BR - Injustice and challenging wisdom

The Book of Job

Here are links to all our previous threads.

from le Salon:
Prep: http://www.librarything.com/topic/127545
Genesis: http://www.librarything.com/topic/129966
Exodus: http://www.librarything.com/topic/131811
Leviticus: http://www.librarything.com/topic/133405
Numbers: http://www.librarything.com/topic/135184
Deuteronomy: www.librarything.com/topic/136380
Joshua: http://www.librarything.com/topic/137927
Judges (same thread as Joshua, starts on post #69): http://www.librarything.com/topic/137927#3452932
Ruth (same thread as Joshua, starts on post #142): http://www.librarything.com/topic/137927#3478722
1 & 2 Samuel: http://www.librarything.com/topic/139684
1 & 2 Kings: http://www.librarything.com/topic/142552
1 & 2 Chronicles: http://www.librarything.com/topic/146697
Ezra and Nehemiah: http://www.librarything.com/topic/154880
Tobit & Judith: http://www.librarything.com/topic/159435

from Club Read:
http://www.librarything.com/topic/168909

This thread is intended to be for a group read. Feel free to join or post. For now I will try to organize my notes to post here. (I have 18 pages of written, but disorganized notes.)

I read Job for the first time in February. I used two versions:
- from The Wisdom Books: Job, Proverbs, and Ecclesiastes: A Translation with Commentary by Robert Alter
- The HarperCollins Study Bible : New Revised Standard Version, Including the Apocryphal/Deuterocanonical Books With Concordance (Fully Revised and Updated). No touchstone (?). Link here

A quick list of thoughts:
- Some biblical scholars call it the highest form of poetry in the Bible (or did he mean OT?).
- After a two chapter prose set-up, I was caught off guard by how much Job's poetry in chapter 3 got to me. So were his three friends. But our responses were a little different.
- In some ways Job opens a challenge to religion, but doesn't end that way
- Job does challenge the wisdom from the Bible, especially from The Book of Psalms (and probably The Book of Proverbs)
- to put it another way:
---- conventional "wisdom" was the belief in divine distributive justice - that is that you got in life what you deserved, and suffered for your sins.
---- Job's experience leads to to seeing clearly that this is not true, even if no one will listen to him.
---- In the process he mocks Judaic wisdom, especially the Psalms
- Theologically Judaism has found Job very troubling and controversial. Christianity traditionally has not. Instead Christianity admires Job's faith and sees him as a biblical hero.

A quick structural outline

Chapters
1 & 2: Frame Story
3: Job's death wish
4 - 27: debates between Job and his friends
28: hymn to wisdom
29-31: Job's conclusion
32 - 37: Elihu's speeches
38 - 42.6: God speaks to Job
42:7-17: concluding frame story

Chapters 4-27
4 - 5: Eliphaz
6 - 7: Job
8: Bildad
9 - 10: Job
11: Zophar
12 - 14: Job
15: Eliphaz
16-17: Job
18: Bildad
19: Job
20: Zophar
21: Job
22: Eliphaz
23 - 24: Job
25: Bildad
26 - 27: Job, but garbled so unclear.

From Robert Alter's introduction:

- Job contradicts the consensus view of reward & punishment, and subverts traditional wisdom.
- It expresses outrage with God's world, but does not question God
- It is artistically philosophical, and not systematic.
- Job's concern is with the structure of reality and the ephemeral life within that structure
- stylistically unique

- rejects anthropocentric creation
Some more on this. There are Genesis 1:1 references throughout Job. In Genesis the world is created for man, and man is the ultimate creation. When God speaks and challenges Job, he contradicts this. Man is just one small thing of unfathomable creations of God.

- There are no Israelites in Job. And it's not a history of the the Jewish covenant. Job is considered one of the early wise men and lived somewhere east of the promise land, and, apparently close to Arab areas. His exact location is unclear.

- Alter argues for a 6th to 4th century BCE composition based on linguistics and especially based on the Aramaic influences on the language. He imagines Job being written in the shadow of the Babylonian exile. (Personally I find that more romantic, then speculative.)

- The frame story reads like folklore. It's reasonable to imagine a Job folktale that was later reworked into the poetic book. The frame story preserving some elements of the older folktale. Alter calls the frame story a pretext. He also feels that the Hymn to Wisdom (chapter 28) and Elihu's speeches (chapters 32-37) were added later as "interpolations".

- Alter translated Elihu has satire and humor. Elihu comes across pretty silly in the NRSV. In Alter's translation, he comes across as very entertaining. (Otherwise, Alter's translation is awkward and, to me, confusing. But the notes are so enlightening that he's well worth reading)

- Alter see's three tiers poetry
Lowest - the back and forth debates of Chapters 4-27
2nd tier - Jobs opening and closing Chapters 3 & 29-31
highest - God in 38-42

In my opinion, chapter 3 is the best in the book. And the poetry remains good for a bit longer, slowly getting less and less interesting. God may be great poetry in Hebrew, but I did not find it all that fascinating, as poetry, in translation.

Is poetry even translatable? It relies so much on the rythm and sounds on one hand, and also on wordplay. I've always had difficulties with biblical poetry. But I have started to enjoy Job, I'm at chapter 13 now. Alter is hard to read in ebook form because of the way the notes are gathered at the end of each chapter. Maybe I should give up on him and read the NRSV with the Harper Colins notes. I can read those in the Olive Tree app on my iPad, with the text on one side and the notes on the other, which is invaluable.

I'll have to dig out my Alter. I had thought that Job was far older.

Robert

Accidental double posting. So here's a lion instead of a duplicate message:



Robert

>7 FlorenceArt: Flo - the translations of Alter and NRSV are quite different in meaning, clarity, implication, etc. I also read some with the Jerusalem bible, but it did not add much for me, do I quit after a bit.

As for the Notes - I highly recommend Alter with notes, as the notes are the best part. But generally I preferred the NRSV translation for readability. Alter can make the simple very confusing. But I have a hard copy of Alter so the notes are in easy reach. Sounds like you need two tablets! One for the text and a separate one for the notes.

>8 Mr.Durick: Robert - the HarperCollins editors agree on the dating (And it's a pretty strong group of editors, as far as I can tell)

>9 Mr.Durick: yum

The Hebrews were the least sentimental and romantic of peoples. The Old Testament stories are heavy with irony, often of the most sardonic kind. And yet their hard, acrid realism appears against a background of belief that is the substance of the most exalted and affirmative religions, compared to which the religions of their sister civilizations, Egyptian, Babylonian, and even Greek, presented a conception of the universe and man both terrible and mean.

from The Vision of Tragedy by Richard B. Sewall

Just read this yesterday. Job is that "background of belief that is the substance of the most exalted and affirmative religions". His experiences both in the folktale and the poetic dialog are the "hard, acrid realism". Perhaps I should soften to "is" and "are" to "may be like"?

notes from the introduction to Job in the HarperCollins Study Bible

- At stake in Job is the survival of religion
- There are many levels of tension, and irony abounds.
- "Job" can translate to enemy, or hated one or "where is the divine father"
- dates Job to the Late 6th or 5th century bce

Notes from the Job essay in The Literary Guide to the Bible by Moshe Greenberg.

- contradiction between the patient Job of the frame story and the impatient Job of the poetic dialogues, who has a crisis of faith.
- There is not consistent course of argument. Notes that the problem of Coherence is a literary problem.

Opening frame story
- Ponders whether Job's vocal fidelity to god is only vocal (1:20-21 - "Naked I came ...and naked I return")

First round of dialogue:

Eliphaz in chapters 4 & 5 opens several themes that repeate
- He is surprised by Job's rebellion against god
- preaches the wisdom doctrine of distributive justice
- has a revelation - that man cannot be innocent and his life is too short to acquire wisdom. Man is born to wisdom. The only answer it to turn to God. (This is, I think, where Job ends up too)
- Bildad will argue that passed down wisdom spreads across more time and somewhat counters the limits of a short life. He is, of course, arguing that the Wisdom tradition has value.
- Zophar will tell Job that if God would answer, he would show Job his ignorance (which is what actually happens)

Jobs response includes frustration that his friends have deserted him. All he asks is that they listen to him and show him his faults. Instead the feed him standard wisdom and the repeat the wisdom of idea of distributive justice.

As the conversations carry on, Job further and further undermines the Wisdom tradition with real observation. He especially focuses on the falsehood of distributive justice. While Job is only a story, his words have truth that do undermine this. He themes spread out. He begins to cover the injustice in society in general and, iirc, eventually preaches about the hardships of the innocent poor. That happens late and gets a little lost, but I found that fascinating that unsolvable social injustice would rear it's head here. It's so far from the personal tragedy of Job.

- In undermining the Wisdom tradition, Job will mock many of the Psalms.
- Job will use legal language and express wanting to present his case.
- Job plays with contradictory logic.
---- Who could judge a case with god and stay impartial?
---- Expresses the infinite power & wisdom and then notes its destructive results
- Job may touch on the afterlife in his ideas of reviving after death.

Some trends through the book
- Job's feelings evolve. He moves from rejecting life to longing for intimacy with God.
- The friends get continually harsher
- The friends criticism rouses Job to go further and deeper in his thoughts. This also moves Job away from his depressive abyss.

Greenberg continued

Second round of dialogue

- Friends begin to mock Job's wisdom
- They begin to elaborate on the punishments of the wicked
--- Eliphaz - torment of the wicked
--- Bildad - destruction of the "tent" of children - ie. of their lineage
--- Zophar - uses digestive imagery.
- Job begins to talk of a redeemer in heaven who will argue for him.

The hymn to wisdom (chap 28) - Job is teaching his friends to say, "I don't know"

Jobs closing (chaps 29-31) is legal

Elihu - is a setting.

God
- presents unanswerable questions.
- The purpose of the Behemoth and Leviathan are only to decenter man
- God basically concludes that he does not conform to human conceptions of reason and justice
- Greenberg argues God has liberated Job from false expectations (derived from concepts of the covenant). But he notes that God offers no alternative for Job.

I think these are Greenberg's conclusions from Job, but I've waited to long to get this down. They might be my conclusions from Greenberg, or a mixture of the two

- Distributive justice is false. Do not assume sin from suffering.
- Just fear God and shun evil. There is nothing else you can do.
- Job shows "an irrepressible yearning for divine order, baffled but never stifled by the disarray of reality"

Finally James Kugel's take in How to Read the Bible.

Kugel wonders about the affects of Babylon on the Wisdom tradition and feels the Job poet could not quite make peace with sages from the east about suffering. Job provides no straight forward answer.

He notes that Job was a source of controversy for Jews throughout the Middle Ages, but no so for Christians. Christianity loved Job's righteousness (which is praised in the Epistle of James). They loved how he found strength even in his affliction.

I have 11 pages of notes from my actually reading of the text. I'm planning to read through them and mention anything worth remembering here, but I'm not sure how valuable these notes really will be for me or anyone else. So, apologies ahead of time if this doesn't work out. My goal is to NOT re-read all of Job as I do this...

chapter 1
Alter translated Hasatan to the Adversary. Satan, as the distinct bad entity, hero of Paradise Lost, was not yet in circulation.

chapter 2
I dwell on the seven days of silence after jobs "friends" show up. Keep in mind these aren't his buddies. Job is a wiseman, and these are his peers, fellow wisemen who have come to help him by sharing their wisdom. They all sit silent for seven days and, so when Job speaks, they have each built up in their mind their own expectations of how he will respond and what they will say. I suspect they have lulled their brains to sleep with the idea that Job is ruined and will have no strength to offer much and they will merely console him and tell him to buck up. But, keep in mind, we readers are wisemen too. We are also watching over our own seven days, which only lasts a few seconds in reality. But still we reconstruct that seven days and build our own expectations up. What is Job dwelling on and where will it lead him?

chapter 3
A note on biblical poetry. Typical is a two line verse where the second part parallels the first part in such a way that the overall affect is intended to reinforce the sense. Alter calls this intensification, a word that seems correct but leaves a bad taste in my mouth. Intensity is a judgment call, and making it more intense assumes it was intense to begin with, so that description forces the poetry down our throats. But the idea is logically sensible. Another phrase, which Alter quotes in his Psalms introduction, is "syntactic accentual parallelism" - and I like accent better than intensification. Anyway, the point is the two parts are grammatically parallel, have sounds and meaning that are parallel, whether synonymous or contradictory. And that the affect is to give more accent to what is expressed. The second part accents and also changes the first part.

As reader this means we have to read both lines together as one, and this of and by itself expands our thinking a bit.

All this you will find reflected in Job, although with variety. Sometimes it's three lines or four where the accents are re-emphasized. But, I think chapter 3, lines 1-10 are bit extreme. Each line emphasizes the previous one so that the only way to read it is to have the entire ten lines in your mind at the same time. And this evolutionary. As you read the second phrase, you re-evaluate the first. Then the third phrase makes you re-evaluate the whole line. And all ten lines keep changing as you read them until it concludes.

If you are like me, try it - go read the first ten lines again: (NRSV link here)

---

Job is protesting his life, cursing the day he was born, and even the joy of the orgasm from which he was conceived ("let no joyful cry be heard"). Of course, YMMV, but I found this accenting to result in a controlled and intensely expressive burst of anger. It reverberates. It's so much more effective then our usual four letter words. Like the guitar solo that introduces The James Gang's Funk #49, it's critical to the entire book. It sets the book, gets our attention...it makes the book.

Thank you for these notes Dan. I wish I had something smart to say in return but to be honest I haven't had time to read them with the attention they deserve. I'll try to correct that soon.

Flo - If my comments offer something useful, great. Part of me it just getting them out, however. So, don't feel pressured to read them with any care. Not sure they truly deserve any attention...

finally some time to continue

chapters 4 & 5 - Eliphaz
Important chapters and the best of the friends responses to Job (especially chap 4, IMO). It is not at all the kind of response Job was looking for, and yet it's also the nicest response of all yet to come. While Job is frustrated, and will express that later, Eliphaz is holding back, restraining his true feelings of how much he is undone and repulsed by Job and his response.

note - Alters translation confuses chapter 4. NRSV is a much clearer translation.

Eliphaz opens by giving Job an excuse for what Eliphaz sees as his failures. (“But now it has come to you, and you are impatient; it touches you, and you are dismayed.”) It’s only nice on the surface. It shows that Eliphaz thinks Job is wrong, has already come to his own conclusion about Job and; it implies Eliphaz clearly feels he knows better.

Mixed in Eliphaz's response are several references to the creation story in Genesis, but in sort of reverse sense (“By the breath of God they perish”, “those who live in houses of clay”), his conclusion about Job - that Job surely must have deserved what he is getting, (“Think now, who that was innocent ever perished?”), his philosophical placement of man in relation to God (“Can mortals be righteous before God? Can human beings be pure before* their Maker?”), and his advice -- advice which happens to be what Job ends up concluding (“As for me, I would seek God, and to God I would commit my cause.”)

This is the long way of saying Eliphaz has a lot going on here. Yet, despite all this complexity and his fascinating talk of his vision, it ends with standard conventional wisdom…

The rest of the conversation is Job rebelling against and undermining conventional wisdom, while his friends respond by restating the conventional wisdom even stronger.

chapters 6 - 7 Job's reply
opens: "O that my vexation were weighed, and all my calamity laid in the balances! For then it would be heavier than the sand of the sea;" - maybe a little "vexation" toward Eliphaz?
- in chapter 6 Job is justifying his complaint
- in chapter 7 job goes on about his endless suffering and insomnia.
- first reference to Canaanite mythology - Yamm, a Canaanite sea god
- Ch 7:16-17 plays on and mocks psalm 8 (v4-5)

Psalm 8 v4-5:
4 what are human beings that you are mindful of them,
mortals that you care for them?
5 Yet you have made them a little lower than God,*
and crowned them with glory and honour.

Job 7: 16-17
17 What are human beings, that you make so much of them,
that you set your mind on them,
18 visit them every morning,
test them every moment?

Chapter 8 - Bildad
- In the notes for this chapter Alter says with these friends the Job poet performs a "delicate balancing act in assigning them boilerplate poetry that reflects their conventional mindset and giving them some striking lines..."
- Anyway, Bildad says listen to the elders and learn the wisdom. "Would Shaddai pervert what is right?" i.e. Job must have done something to deserve his fate.

Chapters 9 & 10 - Job's reply
Job thinks through the idea of arguing his case with God and how pointless it would be and yet how much he desires to be able to do so. It's worth quoting a bit from chapter 9:

16 If I summoned him and he answered me,
I do not believe that he would listen to my voice.
17 For he crushes me with a tempest,
and multiplies my wounds without cause;
18 he will not let me get my breath,
but fills me with bitterness.
19 If it is a contest of strength, he is the strong one!
If it is a matter of justice, who can summon him?
20 Though I am innocent, my own mouth would condemn me;
though I am blameless, he would prove me perverse.
21 I am blameless; I do not know myself;
I loathe my life.
22 It is all one; therefore I say,
he destroys both the blameless and the wicked.
23 When disaster brings sudden death,
he mocks at the calamity of the innocent.
24 The earth is given into the hand of the wicked;
he covers the eyes of its judges—
if it is not he, who then is it?

That's strong stuff partly because it's entirely true. Disasters do not fall the wicked, but take everyone down. So much for a just god.

Note another anti-creation reference in line 18 - God, who breathes life into the mud in creation "will not let me get my breathe"

Following along here with great interest. That is interesting about the "breath" in line 18.

Chapter 11 - Zophar
Condemns Job as a liar and focus's on purity.
Alter's translation in verse 6 has "for prudence is double-edged" - which has such a wonderfully ambiguous meaning. But the NRSV translates the same line as "For wisdom is many sided" and I suspect the ambiguity is Alter's creation and not derived from the text.

Chapters 12, 13 & 14 - Job's reply
- In chapter 12 Job opens by mocking his friends wisdom, and presumable Zophar's very simplistic wisdom argument. Then goes on about the capricious destructive power of god
- more anti-creation in v22: God "uncovers the deeps out of darkness, / and brings deep darkness to light."
- In chapter 13 Job rants and blasts the questions, who he calls quacks. I found myself writing down a lot of quotes, like v5 "Would that you fell silent and this would be your wisdom"
- Job also works out, in an interesting way, the conundrum of making a case against god.

7 "Will you speak falsely for God,
and speak deceitfully for him?
8 Will you show partiality towards him,
will you plead the case for God?
9 Will it be well with you when he searches you out?
Or can you deceive him, as one person deceives another?
10 He will surely rebuke you
if in secret you show partiality.
11 Will not his majesty terrify you,
and the dread of him fall upon you?
12 Your maxims are proverbs of ashes,
your defences are defences of clay. "

And note 13:24 "Why do you hide your face,
and count me as your enemy?" What is interesting is that at this point Job is dealing with a silent God, which is what humanity deals with. It's relevant to us - to be asking these frustrating fundamental questions into the silence. Also, he's right, his "friends" maxims are worthless, just words, ashes. They do not represent our reality. i.e. the wicked aren't punished and the good are not rewarded.
- Chapter 14 focuses on mortality and the limited life of man. Actually this has been talked about numerous times above, by both Job and his friends/questioners. "And man lies down and will not arise / till the sky is no more he will not awaken"

Chapter 15 - Eliphaz.
No longer nice, Eliphaz now blasts Job - for undermining religion.

Chapters 16 & 17 - Job's reply
- In chapter 16 Job is arguing his innocence, but his frustration expresses itself in word play that condemns his friends.
v7 - Alter translates this as "But now he has worn me out" - leaving "him" as God, or maybe Eliphaz. NRSV says "God", not "him"
v11 - "God gives me up to the ungodly, and casts me into the hands of the wicked." - ie Job's "friends"
v18 is a Cain & Abel reference: "O earth, do not cover my blood; let my outcry find no resting-place."
- in chapter 17 Job prays for relief ("Where is my hope")

Chapter 18 - Bildad
re-states the conventional wisdom of the proverbs, that God punishes the wicked. He uses the word "surely" twice. It's all very simple to Bildad.

Chapter 19 - Job responds
Job is now fully an outcast within this circle of four. He has a famous line, important to Christians: v25 "But I know my redeemer lives, and in the end he will stand up on earth." It's an odd line in that it's not really apropos of what he talks about before this...not that any of this discussion has held any logic in the way we think of it today.

>22 avidmom: Hi. Cool. Just noticed your post. Nice to know someone is reading this. There are endless details like that line embedded in the text here. I'm just touching on a few.

You read so much more in this than I do, Dan. Thank you for your insights. I have been reading Alter's version but I have difficulties with it. I think I will switch to the NRSV.

I have to say I admire Job's obstinacy to confront God and his sanctimonious "friends" in claiming that God is being unfair.

And the prize of the most amazing statement goes to Eliphaz, 4-7:

"Recall, pray: what innocent man has died, and where were the upright demolished?"

I don't think I would have to recall very hard for that.

>26 FlorenceArt: understand about Alter, he seems to think lack-of-clarity is somehow a better form of translation. I have to say his psalm translations are terrible - unclear and lacking any poetic taste, if that makes sense. He did better with Job. He adds some interesting aspects that the NRSV smooths over. I read a chapter by Alter first, then followed with the NRSV. With psalms I alternate whether I do Alter or NRSV first.

Also, thanks for compliment, although these are generally not my insights, mostly just noting the more interesting notes. And I admire Job too.

Chapter 20 - Zophar
On God's punishment of the wicked

Chapter 21 - Job's reply
A clearly annoyed Job argues the wicked do NOT get their just punishments.

Chapter 22 - Eliphaz
Tells Job he is evil. My notes say "unreflective moral certitude", which I think I quoted from Alter, not sure

Chapters 23-24 - Job's reply
In chapter 23 Job wishes he could make his case before God ("I shall come out like gold"), but dwells on God's silence then fears what God has in store for him. ("13 But he stands alone and who can dissuade him? What he desires, that he does. 14 For he will complete what he appoints for me; and many such things are in his mind... the Almighty has terrified me "

In chapter 24 Job dwells on how the wicked are not punished. (v25 "If it is not so, who will prove me a liar,
and show that there is nothing in what I say?’")

Note - Alter claims verses 18-24 are garbled and maybe misplaced. They read OK to me though.

Note 2 - I seem to recall Job expressing some things about social justice here, about how the poor are neglected while the rich get richer. Anyway, it was interesting to see something along those lines expressed in such an early text.

Chapter 25 - Bildad
only six lines

Chapter 26 - Job replies
Alter gives several lines here to Bildad and argues they might even be Zophar's third response. The lines are clearly in agreement with the wisdom tradition and with Job's friends, and not with Job, so far. Some argue Job is being sarcastic, or that Bildad has become so predictable that Job is finishing Bildad's speech for him.

Chapter 27 - Job begins to conclude the discussion
Alter only gives Job lines 1-7 - the theme is basically "I hold fast my righteousness, and will not let it go;"
Alter gives lines 8-23 to Zophar (the only friend not to get a third spiel). The HarperCollins Study Bible can't explain lines, except maybe as sarcasm.

Chapter 28 - hymn to wisdom.
This should be Job speaking, but Alter and many others see it as a later addition to the text.
This is nice. The basics are concluded in the final line: “Truly, the fear of the Lord, that is wisdom;and to depart from evil is understanding.”
My notes say " Alter odd but superior to NRSV"

Chapters 29-31 - Job's conclusion
Not all that interesting to me.
In chapter 29 Jobs dwells on the riches he once had
In chapter 30 he dwells on his current state of misery and as a target of mockery
In chapter 31 Job restates his case.
My notes say that the NRSV is much better than Alter in chapters 30 & 31.

Chapters 32 to 37 - Elihu
Elihu is frustrated by the silence of the elders after Job's last speeches, so he, who is not an elder, goes on a long winding monologue that essentially restates the wisdom tradition already given by Job's "friends". He doesn't add anything new.

Alter does something nice here. Compare translations:

Alter's version, from chapter 32:16-20

16 I waited, for they did not speak,
for they stood, and no longer responded
17 I, too, will speak out my part,
I will speak my mind, I, too.
18 For I am full up with words,
the wind in my belly constrains me.
19 Look, my belly is like unopened wine
like new wineskins it bursts.
20 Let me speak that I may be eased,
let me open my lips and speak out.

Elihu is mocking himself, he need to speak held in like gas ("wind in my belly") and he needs to speak like one needs to burp or fart (" Let me speak that I may be eased". Alter has presented the young Elihu as satire, someone supposed to be taken as humor. NRSV obscures this so much it gets lost.

The same lines from the NRSV:

16 And am I to wait, because they do not speak,
because they stand there, and answer no more?
17 I also will give my answer;
I also will declare my opinion.
18 For I am full of words;
the spirit within me constrains me.
19 My heart is indeed like wine that has no vent;
like new wineskins, it is ready to burst.
20 I must speak, so that I may find relief;
I must open my lips and answer.

Chapters 38 - 41 - God speaks.

First an outline of sorts
- God gives two speeches. The first is chapters 38 & 39. After a few lines from Job, God gives his second speech in chapters 40 & 41.
- God covers his wonders
--- 38:4-21 - on cosmogeny
--- 38:22-38 - on meteorology
--- 38:39 - 39:40 - on zoology, covering the animals
--- 40:15-41:11 - mythical zoology - Behemoth & Leviathan

Throughout God's response are many subtle direct responses to Job's complaints. Such as God nothing the darkness and light, which Job only wishes for darkness, or God saying how the sea came out of it's "womb", where Job wished the womb he was in never existed.

Behemoth
Alter sees this as an attempt at describing a hippopotamus. That is not the way it has been used in art in literature.

Leviathan
Alter sees this as an attempt as describing a crocodile. But, same problem, art and literature have treated this differently. The leviathan is the source for Moby Dick, for example. (Job is a major theme in Moby Dick, although I have to admit not fully understanding the relationship - or at least I haven't worked it out coherently yet)

But the basic theme here is that God has removed man from the center of the universe. God does a lot of wonderful stuff, and this mankind thing is just one of the those things, and we can't possibly hope to understand God.

What interesting is that while it's an answer that Job cannot possibly have any response to, and it's true, our senses only give us access to a very tiny fraction of all the information in the world out there, still, God hasn't addressed Job's questions, including his main concern on the failure of the distributive justice, the false idea underlying the wisdom tradition. It's just left hanging here. Life isn't fair.

In Chapter 42 Job responds: "Therefore I have uttered what I did not understand, things too wonderful for me, which I did not know." God wraps it up by saying the Job was right in what he said (including the bit about life being unfair) and the friends were wrong and spoke falsely. Then Job his given is fortune back and ten new children (because kids are replaceable) and lives a long happy life.

Why was Job right and the friends wrong? Because Job described the world as he saw it, whereas his friends responded with the wisdom tradition and stuck to it, even when it contracted what we can all clearly observe.

Finally caught up! (I came via Esther and Maccabees; the latter at least were greatly entertaining.) I'm just at the start of Job, so I guess I haven't actually caught up with you yet, Daniel, but just wanted to check in!

I finally finished Job! It helped that I wanted to be ready to start Psalms on Monday, but also that I abandoned Alter. After many false starts I was able to enjoy the last chapters, although the end has obviously big chunks missing and is a bit confusing.

I especially enjoyed chapter 28, where Job describes how man upturns mountains and digs the soil to uncover hidden treasures, and makes bread from the soil, but wisdom is hidden from him and cannot be mined for.

Congrats flow. Maybe it's time to abandon Alter...maybe he is the reason I haven't been able to enjoy the psalms...

Next thread is up, on the second try, here---
https://www.librarything.com/topic/179892

From a philosophical and religious perspective, Job was a disappointment. The comments I has read here and there from religious scholars led me to expect more. On second thought though, I think I understand the point of the story, but I don't like it. I have some notes about this, but I'm afraid I might overstep the boundaries of this thread if I post them.

I would love it if you posted them here. It's been a while and I will need to dust up my own thoughts. In the end I think I was ok with what Job did. I liked that he challenged, and played with challenging further, and I liked that god's answer doesn't actually address his main points, leaving them out there for the reader to think about.

OK then, here are my thoughts. I hope I won't offend anyone, as this is the point of view of someone who has never held any kind of religious belief and has some difficulties relating to them.

From a philosophic and religious perspective, Job was a disappointment. I was expecting more, based on comments I read here and there from various religious scholars. Specifically, I was waiting for the debate that Job said he wanted, between God and himself. But there was no debate.

Instead, this is what I read after God suddenly appears out of a whirlwind: He launches in a very impressive discourse (one of the literary peaks of the book) that can be summed up thus:
- I am the almighty, I created the world and everything on it, and I command to everything on it. Now what do you have to say for yourself?

To which Job replies:
Job 40
4 “See, I am of small account; what shall I answer you?
I lay my hand on my mouth.
5 I have spoken once, and I will not answer;
twice, but will proceed no further.”

The Harper Collins notes see this as conceding defeat:
“40.4–5 Against the background of cosmic wonder, Job recognizes divine silence about human beings and perceives the futility of greatness, even moral excellence. He therefore vows to abandon his challenge of God’s conduct.”

OK, maybe. That's not how I read it at first though. What I read was a rather childish, or maybe cowardly:
- I spoke twice already, and I see it's useless as you're not going to recognize my plea, so I'll keep silent now.

Then God:
- Well come on, show me what you can do! Can you defeat Behemoth or Leviathan as I did? Can you?

At this Job folds completely (chapter 42):
​1 Then Job answered the Lord:
2 “I know that you can do all things,
and that no purpose of yours can be thwarted.
3 ‘Who is this that hides counsel without knowledge?’
Therefore I have uttered what I did not understand,
things too wonderful for me, which I did not know.
4 ‘Hear, and I will speak;
I will question you, and you declare to me.’
5 I had heard of you by the hearing of the ear,
but now my eye sees you;
6 therefore I despise myself,
and repent in dust and ashes.”

I don't now about you, but I don't call this debate. I call it bullying.

But maybe this, after all, is the message that the scholars saw and appreciated more than I do: God is so great and powerful that it is not for humans to question Him. Which makes sense, if you must believe in a omnipotent creator, I guess.

I did find it interesting how this book gives an insight on the evolution toward a belief in an afterlife. In other middle-eastern religions, the evils suffered by men were assigned to gods, and thought to be triggered by ritual transgressions. Since the rituals to follow were so numerous and complex, it could be understood that the victim did not realize or remember his transgression, although I understand that Job's question (What did I do to deserve this?) can already be found in several texts. However, with the gradual shift from ritual purity to moral righteousness, it gets more difficult to justify random evil. You can see a trace of this shift when Job's well-meaning "friends" talk of purity, while he maintains that he has been virtuous. Job himself gives hints of the next logical evolution when he complains that this life is all that we have, and if we are punished for nothing, there will be no setting things to right afterward. If you must believe in a single, all-powerful god who punishes the wicked and rewards the just, since it is pretty obvious that retribution doesn't happen in this life, you have to think up an afterlife where this happens.

A little anecdotal fact I happened to notice while looking for the HC notes on Psalms: Job has seven sons and three daughters (twice!), just like Baal. And like Baal, his three daughters are named, but not his sons.

Regarding Job, Florence, I had a similar response to yours, but I think it's a bit more open-ended than that whether it's just cowardice (and even at that, I mean, God's pretty scary, so I think we can sympathize with Job even if it doesn't make him a hero of rebellion for the ages) or something more complex and savoury, a deep deep irony. (As I described at greater length in my review: https://www.librarything.com/work/14971410/reviews/108698345).

>40 MeditationesMartini: Hadn't seen your review before. That was fun.

Yes, great review! And it reflect pretty much how I felt when I was reading. And also it reminds me of something that I had forgotten already: the worst injustice in all this, is that Job never, ever, even once rebels or reneges. Up to the last minute, he maintains that he is the victim of injustice but he still recognizes God's right to do this to him. And what thanks does he get in return? God pulls out Behemoth and Leviathan, and how do you trump that when you're only a puny human? That's unfair, that is.

And here I am getting all worked up again...

I'm thinking that kind of rebellion, called God bad, while it hovers on the edges, is out of context for the book. But, I think there is also a concession by God. The world isn't fair. He concedes Job's argument there by not contesting it. It's a victory of sort and I think Job may realize he will win that battle, as long as he doesn't say so explicitly.

"Out of context" meaning kind of "out of bounds," beyond the pale, off the playing field? Yes, true. Job wins the debate, and he sems like he might just be the kind of guy for whom that's meaningful consolation for all his suffering.

I am joining this party rather late, but all that has gone before is very interesting. The one thing that bothers me most about the Book of Job is never mentioned. And I apologize in advance for offenses given by the following:

I am astonished that no one ever comments on the utter bad faith demonstrated by God right at the outset! Here he is strolling through the garden with Satin who, if I recall correctly, was cast out of heaven by that same God and is the very personification of Evil! And here the two of them are conspiring together against a poor unsuspecting human who has done his utmost to please that God.

If the Book of Job is the word of God, how could anyone take anything seriously after God has exposed himself to be complicit with the Enemy? It reminds me of a two-bit novel about mafia intrigues.

So I ask you: Do you not see the utter perfidy demonstrated by God in this instance? Any other messages that follow in the Book of Job are all overshadowed and cancelled out IMHO by the initial betrayal of a God everyone is supposed to believe in! I'm just saying . . .

Ok, I'll have at go at a response. It's well...not the point. God and Satan are just set up. It doesn't really make any sense, but it's just folk tale stuff. Bad stuff happens. The key to the setup is that Job is blameless. And the point is Job's response.

I think if we take God literally here we are missing the point of the story. God is just a foil, the reality we deal with and believe in, that we find comfort in and yet that fails to protect us. Job is an outlet for the exasperation this leads us to. But he's a very controlled outlet.

It's easy to mock a God that does this to his most earnest servant. But, there is a component of reality. Things we count on aren't always reliable.

I guess I'm not contradicting you, just trying to expand the perspectives.

>45 Poquette: The Satan in this text has very little to do with the one you are describing. That came later. I have no idea when, but I would suspect long after most of the Bible was written. Satan is not even his name, but his function: the satan, meaning the accuser. He is a high official at the court of God. Harper Collins calls him "the Lord’s master spy on the road toward becoming a hostile agent".

The key to the setup is that Job is blameless. And the point is Job's response.

I understand that God and Satan are both constructs in this instance. That is the modern scholarly view. It is funny that I, a nonbeliever, am so offended by the construct. But there it is. ;-)

>45 Poquette: yup, totally agree on the perfidy. God's reliably the worst guy in the bible.

>45 Poquette: He's like the archetypal patriarch in a Tennessee Williams play. At least the image I have of a Tennessee Williams play. Unfair, abusive, explosive, irrational. An ordinary human with too much power.

>50 MeditationesMartini: and >51 FlorenceArt: And people were expected to believe in that! It boggles the imagination!

Not were, but are.

Without belief, it's a non-issue. But with to-the-word belief it becomes a dilemma.

Indeed.