefore be cut or burned away” for humans to experience paradise (p. 75). He even suggests it’s an image of “trial by fire” (p. 83).
Concerning Cain and Abel, he writes that the “key to understanding the story of Cain and Abel…is recognition that it is a story about work.” It’s about the “relationship between work and sacrifice” (p. 90) which offers a “motif” about opposed forms of sacrifice and work (p. 103).
What’s the message of the call of Abraham? It’s that those “who hearken toward true adventure in the service of what is highest…will fulfill not only the deepest longing of the forward-moving soul but also constitute the most effective possible strategy for success” (p. 242).
“Concerning Cain and Abel, he writes that the ‘key to understanding the story of Cain and Abel…is recognition that it is a story about work.'”
What is the meaning of Abram’s name being changed to Abraham (which means the father of multitudes)? “It means that the essence of fatherhood itself…is precisely the encouraging voice that rewards the impulse or possibly instinct… to take on challenge, voluntarily; to develop further; to mature; to extend self upward and grow” (p. 243).
Moving ahead to Exodus, what is the meaning of the story about Moses climbing Mount Sinai to receive the Ten Commandments? This is a representative story by the “imaginative authors” of Exodus (p. 391). The peak of Sinai symbolizes “the pinnacle of the system of values” (p. 388). “Psychologically speaking, he [Moses] experiences a profound, even revolutionary moment of insight” (p. 388).
These are just a few examples, but they are representative of how Peterson reads the Bible. The biblical stories are archetypes, universal patterns, for how humans can become whole, mature beings.
Peterson’s conclusion (see pp. 496-502) makes it very clear how he understands these stories to work:
- Eve illustrates the “pathology of compassion.”
- Adam shows what happens when men forever “strive falsely to impress his mate.”
- Cain and Abel embody “fundamentally opposed modes of being and becoming.”
- Noah is the paradigmatic “good man” who can “trust himself and God.”
- Abraham is the “archetypal individual adventurer” and he models consecrating “his life to the upward path and to sacrifice whatever is necessary in that pursuit.”
- Moses is the “archetypal pattern of our striving, of motivation itself.” He “faces his adversary.”
- Jonah teaches us “that each man is called upon to say his piece, lest the world suffer…”
“The biblical stories are archetypes, universal patterns, for how humans can become whole, mature beings.”
And in the end, Peterson asks the all-important question: Is the divine real? And his answer? “It is real insofar as its pursuit makes pain bearable, keeps anxiety at bay, and inspires the hope that springs eternal in the human breast. It is real insofar as it establishes the benevolent and intelligible cosmic order” (p. 504).
The apostle Paul, however, answers the question of the divine very differently. Rather than saying, as Peterson does, that believing makes life better so it’s good to act like it’s real whether it is or not, Paul says that if Jesus is not raised then to believe is sheer foolishness (1 Cor 15:12-19).
Frankly, Peterson so misconstrues the Bible that his synopsis of it is the exact opposite of the Bible’s message. As noted earlier in this review, his take is that the Bible shows us that human wellbeing depends all on us and if we try hard enough, we can become giants of humanity. Immediately after saying that, he adds that by doing that, we can transform “into the true Sons and Daughters of God” who are even called upon to do greater things than Jesus himself (p. 505). For Peterson, humans are the hero of the story.
“His take is that the Bible shows us that human wellbeing depends all on us and if we try hard enough, we can become giants of humanity.”
But what the Bible actually shows us is that humans are made for a very real and personal God, and apart from Him we are a sorry lot who can’t redeem ourselves by moral effort, suffering, and sacrifice. We are in desperate need of rescue, and God mercifully has come to our aid over and over, until at last He sent His Son to do what we could never do for ourselves. And it’s only in union with the Son that we can ever hope to be a son or daughter of God. God is the hero of the story!
So, if you want to read Jordan Peterson for practical self-help advice, go for it. But don’t read him to find out who God is or how to read the Bible. It seems he doesn’t yet know God, so he fails to understand God’s word.
