Job 1

“There was once a man in the land of Uz” ($W[, `uts). That’s how the book of Job begins. It has the flavor of a fairy tale. “There was once a man.” “Once upon a time.” At a recent Wednesday night service, I used that phrase in talking about it. In fact, that’s how Stephen Mitchell begins his translation of the book.[1] Not surprisingly, chapters 1 and 2, which comprise the prologue—the introduction—have been considered as legendary in nature. They’re considered to be a folk tale.

But before I go any further, let me say that referring to something as a legend doesn’t mean that it isn’t true. You’ve heard that legends have their basis in fact? We shouldn’t read this the way we would a newspaper or an encyclopedia. What matters here is the message. And it’s a message that continues to have urgent meaning for every generation that walks the earth.

The book of Job is mainly a series of poems, with Job, his friends, a mysterious young man named Elihu, and the Lord taking turns at speaking. The long section of poetry is enveloped by the passages of prose known as the prologue and epilogue. By the way, the epilogue, the last part of chapter 42, is also considered to be part of the legend of Job. It very much has the feel of…”And they lived happily ever after.” But more about that in two weeks!

Why do bad things happen to good people? We’ve all asked that question: maybe not with those exact words, and maybe not with any words that we’ve actually spoken out loud or thought to ourselves. But the unfairness of life inevitably occurs to every human being at some point, usually when we’re still quite young. I say it’s inevitable; it can’t help but happen, because we’re created in the image of God. And part of what that means is that we have an innate, an inborn, sense of right and wrong. We have a sense of justice. How we act on it is another matter.

If we approach the book of Job seeking the answer to that question—Why do bad things happen to good people?—we may come away feeling…unsatisfied. It never does reveal the secret formula or the one explanation that solves the puzzle. I realize that today’s reading deals with just the introduction, but Job is one of those books that almost requires that the whole story be told at once.

It seems that something more fundamental is going on than the question, “Why do bad things happen to good people?” The book challenges a key notion of how God deals with the human race. This is important. It calls into question something that the orthodox faith of the day held about divine reward and punishment, which was: the righteous prosper, the wicked suffer. There are plenty of scriptures that say that very thing. Here’s just one example from the psalms: “Many are the torments of the wicked, but steadfast love surrounds those who trust in the Lord” (32:10).

Don’t we all believe something like that? You will reap what you sow. What comes around goes around. That’s what Job’s friends—Eliphaz, Bildad, and Zophar—keep telling him. (By the way, recent archaeological discoveries have uncovered Zophar’s last name: apparently, it was Zogood.) [The people on Wednesday night didn’t seem to like the “Zophar Zogood” joke either!]

Our tendency is to feel that people ought to get just what they deserve. “Hey buddy, you’re gonna get what’s coming to you!” That does seem to be the way of justice. People should be praised or punished, based on what they’ve done. That seems only fair. I know I don’t want to live in a world in which corruption runs the show. (Maybe I should say, “I don’t like living in a world in which corruption runs the show!)

Still, another tendency is to want those people to be brought to justice—while we receive mercy. At some level, we all understand that there has to be room for grace, whether we use that particular word or not. We want to be let off the hook. I dare say, we need to be let off the hook. Our ideas about reward and punishment tend to lock us in a steel cage, with no chance of escape.

Our scripture reading speaks to that. I want us to notice something in the conversation between God and Satan. The Lord says that Job “still persists in his integrity, although you incited me against him, to destroy him for no reason” (v. 3). For no reason. So much for the theory that Job deserves the loss of all his wealth! So much for the claim that some secret sin explains the death of his children! Already, deeply embedded in the story that centuries later would become the book of Job as we have it, is the declaration—indeed, the divine declaration—that all the horrible stuff that’s happened to Job is through no fault of his own.

It can be hard to remember that sometimes…stuff happens. Pain, disease—something suddenly going wrong with the car—can leave us feeling like all the forces of the cosmos are arrayed against us. It’s not that God is ticked off at us; it’s that we live in a world with a lot of complicated things going on. And the more complicated something is, the more there is to it that can go wrong.

One individual in the story who’d rather ignore such things is Satan. Actually, in the book of Job, this creature is known in Hebrew as @f;c;h' ha-satan, “the satan,” which means “the accuser,” “the adversary.” (Let me insert something here. This legendary portion of Job is believed to predate Moses and the giving of the law. Job is a Gentile from the time of the patriarchs, centuries earlier.) At this point in time, “Satan” is not yet considered to be a name; it’s still a description. And his job fits that description: his task is to test human faithfulness. To the early Hebrews, he seems to fit a necessary role. “The satan” isn’t really seen as evil. After all, God goes along with his suggestions.

But he says something in verse 4 that we need to think about. If you recall chapter 1, Job, after being called the richest man in all the East, loses all his wealth, and what’s more, all his children are killed. Still, as verse 22 tells us, “In all this Job did not sin or charge God with wrongdoing.” Now, in chapter 2, Satan says, “All that people have they will give to save their lives.” And he follows that with the idea of attacking Job’s health.

“All that people have they will give to save their lives.” Is that true? In the context of the story, Satan is referring to Job’s wealth—and even to his children. It’s certainly an unflattering picture he insists on painting of Job, and for that matter, of everyone. What would we give to save our lives, to save our skins? Our possessions? I guess most, if not all, of us would say “yes.” But family members? How about our integrity? It’s hard to say what we would do until we’ve been put in the situation.

As for Job, he doesn’t sell out. He holds on to his integrity, even when his wife suggests otherwise. A few weeks ago, I said that the Pharisees have gotten some bad press down through the ages—well, so has Mrs. Job! Remember, she too, has suffered from the theft and death of the family’s livestock. And let’s not forget the loss of the children and the devastating impact that would have on Mrs. Job. (Granted, I’m assuming that the kids were also hers!)

The fact that this scripture reading falls on World Communion Sunday adds another dimension. We see in the suffering of Job (and Mrs. Job) a look at the suffering of the world. It’s not a pleasant thing to contemplate our suffering brothers and sisters in other countries. That may be why they get so little of our attention.

I’ve been reading a very interesting book by Richard Rohr, Job and the Mystery of Suffering: Spiritual Reflections.[2] Rohr is a Franciscan priest who lives in New Mexico. For Fr. Rohr, the book of Job is more than a look at a good man suffering from evil. It is a story of conversion. Job is the person who has everything stripped away, journeys through the storm, and finds God in a new way. I won’t go into detail about that now; I’ll save that for the 19th, when we look at chapter 42!

I mention the idea of conversion, though, because we need to hear it. Suffering doesn’t ever really go away. We may think we’ve banished it to a far-away land, but it always seems to have a round-trip ticket! Still, I’m not going to suggest that everyone gets an equal dose of suffering.

That’s understood very well by three guys in our story: Eliphaz, Bildad, and Zophar. They hear of the horrendous things that have happened to Job, and wanting to comfort him, they set out together to see their friend. The scripture says, “When they saw him from a distance, they did not recognize him” (v. 12). Not so long ago, I went to see someone who’d been through the meat grinder, so to speak. At first, I didn’t recognize that person. I understand this story in a way I didn’t before.

After weeping, tearing their robes, and throwing dust in the air—the ritual of mourning, of grief—the three companions sit down on the ground with Job, and no one says anything. According to the text, this goes on for “seven days and seven nights,” a poetic way of describing the very long time that they maintain a silent presence with their tormented friend.

Remember my “Zophar Zogood” attempt at a joke? Well, just as I did on Wednesday night, let me say that for Job’s friends, it’s “so far, so good”: at least, regarding their behavior. They’re doing a very difficult thing. They’re actually being there with their friend in the midst of his pain. Anyone who’s simply been with a suffering friend or family member knows that it isn’t fun. It requires a sacrifice of self. It isn’t until they open their mouths and start giving unwanted advice that Job’s friends earn the description “miserable comforters,” which he assigns them later on (16:2).

We’ll take a look at the comments of Eliphaz and the others next week. But I think it’s safe to say that Job’s friends, in their clumsy, boneheaded way, are part of his journey of conversion. Hearing them go on and on seems to help Job realize that he’s now grown beyond the level of faith and understanding at which they’re stuck. He’s been forced to!

Maybe some of you can relate to Job. Maybe you find yourself in that unfamiliar terrain, in which the supports of the past have failed. The old certainties have turned out to be illusions. Life has led you down paths that you never would have chosen. I want to finish with some words from Richard Rohr’s book that speak to that lonely feeling when it seems that the whole world has abandoned you.

“When you are feeling abandoned, pick up Job’s book and speak Job’s prayers and know they have been prayed before and that we are part of a great history and we are all in this together. There are no feelings we feel that others have not felt before. At such times, in our prayer, we unite ourselves in solidarity with others who suffer and who have suffered before us.

“Often, that’s the only way out of self-pity and a preoccupation with our own feelings. We have to choose solidarity and the ‘communion of the saints.’ There, we realize we are carrying the weight of our brothers and sisters, and they are carrying ours.”[3]

[1] Stephen Mitchell, The Book of Job (New York: HarperPerennial, 1992), 5.

[2] New York: Crossroad Publishing Co., 1996.

[3] Rohr, 94.