Job Chapter 3

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Chapter 3

Read Scripture: Job 4: 1 – 27:23

The main idea of this section is Job’s response to the test and his adversities.

This third session of Job is undoubtedly the longest reading that you will have to do. And it may raise some serious questions in your life about what you believe. Job’s three friends have listened to Job for seven days, a full week. They have said nothing at this point and now we begin to hear their response which is as much about what they believed before this event as it was about what has happened to Job. Eliphaz starts the discussion which follows the pattern, Eliphaz, Job, Bildad, Job, Zophar and then Job for two cycles and then Zophar is strangely absent the last cycle.

Eliphaz begins by appearing to be compassionate to Job and reminding Job of his compassion to others. We begin to hear what Eliphaz believes. He believes that the wicked suffer and the righteous prosper. This is a theme that has run throughout the history of humanity. What is interesting is that most theologians would say that the opposite is the case. What you believe is based primarily on your own experience and the world and culture you have grown up and lived in. Eliphaz suggests that humans are born sinful, something we all agree to as a basic tenant of our belief. And he also tells us of a vision where he has seen that no mortals can be righteous before God. But he also argues that Job is wrong in his belief that we have an intercessory in heaven. Job’s response to all this is that his pain is more than he can handle. He laments that our friends disappear in times of trouble rather than stay and comfort you. What we will see is that Job never stops proclaiming his innocence.

Next up is Bildad. Bildad is angrier than Eliphaz but not the angriest of the three. Bildad believes that we suffer because of the sins of our ancestors. He believes that we suffer for sins of our parents and their parents and that suffering is past down through generations. One could argue that genetic disease is the source of this belief. What do you think? Job reacts by telling us what we already know. That God is greater than humanity and that God does what God wants to do. All of this in the face of two of his friends arguing that God always looks after the good and destroys the wicked. As a side note, Job refers to the constellations of the Bear and Orion.

Now we meet the angry one. Zophar is the angriest of the three. Why that is so never fully comes out except that he seems the one to be most offended by Job’s discourse to God. He asks the question, is it possible for any of us to know God? Job responds by suggesting that his friends should learn from the animals and that they are the wisest of men in the world, a derogatory expression suggesting just the opposite. Job tells us that God is wisdom and strength and that he is no less than the three in his understanding just because of his infirmities, his disease and illness. Maybe we should look at this response the next time we accuse deafness as being dumbness and autistic and stupidity or other derogatory terms we have for those whose illnesses make them different.

We begin the cycle again with Eliphaz. He believes that Job has become a windbag, full of hot air and making no sense at all. He wants to know what right Job has to question God. The right question maybe, but with the wrong understanding. He still reiterates his basic belief that the wicked suffer and the righteous prosper. Job’s reaction is immediate and straightforward. He believes that his complaint is against God and his friends should not involve themselves at all in this his discussion with God. He wants to know what they are blaming him as he still is proclaiming his righteousness. And he again argues that he believes he has an intercessory in heaven.[read 16: 19-21] Bildad argues his same argument, that our suffering is because of the sins our ancestors or ourselves. He even goes so far as to call Job stupid. Job wants to know why his friends torment him while he is in the midst of his struggles. And then in 19: 25-26 he tells Bildad and the others that he knows his redeemer lives and he (the redeemer) will one day stand on earth and bring salvation. And then he says that it is not in life that the righteous prosper but after the resurrection. This indicates that Job is aware of the ancient understanding of death and resurrection following judgment. But Zophar chimes in this time angrier than the last. What right does Job have to say that he is righteous and what right does Job have to question God. I wonder how many of those who tend to fundamentalist thought would agree with Zophar. And I wonder how many of us who have heard the expression that we cannot question God took that from Zophar’s response to Job.

We finish this section with Job still arguing that he is guiltless in all of this and we who have third person knowledge of the situation know that he is right. The questions really center on how do we help each other when we are suffering? What do we do especially when we believe that the suffering has been the result of the person’s actions? 

Questions

Answer the following questions in discussion group:

1.    How do the three friends respond to Job?

2.    How might they have responded?

3.    How do you respond to the statement, the wicked suffer and the righteous prosper?

4.    Do you believe that you have the right to question God?

5.    Is there truth to the statement, we suffer for the sins of our ancestors?

6.    How might you have responded to Job’s suffering?

7.    How might you have responded to Job’s response to his suffering?