Job 1:1-3 There was a man in the land of Uz, whose name was Job; and that man was perfect and upright, and one that feared God… Job may be called "the first of the Bible heathens." He was not a Jew, he was one "outside the pale of the visible Church." The problems of the book are of interest to man as man, and not as either Jew or Gentile. There is no allusion in the book to Jewish traditions, customs, or modes of thought,. The sacrifices mentioned are primitive, not Mosaic. There is a striking breadth and universalism in its pictures of life, manners, customs, and places. There is a variety about the local colouring that we find in no book that is undoubtedly Jewish in its origin. There is a marked absence of the strong assertion of God as Israel's God which we elsewhere find. The picture of Satan is very different from that which we have elsewhere in Scripture. Many considerations point to the very high antiquity of Job's time, — such as his own great longevity; the primitive and patriarchal simplicity of life and customs; the reference to sacrifices, but to neither priest nor shrine; the fact that the only form of idolatry spoken of is the very primitive one of the worship of the sun and moon; and the total silence of the history to such striking and momentous events as the destruction of Sodom, and the giving of the law. When or by whom the book was written we have not sufficient evidence to warrant even a guess. The presence of the book in the Canon ought to be a standing marvel to those who can see in the Old Testament only a collection of Jewish literature, a store house of national thought, history, poetry, or theology. The book stands by itself, sublime in its solitariness, suggestive in its isolation. Not less remarkable is the book if regard be had to its literary character, its poetic elevation, its dramatic daring, its full-blown magnificence of imagery. Carlyle says, "There is nothing written, I think, in the Bible or out of it, of equal literary merit." The form is essentially dramatic. The problem presented is one phase of the world-old and worldwide one of human suffering. It is the most inscrutable side of the mystery that is presented and treated — the suffering of a righteous man; not of one made righteous, purified, by the discipline of pain, but righteous prior to the assault of affliction. There is brought before us a figure of piety and fame, public repute and private virtue. Then follows the charge of selfishness, preferred by the accuser, and the Divine permission that he be put to the test. The working out of this test, its effect upon him and upon his friends, constitute the body of the drama. The theory of the friends is this; in this life pain is proportioned to sin, and joy to righteousness; suffering to transgression, and reward to innocence. It makes no provision for a mystery of suffering; all pain, whilst it may be made to be disciplinary or corrective in its consequence by being rightly used, and by learning what it is fitted to teach, is yet, in its primary character, penal. When, therefore, you see suffering, you may be sure there has been sin. Job indignantly repels this explanation of his sufferings. He touches the very borders of blasphemy in his declarations of innocence, and his demands that the Almighty should show why He causes him thus to suffer. As the argument develops, the parties change places. The friends, at first calm, dispassionate, and even, from their standpoint, considerate and forbearing, deteriorate. They lose temper in presence of what they deem to be Job's obstinacy and sinful determination not to admit his sins. Their theory is not broad enough to cover all the facts of the case: this they feel, and naturally they become irritated and irritable. The episode of Elihu may be passed by as not essential to the development of the drams,. In a few sentences may be stated the position which is assumed by the Divine voice. He ends the controversy, but not by explaining the difficulties which had perplexed them all. He asks, Is it the Creator God of this universe that man dares to arraign at his bar, and is it of Him that he dares to demand a self-vindication? The true attitude of man ought to be one of confidence in the God whose works proclaim Him to be infinitely great and wise. Man is crushed out of the last semblance of self-complacency. The effect of this self-manifestation by the Almighty, and of the revelation of what His own real image is, strikes Job into nothingness. But whatever had been his faults, those of his friends had been deeper and deadlier. Their presumption had been more than his. So the Almighty vindicates the sufferer, and condemns, though He spares the mere theologians, who set their own orthodoxy as higher than His charity, and a human theory above a Divine sympathy. (G. M. Grant, B. D.) Parallel Verses KJV: There was a man in the land of Uz, whose name was Job; and that man was perfect and upright, and one that feared God, and eschewed evil. |
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