Loading...I have been doing a series of posts on the views of suffering in the book of Job. I quite intentionally use the plural “views” because, unlike what most people think or assume (those who have any opinion on the matter) the book of Job does not present a solitary view but several views that are at odds with each other. One of those views is opposed by the author. But two of them – that are at odds! – are embraced by the author. Or, rather, we need to use the plural again: by the “authors.” As I point out, there are at least two authors behind our book of Job, writing at different times, in different places, for different audiences, and setting forth different views. Only later did some unknown third person combine the writings – one of them a narrative folk tale told in prose (chs. 1-2, 42) and the other a set of dialogues presented in poetry (chs. 3-42).
If you haven’t read the previous posts, no worries. This one and the ones that follow will make sense on their own. These will be on the view of suffering found in the main part of the book the poetic dialogues. They again will be drawn from my book God’s Problem: How the Bible Fails to Answer our Most Important Question – Why We Suffer (HarperOne 2008).
******************************
The view found in these dialogues is very, very different from the one in the narrative framing story of the prologue and epilogue. The issue dealt with, however, is the same. If God is ultimately in charge of all of life, why is it that the innocent suffer?
For the folktale it is because God tests people to see if they can retain their piety despite undeserved pain and misery. For the poetic dialogues, there are different answers for different ones of the figures involved: for Job’s so-called friends, suffering comes as a punishment for sin (this view appears to be rejected by the narrator). Job himself, in the poetic speeches, cannot figure out a reason for innocent suffering. And God, who appears at the end of the poetic exchanges, refuses to give a reason. It appears that for this author the answer to innocent suffering is that there is no answer. That, in itself, is obviously very interesting!
The Overall Structure of the Poetic Dialogues
The poetic dialogues are set up as a kind of
Get access to Dr. Ehrman's library of 4,000+ articles plus five new articles per week about the New Testament and early Christianity. It costs as little as $2.99/mth and every cent goes to charity!
Unlock 4,000+ Articles Like This!
But the rest of the structure is clear. After the friends have had their say, a fourth figure appears; this is a young man name Elihu, who is said to be dissatisfied with the strength of the case laid out by the other three. Elihu tries to state the case more forcefully: Job is suffering because of his sins. This restatement appears to be no more convincing than anything the others have said, but before Job can reply, God himself appears, wows Job into submission by his overpowering presence, and informs him that he, Job, has no right to challenge the workings of the one who created the universe and all that is in it. Job repents of his desire to understand, and grovels in the dirt before the awe-inspiring challenge of the Almighty. And that’s where the poetic dialogues end.
Job and His Friends
The poetic section begins with Job, out of his misery, cursing the day he was born and wishing that he had died at birth:
After this Job opened his mouth and cursed the day of his birth. Job said:
“Let the day perish in which I was born,
and the night that said ‘A man-child is conceived.’…
Why did I not die at birth,
come forth from the womb and expire?
Why were there knees to receive me,
or breasts for me to suck?…
Or why was I not buried like a stillborn child,
like an infant that never sees the light?” (3:1-3; 11-12; 16)
Eliphaz is the first friend to respond, and his response sets the tone for what all the friends will say. In their opinion, Job has received what was coming to him. God does not, they claim (wrongly, as readers of the prologue know), punish the innocent but only the guilty:
Then Eliphaz the Temanite answered:
“If one ventures a word with you, will you be offended?
But who can keep from speaking.?…
Think now, who that was innocent ever perished?
Or where were the upright cut off?
As I have seen, those who plow iniquity
and sow trouble reap the same.
By the breath of God they perish,
and by the blast of his anger they are consumed.” (4:1-2; 7-9)
All three friends will have similar things to say throughout the many chapters of their speeches. Job is guilty, he should repent, and if he does so God will relent and return him to his favor. If he refuses, he is simply showing his recalcitrance and willfulness before the God who punishes those who deserve it. (These friends seem well versed in the views of the Israelite prophets we considered in chapters 2 and 3) And so Bildad, for example, insists that God is just and seeks Job’s repentance:
Then Bildad the Shuhite answered:
“How long will you say these things,
and the words of your mouth be a great wind?
Does God pervert justice?
Or does the Almighty pervert the right?
If your children sinned against him,
he delivered them into the power of their transgression.
If you will seek God
and make supplication to the Almighty,
if you are pure and upright,
surely then he will rouse himself for you
and restore to you your rightful place.
Though your beginning was small,
your latter days will be very great.” (8:1-7)
Zophar too thinks that Job’s protestations of innocence are completely misguided and an affront to God. If he is suffering, it is because he is guilty and is getting his due; in fact, he deserves far worse (one wonders what could be worse, if the folktale is any guide)
Then Zophar the Naamathite answered:
“Should a multitude of words go unanswered,
and should one full of talk be vindicated?
Should your babble put others to silence,
and when you mock, shall no one shame you?
For you say, ‘My conduct is pure,
and I am clean in God’s sight.’
But O that God would speak,
and open his lips to you
and that he would tell you the secrets of wisdom!
For wisdom is many-sided.
Know then that God exacts of you less than your guilt deserves.” (11:1-6)
And this is what Job’s friends are saying! I’ll continue in the next post.
Thanks Bart; very helpful.
But – if assuming that the poetic and prose parts have different authors – two questions of clarification:
– which is the author of the prose remarks and sections within the poetic chapters? As these consistently refer to God as YHWH; would you therefore see them as inherited from a former prose debate between Job and his friends (and Elihu)? Without these prose markers, the poetic debate makes little sense.
– If a ‘poetic author’ has picked this particular prose folk-tale to frame his narrative; can we then infer that the retained *conclusions* of that prose tale can be considered as still governing his composition of the poetic debate? Hence that the poetic author still understands God as commending what Job has said, while rejecting what the three friends said? (Job 42:8); maybe also implying that Elihu is the one rebuked at Job 38:2?
One point to clarify perhaps; the poetic author appears to be less concerned with the ‘problem of suffering’; than with the ‘problem of wickedness and righteousness’. Job does not object when the children of the righteous suffer; he objects when the children of the wicked *don’t* suffer. (Job 21:8).
Yes, the idea is that there are two sources that a redactor has fit together and provided transitions etc. for, and was indeed attempting to use the framing device of the prose narrative to guide and tame the poetic dialogues.
“[T]he answer to innocent suffering is that there is no answer.” Don’t look to the printed word for the answer. Deal with the suffering with whatever it takes. Humanity is created with free will. Use it wisely. Don’t let the printed word confuse you. Life is always more complex than any text can explain or promise.
Job’s story seems to contradict the “orthodox” belief that humans are born in “original sin” as expounded by Augustine and taken as dogma and justification for humans’ preponderance to sin and “condemnation” by present day Christian churches. This being the result of Adam and Eve’s transgression that results in humanity’s “fall from grace”. But statements of Jesus and authors of the Gospels and Epistles seem to contradict this, since Jesus was planned by God to “save” humanity before the world (including Adam & Eve) was even created. (Peter, Chapter 1: 20-21: “He was chosen *before the world was created* but has appeared in these last times for your sake. Through him you believe in God, who raised him from the dead, etc.”) The terms “predestined, foreknown, preordained” are used repeatedly. I’m sure Bart can quote other passages that would infer this also. So, this would mean that poor Adam and Eve (and us) were actually “set up” to “fail the test” as it were, if one takes the story as justification for “judgement”, otherwise there would be no need for a “Saviour”. Not unlike the God in Job’s story. Humans are mere pawns in a game that God plays.
“And God, who appears at the end of the poetic exchanges, refuses to give a reason. It appears that for this author the answer to innocent suffering is that there is no answer.”
…..32:19 Behold, my belly is as wine which hath no vent; it is ready to burst like new bottles. I will speak, that I may be refreshed: I will open my lips and answer!!!!
I will attempt to bring a weight and glory to Job that is just not seen by most people let alone atheists.
1. God meets Job–I’m shocked most people don’t see this.
2. in the presence of God Job’s mind is able to transcend the temporal and glimpse the eternal. Immediately the weight of Job’s temporal groanings are drown out by the presence of the eternal.
3. God meets Job
4. The questions God asks is in fact the very answers to Job’s deepest questions!
6. Job is the germination —the very birth of a new thought and new theology of God and life.
7. Both Adam and Job experience a test foisted on them by Satan that requires theology change.
8. Death serves us
9. Trust
10. Perhaps a book could be written on the statement “God meets Job”
I’ve always felt like Job’s friends get a bad rap when people talk about this story. Don’t you think that sitting in total silence for a week in morning was enough solidarity for the occasion?! Personally, its alot to ask when i have to get dressed up on a Saturday for a funeral, and even then, that’s a commitment of a few hours, right? Job’s friends go way above and beyond the call of duty in terms of sympathy and mourning. How much attention do you need before we can all go back home, Job? Seriously dude… its always about Job- who- by the way is richer and can afford to lose more than anyone he’s requiring this support from in the story. Cey me a river Job. We all have it tough. The difference is that you can just go buy a new family and new house if you wanted to. 😝
The problem is that they sit in silence in teh prose story. People give them a bad rap for what happens in the poetic dialogue — which is from a different source with a different portrayal of them.
Agreed. I tend to use that angle to direct people who may not realize what’s actually haooening in Job literarily. I sit in a small group with a bunch of older, very “churchy” Presbytetian engineers. These are the types of gentleman who will hold up the discussion group for a month trying to figure out the mechanics of how the Sun *REALLY* stood still in Joshua.
So, when they hop on the bandwagon of judging Job’s friends, i like to counter their literal readings by pointing out they sat in silence for a week! 😊
I’ve never paid attention to the third chapter of Job before. It contains imagery that might be interesting to analyse in more depth and perhaps relate to other ancient poetry. Of course, the imagery of wishing to have died at or before birth also occurs elsewhere in the Bible, notably in Jeremiah (I know a song about that). The imagery of cursing a day in verses 1-10 also raises a number of questions about how people conceived of time.