My Redeemer Liveth!

My Redeemer Liveth!

or

“Worms Cover Them Both”

Job Chapters 15-21

 

Structure

As just one evidence of the beautiful, powerful writing of the Book of Job, the narrative structure of the book is easily analyzed. There is the prelude, which takes place alternately in the court of heaven and in the earthly life of Job. This is followed by a series of dialogues, which are followed by a postlude. The dialogues themselves are separated into sections. In the first section, Job interacts with his friends Eliphaz, Bildad, and Zophar; in the middle section he debates with Elihu; finally, he comes into the manifest presence of God. The first set of dialogues is also grouped into thirds, as Job is accosted by each friend in turn, and then utters a response to the charge. As each friend has had a turn, the cycle is repeated once and once more. In the current lesson, we find ourselves in the second of these three exchanges.

To provide a different viewpoint from the previous lesson, instead of a linear progression through each cycle of charge and response, we will cut across each cycle to analyze the common themes which run through them all.

The Wisdom of the Friends

Though in the first cycle Job vigorously defended himself (13:17-19) and you and I, as readers, have even the testimony of the Lord that Job was blameless (2:3) the three friends continue to address Job from the viewpoint of their transactional ontology, which sees every aspect of our lives, including our relationship with God, as cause and effect. From this vantage, the effect of Job's suffering demands the cause of his sin. The friends address this sin both directly, with open accusations, and indirectly, by describing the plight of the wicked as the very suffering that Job endures.

Eliphaz leads the group with the direct charge that Job is motivated by his sin (15:5-6) and then through an inferential charge, in which Eliphaz describes the just recompense of the wicked man in words that mirror the suffering of Job (15:32-34).

Bildad follows with an unrelenting series of calamities that come upon “the wicked man”. This series starts with the simple statement that “his lamp is snuffed out” and continues through an escalating series of metaphors for an escalating progression of suffering. This tragic, though beautifully written passage culminates with the accusation “such is the place of one who knows not God.” (18:5-6, 20-21)

Zophar is not to be outdone. He begins with a very earthy description of the plight of the wicked. This he expresses as a prehistoric truth known even to Job himself (20:4-8). Zophar continues with an insightful description of the way God repays the wicked: their great hunger for worldly things only leads to more hunger, and is never satisfied (20:20-22).

The Patience of Job

The “patience of Job” is proverbial, but anyone using the phrase in any way other than the ironic has not made a very careful study of the book. The impatience of Job with his friends rings throughout the book, and is certainly evidenced in this section. In response to Eliphaz, Job denounces his friends as “miserable comforters” and vows that he would do better if the roles were reversed (16:1-5). Before Bildad begins, Job resignedly tells his friends “Try again!” though it is clear that he does not expect any good to come of it (17:10-12). After Bildad, we can hear the great impatience of Job spill over from his brimming ire towards his friend to his mounting frustration with God, who without any provocation (from Job's point of view) has a burning anger against him (19:1-11). After Zophar, Job declares that the one comfort his friends might offer is simply to listen to him. Immediately having stated this, Job dismisses his earthly adversaries and turns the full measure of his impatience towards God (21:1-4).

You Even Undermine Piety

Certainly, however, there is more going on here than simple bickering. The friends, as we have seen, continually accuse Job of the sin that must explain his suffering, but they are perhaps more alarmed with Job's attack on the other side of the transactional equation. Eliphaz speaks for the group when he says to Job “You even undermine piety (15:4a NIV, KJV reads “Yea, thou castest off fear”). And it is true that Job has questioned the value of piety in a way that directly challenges any cause and effect view of existence, when he says that God would surely punish him if he were guilty, but is absolutely unbound by any fair-mindedness that would reward him for his devotion (10:13-15).

In this cycle of dialogue, Job even questions the issue of punishment. In response to Bildad (18:5) Job wonders “how often is the lamp of the wicked snuffed out?” And in response to Zophar (20:29) he wonders how often the wicked receive “the fate God allots” (21:17). Job has previously wondered what the nature of humanity could be, that God should take such an active interest in our existence (7:17). Here, he asks through the mouths of his hypothetical “wicked” men, what the nature of God might be that deserves our reverence. From this point he goes on to speak of the nature of God, which is not only unknown, but unknowable, and in whose dominion we may have a good life, or a bad life, but in the end are covered in worms, each alike (21:22-26).

My Redeemer Liveth!

Though Job's attitude towards this earthly life is ultimately cynical, and though (we might evens say) that attitude is merited by his situation, the book is not completely without hope. Many of these expressions of hope are couched in the irony through which Job understands his life. When Job desires an arbiter “who might put his hand on both of us” (9:32-33) he prefigures for us the intercessor who brings us, not into the court of accusation, but into the court of redemption (Romans 8:31-34). When Job admits that he cannot bring anything of value that might be used as collateral in his imagined conflict with God, and ironically asks God to provide that “pledge” or “security” on his behalf (17:3-5) he foreshadows the one who will be the propitiation for our sin (1 John 2:2). When Job yearns for a witness in the presence of God who might present his case (16:19-21) he speaks of the one who constantly intercedes between us and God (Hebrews 7:23-25).

Finally, though he loathes this life (7:17) in which he cannot fathom either his role, or the role of the Almighty God (21:15) – in the face of all we do not know, Job confesses the one thing that is known:

For I know that my redeemer liveth, and that he shall stand at the latter day upon the earth: And though after my skin worms destroy this body, yet in my flesh shall I see God: (Job 19:25-26 KJV)