Job The Steadfast
I am finding Roland to be a quite thought-provoking writer. This has been especially true of his chapter on Job. He says that “while the Book of Job can comfortably be classified within wisdom literature, it remains wisdom of an unusual kind. Scholars often speak of a crisis of wisdom in connection with Job and Ecclesiastes” (34). I think that sort of captures part of what makes the book of Job so fascinating. As Roland said, “the entire work is a sophisticated literary achievement” (35).
I especially liked his provocative discussion on the prologue, so I would like to focus this post on it. I had studied about the satan (adversary) before and it was apparent to me that our view of “Satan” today tends to influence our understanding of the way the satan figure is used in the OT. For one thing, it is not clear that the same being is in view every time the satan is mentioned. Quite intriguing is the role of the satan in the prologue of Job. It raises several questions to which I think most Christians tend to give simplistic answers. Roland says “from a perverse point of view, one might even say that Satan is concerned about God’s true glory and that God not be deceived by these humans whom Satan knows so well!” (36) This assertion sounds pretty awful (and I think that’s why he starts with “from a perverse point of view”), but when you consider that the role of the satan seems to be that of a prosecutor, the statement makes sense. Of course some people would react to the apparent idea that the satan knows human beings better than God, but I think this would miss the point. God is sovereign and knows all things, but the prologue wants to depict this fact in the form of a conversation between God and the satan from the point of view of the prosecution. When all is said and done, God is orchestrating the whole thing. As far as the Israelites were concerned, “there was a dark side, or underside, to God that was simply accepted” (36), see Deut. 32:39 and Isa. 45:7. And later on “[Job] stands by the biblical view that God is the cause of all things, evil as well as good” (37), see Amos 3:6 and Lam 3:38. The implications of God’s being the cause of all things really interests me and it is an area I want to do more thinking on.
When considering the satan’s accusation, Roland makes an observation that I thought was quite penetrating:
“Do I love God or myself when I love God? Is a selfless, disinterested worship of God possible?” (36)
Perhaps that’s the heart of what the satan is telling God.
Roland then talks about the dialogues, Elihu, the Lord’s reply and the epilogue. Acknowledging that Job is a hard book to understand, he says,
“Has this chapter explained the message (or messages) of the Book of Job? If so, perhaps it has betrayed the work” (45)
Roland may not have explained the message (or messages), but he certainly increased my interest in the book of Job.
Bibliography
Murphy, Roland E. The Tree of Life: An Exploration of Biblical Literature. Grand Rapids, Michigan: W. B. Eerdmans Pub. Co., 2002.
