Bad Things, Pt 1

Ryrie

• “Though we know that the title of the book comes from its principal character, and that Job was a historical person (Ezek 14:14, 20; James 5:11), we do not know for certain who actually wrote the book. Suggestions include Job himself, Elihu, Moses, and Solomon.”

• “The events may have taken place in a patriarchal society in the second millennium b.c., around the time of Abraham. Several facts support this dating: (1) Job lived more than 140 years (42:16), a not uncommon life span during the patriarchal period; (2) the economy of Job’s day, in which wealth was measured in terms of livestock (1:3), was the type that existed in this period; (3) ike Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, Job was the priest of his family (1:5); (4) the absence of any reference to the nation of Israel or the Mosaic Law suggests a pre-Mosaic date (before 1500 BC)”

• “Three principal views exist concerning the date of writing: (1) in the patriarchal age, shortly after the events happened; (2) in the time of Solomon (950 bc); (3) at the time of the Exile or after, though the mention of Job by Ezekiel (Ezek 14:14) negates such a late date.”

• “The detailed report of the speeches of Job and his friends seems to argue for the book’s being written shortly after the events occurred. On the other hand, the book shares characteristics of other wisdom literature (e.g., Pss. 88, Pss 88:89) written during the Solomonic age and should be regarded as a dramatic poem describing real events, rather than a verbatim report.”

• “The book wrestles with the age-old question: Why do righteous men suffer, if God is a God of love and mercy? It clearly teaches the sovereignty of God and the need for man to acknowledge such. Job’s three friends gave essentially the same answer: All suffering is due to sin. Elihu, however, declared that suffering is often the means of purifying the righteous. God’s purpose, therefore, was to strip away all of Job’s self-righteousness and to bring him to the place of complete trust in Him.”

• Job provides critical insight into the work and strategy of Satan.

• “The best-known verses in the book are 19:25-26.”

• (1) Uz was SE of the Dead Sea. It is referenced in Lam 4:21 and by Ptolemy as the same territory as Edom.

• (1) The meaning of “Job” is unclear. “It may mean ‘the one who turns back to God’ or ‘the assailed or persecuted one.’”

• (1) “Job was not perfect in the sense of being sinless. The Bible teaches (and experience supports the fact) that every person falls short of God’s standard of perfection (Rom 3:23). The writer is asserting here that Job could not be justly charged with any moral failure by his fellow men. From the human point of view he was without blame.”

• (1:1) “eschewed = shunned”

• (1:3) “Job’s greatness consisted in his moral and spiritual qualities… as well as his wealth.”

• (1:5) “Job functioned as priest for his family.”

• (1:6) “sons of God” = “angels. the phrase is used of angels elsewhere in Scripture (38:7).”

• (1:6 via Gen 6:2)

• The interpretation that sons of God = angels “harmonizes with the fact that Satan, himself an angelic being, joined them on this occasion.”

• (1:7) “It is clear form this passage that Satan is a person, not just an evil influence. (1) He conversed with the Lord, which requires intellect. (2) He was antagonistic toward Job, showing that he has emotions. (3) He purposed to destroy Job and disgrace God, thus demonstrating that Satan has a will. Satan’s activities, however, are limited by the sovereign control of God. Consistently throughout Scripture Satan is presented as both a real person and a spirit being. His name means ‘adversary,’ characterizing his basic nature, which is to oppose God’s Person, His plan, and His people.”

• (1:7) “Satan had access to the earth and freedom to roam around on it. He still has this freedom and will continue to exercise it until he is bound for a thousand years during the Millennium (Rev 20:2) and then cast into the lake of fire forever (Matt 25:41).”

• (1:8) “The omniscient Lord initiates the conversation that leads to Job’s being tested and pays the highest tribute to the character of Job.”

• (1:9) “Satn impugns Job’s motives, suggesting that Job has selfish motives for serving God.”

• (1:10) The hedge which Satan sees is one of protection surrounding Job. Ironically, Job later laments the hedge God has placed around him as a sort of prison.

• (1:15) Sabeans were “nomadic bedouins living in the area of Uz and to the S.”

• (1:17) Chaldeans were “another regional group of nomadic marauders, not to be confused with the later Chaldeans, who lived in (and for a time ruled) the Babylonian Empire (7th and 6th centuries bc).”

• (1:20) tearing the robes and shaving the head were “expressions of grief common at this time.”

• (1:20) “Grief and worship can often accompany one another.”

• (1:21-22) “Satan’s first attack was against Job’s possessions. It was designed to expose Job’s true motives for serving God, which Satan contended were selfish. This test took place only after God gave Satan permission to try Job. Job recognized God’s hand in his affairs and evidenced a proper attitude toward his possessions. They were a gracious gift from God, not things he had earned and therefore had a right to keep.”

• (2:4) “Satan charged Job with callousness; i.e., being willing to give up the skin of his animals, servants, and children in order to save his own skin.”

• (2:6) “Satan was permitted to go only so far.”

• (2:7) “Satan’s second test was against Job’s person. Job’s condition was characterized by several symptoms: the skin covering his entire body was affected, he itched intensely, and he was in acute pain. His flesh attracted worms and became crusty and hard (7:5). It oozed serum and turned darker in color (7:5, 30:30). Job also experienced fever and aching bones (30:17, 30). He may have had elephantiasis or a leukemia of the skin. The good will of God included physical suffering for Job at this time, as it does for many today.”

• (2:8) “Job was not only ill, but his sickness made him unclean and therefore a social outcast, a humbling experience for one who was a judge at the city gat (29:7).”

• (2:9) “Since neither Job nor his wife knew what had transpired between God and Satan in heaven, they did not know that Satan predicted that Job would curse God, which Job refused to do, even when Satan used his wife to further tempt him. Job’s wife concluded that he was suffering because God was unfair - a popular explanation for suffering but totally contrary to the character of God. Job called her view foolishness. Many people arrive at her conclusion when they consider only empirical evidence (that which we gain by observation). Unless we also consider revelational evidence (that which comes from God), we are likely to reason as Job’s wife did.”

• (10) “Not only good but also evil comes from God to test and discipline us, and not necessarily as punishment for sin.”

• (11) “Eliphaz was a resident of the city of Teman in Uz (Edom). This town became famous for its wise men (Jer 49:7).”

• (11) “Bildad lived in the area nearby, inhabited by the descendants of Shuah, one of Abraham’s sons by Keturah (Gen 25:1-2).”

• (11) “Zophar also lived nearby, in the area of Naamath.”

• (2:11) “All three men were probably outstanding in their areas and time, since they were friends of ‘the greatest of all the men of the east’ (1:3).”

• (2:13) “Sometimes a silent presence is preferable to words for one who is hurting.”

• 
  

Reflecting God

• “We may be sure that the author [of Job] was an Israelite, since he (not JOb or his friends) frequently uses the Israelite covenant name for God (Yahweh; NIV ‘the LORD’). In the prologue (chs 1-2), divine discourses (38:1-42:6) and epilogues (42:7-17) ‘LORD’ occurs a total of 25 times, while in the rest of the boo (chs 3-37) it appears only once (12:9).”

• “We also know that the author was a wisdom writer of extreme skill, who was very familiar with the wisdom traditions of Israel and the ancient Near East. His topic is similar to that of other ancient stories of righteous sufferers. However, the unknown author of Job writes from a completely Israelite perspective. His understanding of God and creation and human suffering is firmly rooted in the theology of the OT.”

• “The setting for the story is most likely in the second millennium BC. Like the Hebrew patriarchs of that period, Job lived more than 100 years (42:16). His wealth was measured in great numbers of animals and servants (1:3), and he acted as priest for his family (1:5). The raiding of marauding tribes (1:15, 17) fits the second millennium, as does the mention of ‘a piece of silver’ in 42:11. Job is also connected by the prophet Ezekiel (14:14, 20) with the ancient non-Israelite heroes Noah and Dan’el (known from Ugaritic literature). This would definitely place him prior to the Israelite monarchy.”

• “The writing of the book can be dated anytime from the reign of Solomon to the exile. Some prefer an early date based on the increased popularity of wisdom literature in the time of Solomon. Others try to make a connection between the book and some great disaster in Israel’s history such as the death of Josiah (609 BC) or the fall of Jerusalem (586 BC). The lack of evidence prevents a conclusive answer. In any case, the author used the kernel of a much older story that had come down to him through oral and/or written sources.”

• “Job is one of the most difficult book sin the OT to translate. It uses a large technical vocabulary of words from astronomy, mining, hunting and the law courts. Many words do not appear in any other book in the OT, so they are difficult to translate. For that reason, modern translations frequently differ widely. Even the early translators of Job into Greek (the LXX) seem often to have been perplexed. The LXX of Job is about 400 lines shorter than the accepted Hebrew text, and it may be that the translators simply omitted lines he (they) did not understand. The early Syriac (Peshitta), Aramaic (Targum) and Latin (Vulgate) translators had similar difficulties.”

• “The book of Job is a carefully crafted literary masterpiece. It contains both prose and poetry, as well as other literary forms: dialogues, laments, hymns, proverbs, rhetorical questions and legal disputations.”

• Job’s spiritual uprightness, perfect family, great wealth, and spotless reputation equate to “all of the rewards that a person could possibly receive for living a righteous life.”

• Each of Job’s friends has a unique personality. “Eliphaz, the first to speak, portrays himself as a man of great experience and wisdom. He claims to have received from God a mystical vision that supports his views. The second friend is Bildad, the traditionalist, who suggests that maybe Job’s children were the cause of the problem. Zophar, the third and youngest of the speakers, is very dogmatic in his approach. He believes that Job is wrong to claim purity before God. All of the friends have one idea in common, though. They believe that Job has sinned. They are all committed to the traditional wisdom theology that sin causes suffering; therefore all suffering is the result of sin.”

• 

• Although Job’s initial response to the calamity is calm and patient, “his patience quicly disappears in the dialogues. There we see a human being who is desperately struggling to make sense of his sufferings.”

• “We all face difficulties in life that have no reasonable explanation. What will be our response?”

• In the conclusion, God appears to challenge Job’s understanding of the universe through a series of rhetorical questions. “The implication is this: if Job cannot understand the natural order o the world, how can he claim to comprehend the moral universe? And if he cannot comprehend the moral universe, how then can he accuse God of being unjust?”

• “Job never gets an answer to his problem of suffering, but he is able to go on living with his problems because he has met the Lord in a divine-human encounter.”

• “The central theme of Job is the maintenance of faith. Is it possible for a person to maintain a steadfast faith in God and to live a life blameless before God through all of the ups and downs of life? The Accuser posed this question to God in the prologue (1:9), beieving the answer was no. God was willing to accept the Accuser’s challenge, because he knew the answer was yes.”

• “Job was just the person God had in mind to prove the Accuser wrong. In allowing the Accuser to trouble Job, God also demonstrated that not all suffering is due to sin, in contradiction to the arguments of the three friends.”

• One sub-theme is the nature of God. “What kind of person is God? How can he be a just God if he allows Job, his supreme example of righteousness, to suffer without cause? This is the issue of theodicy.”

• A second sub-theme is the nature of creation. “Did God create an ordered world, as his speeches in chs 38-41 indicated, or is this a world of uncertainty where evil and suffering can break in at unexpected moments, as in the lie of Job?”

• A third sub-theme is the nature and activity of Satan. “Do all people experience the harassment of the Accuser in their lives, or is this only applicable to the story of Job?”

• “These are all issues that have challenged the greatest minds in history. Each generation has had to wreslte with the questions raised by Job. They are universal questions that are forced upon humanity through pain and suffering. Thus, Job is a timeless book that helps us to ponder some of the most fundamental issues of our human existence.”

• “The cas of characters with non-Israelite names and the setting in a non-Israelite location (Uz) contribute to the impression that this book is intended to address all humanity, not just Israel.”

• (1:1) “blameless and upright” “does not mean that Job had never sinned. It means that at the beginning o the story he was spiritually and morally right before God. God confirms this evaluation in v 8; 2:3. The following phrase - ‘eared God and shunned evil’ - is perallel in meaning to ‘blameless and upright.’”

• (1:2) “The numbers in these verses add up to multiples of ten, signifying an ideal family and great wealth.”

• (1:5) periods of feasting may last as long as a week.

• (1:6) “In Job the Hebrew for ‘accuser’ is always preceded by the definite article. In the Hebrew of 1Ch 21:1 the article is not used, because by then ‘Satan’ had become a proper name.”

• (8) “the Lord, not Satan, initiates the dialogue that leads to the testing of Job. He holds up Job as one against whom ‘the accuser’ can lodge no accusation.”

• (1:9) “‘The accuser’ boldly accuses the man God commends: he says Job’s righteousness, in which God delights, is self-serving; Job only serves God because it is profitable for him.”

• (1:12) “Satan, the accuser, is given power to afflict but is kept on a leash. In all his evil among people or in nature, Satan is under God’s power. The contest, however, is not a sham. Will Job curse God to his face? If Job does not, the accuser will be proven false and God’s delight in Job vindicated.”

• (1:15) The Sabians were “probably south Arabians from Sheba, whose descendants became wealthy traders in spices, gold and precious stones. Job 6:19 calls the Sabeans ‘traveling merchants’ and associates them with Tema (about 350 miles southeast of Jerusalem).”

• (1:17) The Chaldeans were “a people who were Bedouin until c 1000 BC, when they settled in southern Mesopotamia and later became the nucleus of Nebuchadnezzr’s empire.”

• (20) Notice that Job is silent until his kids are killed.

• (1:21) “Job’s faith remains steadfast. He acknowledges that his possessions are under God’s control, and that gives him repose even in the face of calamity.”

• (2:1-3) “Except for the final sentence, this passage is almost identical to 1:6-8. He who accused Job of having a deceitful motive is now shown to have a deceitful motive himself: to discredit the Lord through Job.”

• (2:3) “God is proud of Jobs’ reaction and emphasizes Job’s integrity to Satan, but he is displeased that Job is suffering ‘without any reason.’”

• (2:4) “Skin for skin!” is “no doubt a proverb - perhaps originally an expression of willingness to barter one animal skin for another of equal value.”

• (2:6) “Satan is still limited by God. Should Job die, neither God nor Job could be vindicated.”

• (2:9) “Satan is using Job’s wife to tempt Job as he used Eve to tempt Adam.”

• (2:9) “Since nothing but death is left for Job, his wife wants him to provoke God to administer the final stroke due to all who curse him (Lev 24:10-16).”

• (2:10) “Trouble and suffering are not always punishment for sin; for God’s people they may serve as a trial (as here) or as a discipline that culminates in spiritual gain.”

• (2:11) Job’s three friends’ “desire to console is to be commended, even though their tactics were often harsh.”

• (2:13) “Their mere presence was of more comfort to him than their words of advice would prove to be.”

Archaeological

• Jewish tradition suggests Mosaic authorship, but there is nothing in the book itself to affirm that.

• Many scholars suggest that the book is a compilation or the product of multiple authors. Specifically, they suggest that the prose frame and/or Elihu speeches were added at a later date. It should be noted, though, that none of this is even remotely conclusive. And some (e.g., the removal of the prose frame) really doesn’t make a lot of sense.

• “The story itself… is of much more ancient origin, most likely passed along by oral or written tradition. The author evidently made a deliberate effort to preserve the archaic, non-Israelite flavor of the language of Job and his friends.”

• Most scholars consider the 10th century BC the earliest possible date for writing. “The majority of scholars today consider the work to be postexilic. However, a postexilic date seems unlikely in light of other ancient Near Eastern texts of the same genre. A large number of ‘pessimistic’ texts from the ancient world to one degree or another parallel the book of Job in that they engage the problem of suffering and the apparent indifference of heaven.”

• “Job sets up the problem of the righteous sufferer. The conventional answer people of Solomon’s day gave to the question of why people suffer is that they were being punished for their own sins or those of their forebears (cf Jn 9), and this is the very answer Job’s friends proposed. But the reader knows from the outset that Job is suffering because he is righteous (Job 1). Thus, when Job rails against the pain and contends that he has not deserved it (e.g., ch 31), the early reader - who had insider knowledge from the prelude - recognized that he spoke the truth. Un