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The mountains of Edom

Books of Scripture

Job

Suffering, divine justice and the limits of human wisdom

42 chapters

Job is a blameless man of the land of Uz who loses his wealth, his ten children and his health after a challenge in God's heavenly court: does anyone serve God for nothing? Three friends come to comfort him and end by insisting he must have sinned. In some of the Bible's greatest poetry Job protests, curses his birth, demands a hearing and declares that his redeemer lives. A young man, Elihu, intervenes. Then God answers out of the whirlwind, not with an explanation but with the vast, wild world he governs. God declares that Job, not his friends, spoke rightly, and restores him. The book's date and author are unknown; its Hebrew is among the Bible's hardest, and its earliest Greek translation was about a sixth shorter.

Lessons

  1. 1A Man in the Land of UzJob 1 · Job of Uz is blameless and upright, rich in children and flocks, and offers sacrifices in case his children have sinned. In the heavenly council the accuser (ha-satan) asks whether Job's piety is only payment for his blessings. God allows him to take everything but Job's body. In one day raiders, fire and wind destroy Job's flocks, servants and all ten children. Job tears his robe, shaves his head, falls to the ground and worships: "The LORD gave, and the LORD hath taken away; blessed be the name of the LORD."
  2. 2Skin for Skin, and Seven Days of SilenceJob 2 · In a second heavenly scene the LORD says Job still holds his integrity "although thou movedst me against him, to destroy him without cause." The accuser answers "Skin for skin" and is allowed to strike Job's body, sparing his life. Job sits among the ashes scraping his sores with a broken piece of pottery. His wife says, "Dost thou still retain thine integrity? curse God, and die." He refuses. Three friends, Eliphaz, Bildad and Zophar, come to comfort him, weep, and sit with him seven days and nights without a word.
  3. 3Let the Day PerishJob 3 · After seven days of silence Job speaks, and the book changes from prose to poetry. He curses the day he was born and the night he was conceived, asking that darkness reclaim them. He wishes he had died at birth and lay at rest with kings, prisoners and slaves, where "the weary be at rest." He asks why light is given to those who long for death. He does not curse God; he curses his own beginning.
  4. 4Eliphaz and the Voice in the NightJob 4 · Eliphaz, the eldest friend, speaks first and gently: Job has strengthened others, and now he faints. Then he states the principle that will drive the friends' speeches: "Who ever perished, being innocent?" They that plough iniquity reap it. He reports a terrifying night vision in which a spirit passed before his face and a voice said, "Shall mortal man be more just than God?" If even angels are charged with folly, how much more humans who live in houses of clay.
  5. 5Happy Is the Man Whom God CorrectethJob 5 · Eliphaz continues: trouble does not spring from the dust; humans are born to it. If he were Job, he would seek God, who does great things, raises the lowly and catches the wise in their craftiness. "Happy is the man whom God correcteth." God wounds and heals, delivers in six troubles and in seven, in famine and war, and the restored man will come to his grave in full age "like as a shock of corn cometh in in his season."
  6. 6Friends Like a Dry WadiJob 6 · Job answers Eliphaz. If his grief were weighed it would outweigh the sand of the sea; the arrows of the Almighty are in him. He wishes God would crush him, and he would still have the comfort of not having denied the Holy One. His friends are like desert streams that run in spring and vanish in summer, so that the caravans of Tema and Sheba that counted on them perish. "Teach me, and I will hold my tongue: and cause me to understand wherein I have erred."
  7. 7What Is Man, That Thou Shouldest Magnify Him?Job 7 · Job compares human life to a hired labourer's hard service and a slave longing for shade. His nights are long, his days swift as a weaver's shuttle, his flesh clothed with worms. He speaks to God directly: am I the sea, or a sea-monster, that you set a guard over me? "What is man, that thou shouldest magnify him?… that thou shouldest visit him every morning, and try him every moment?" Why not pardon me, since I will soon be dust?
  8. 8Bildad and the Wisdom of the FathersJob 8 · Bildad the Shuhite calls Job's words a strong wind. God does not pervert justice; "if thy children have sinned against him, and he have cast them away for their transgression," so be it. If Job is pure and seeks God, God will restore him. Bildad appeals to the wisdom of former generations: a papyrus plant without water withers, and so do all who forget God. God will not cast away a perfect man, and will yet fill Job's mouth with laughing.
  9. 9No Daysman Betwixt UsJob 9 · Job agrees that God is just in power, but asks how anyone could win a case against him. God moves mountains, shakes the earth, commands the sun, spreads out the heavens, treads on the waves of the sea, and made the Bear, Orion and the Pleiades. If Job summoned him, would he answer? "He destroyeth the perfect and the wicked." There is no arbiter to lay his hand on both of them. If God took his rod away, Job would speak without fear.
  10. 10Thou Hast Made Me as the ClayJob 10 · Job decides to speak in the bitterness of his soul: "Shew me wherefore thou contendest with me." He asks whether God has eyes of flesh, to search out a sin that is not there. God's hands shaped him like clay, poured him out like milk, curdled him like cheese, clothed him with skin and flesh, knit him with bones and sinews. Yet God hid in his heart a plan to hunt him like a lion. Why was he born? Let God leave him alone a little before he goes to the land of darkness.
  11. 11Zophar and the Depths of GodJob 11 · Zophar the Naamathite, the bluntest friend, says Job's talk should not go unanswered. He wishes God would speak and show Job the secrets of wisdom: "know therefore that God exacteth of thee less than thine iniquity deserveth." God's wisdom is higher than heaven, deeper than Sheol. If Job puts away iniquity, he will forget his misery like waters that have passed, and lie down without fear.
  12. 12With Him Is Wisdom and StrengthJob 12 · Job mocks his friends: "wisdom shall die with you." He knows as much as they. Robbers prosper while the just man is a laughing-stock. Ask the beasts and birds: they know "that the hand of the LORD hath wrought this." God has wisdom and power, but Job describes that power as unsettling: he leads counsellors away stripped, makes judges fools, loosens the belt of kings, pours contempt on princes, enlarges nations and destroys them.
  13. 13Though He Slay MeJob 13 · Job tells his friends they are forgers of lies and worthless physicians; their silence would be their wisdom. Will they speak falsely for God? He will take his life in his hand and argue his case: "Though he slay me, yet will I trust in him" in the familiar translation, or "Behold, he will slay me; I have no hope" in the written Hebrew. He has prepared his case and knows he will be vindicated. He asks God to remove his hand and his terror, and to name his sins.
  14. 14If a Man Die, Shall He Live Again?Job 14 · "Man that is born of a woman is of few days, and full of trouble." He flees like a shadow. A cut tree may sprout again from its stump at the scent of water, but a man dies and does not rise until the heavens are no more. Job imagines God hiding him in Sheol until his anger passes, then calling, and Job answering: "If a man die, shall he live again?" But the hope fades: as water wears away stones, God destroys the hope of man.
  15. 15Eliphaz HardensJob 15 · The second round of speeches begins. Eliphaz, no longer gentle, says Job's own mouth condemns him: his words are wind and undermine reverence. Was Job the first man born, made before the hills? Did he listen in God's council? The grey-haired and aged are on the friends' side. Then he paints the wicked man's life: dread in his ears, waiting for the sword, darkness, a bloom that falls like an unripe grape.
  16. 16My Witness Is in HeavenJob 16 · Job calls his friends miserable comforters. He could talk like them if they were in his place. He describes God's attack: tearing him in wrath, handing him to the ungodly, setting him up as a target, breaking him breach upon breach. He has sewn sackcloth on his skin. Yet he cries: "O earth, cover not thou my blood… my witness is in heaven, and my record is on high," and longs for one who would plead for a man with God.
  17. 17My Hope and the GraveJob 17 · Job's spirit is broken, the grave is ready. He asks God to give him a pledge, since no one else will guarantee him. He has become a byword, someone people spit at. Upright people should be astonished, but the righteous will hold on to their way. He says to the pit, "Thou art my father," and to the worm, "Thou art my mother." Where then is his hope? It will go down to the bars of Sheol.
  18. 18The King of TerrorsJob 18 · Bildad is offended that Job counts the friends as beasts. He describes the wicked man's fate: his light put out, his steps caught in nets, traps and snares, hunger and calamity, his skin eaten by "the firstborn of death," himself brought to "the king of terrors." His tent is burned with sulphur, his roots dry, his memory perishes, and he has no son or descendant. Every image matches Job's losses.
  19. 19I Know That My Redeemer LivethJob 19 · Job says his friends have insulted him ten times. God has fenced his way and stripped his glory. His brothers, acquaintances, relatives, guests, servants, his wife and even young children reject him; he has escaped "with the skin of my teeth." He wishes his words were carved in rock with an iron pen and lead. Then: "I know that my redeemer liveth, and that he shall stand at the latter day upon the earth," and he will see God. Each phrase of 19:25–27 can be translated several ways.
  20. 20Zophar and the Poisoned FeastJob 20 · Zophar, stung by Job's rebuke, insists that the joy of the wicked is brief. Though he rises to the heavens, he will perish like his own dung. The evil he tastes as sweet turns to asps' venom in his stomach; he must vomit up the riches he swallowed. Because he crushed the poor and seized houses, God will rain his anger on him; an iron weapon and a bronze bow will pierce him. "This is the portion of a wicked man from God."
  21. 21Wherefore Do the Wicked Live?Job 21 · Job asks his friends to listen, and then mock. Why do the wicked live, grow old and grow powerful? Their children are established, their houses safe, their cattle breed, their children dance, they spend their days in wealth and go down to Sheol in a moment. They tell God, "Depart from us." How often is their lamp put out? One dies in full strength, another in bitterness; both lie in the dust. Ask travellers: the wicked man is spared and carried to an honoured grave.
  22. 22Eliphaz Invents a Charge SheetJob 22 · In his third speech Eliphaz finally names Job's sins: he took pledges from his brothers for nothing and stripped the naked of their clothing, refused water to the weary and bread to the hungry, sent widows away empty and crushed the arms of the fatherless. That is why snares surround him. Eliphaz urges Job to return to the Almighty, lay up gold in the dust, and he will be restored; he will even deliver the guilty by the cleanness of his hands.
  23. 23Oh That I Knew Where I Might Find HimJob 23 · Job longs to find God's seat and lay his case before him: God would listen, and an upright man could reason with him and be acquitted. But he looks forward, back, left and right, and cannot find him. "But he knoweth the way that I take: when he hath tried me, I shall come forth as gold." Job has kept God's way. Yet God does what he wants, and Job is terrified of him.
  24. 24The Poor of the Earth Hide ThemselvesJob 24 · Why does the Almighty not set days for judgment? People move boundary stones, steal flocks, take the orphan's donkey and the widow's ox as pledge. The poor hide; like wild asses they forage in the desert, sleep naked in the cold, are soaked by mountain rain; they carry sheaves while hungry and tread winepresses while thirsty. In the city the dying groan, "yet God layeth not folly to them." Murderers, adulterers and thieves love the dark. The last verses (24:18–25) seem to say the wicked do perish, and who speaks them is debated.
  25. 25Bildad's Six VersesJob 25 · Bildad's third speech is only six verses long: dominion and fear belong to God, who makes peace in his high places; his armies cannot be numbered. How can a man be righteous before God? Even the moon is not bright and the stars are not pure in his sight; how much less man, a maggot, and the son of man, a worm. Zophar never speaks a third time. The third cycle of speeches seems broken.
  26. 26He Hangeth the Earth upon NothingJob 26 · Job mocks Bildad's help. Then comes a hymn to God's power: the shades tremble beneath the waters, Sheol is naked before him, he stretches the north over emptiness and hangs the earth upon nothing, binds water in clouds, sets a circle on the waters at the boundary of light and darkness. The pillars of heaven tremble; by his power he stilled the sea, by his understanding struck Rahab; his hand pierced the fleeing serpent. "Lo, these are parts of his ways… but the thunder of his power who can understand?"
  27. 27Till I Die I Will Not Remove Mine IntegrityJob 27 · Job swears by the living God who has taken away his right: as long as he lives he will not speak falsehood or admit the friends are right; he holds fast his righteousness. Let his enemy be as the wicked. Then the speech describes the wicked's fate: his children for the sword, his silver piled up for the just to wear, his house like a moth's, the east wind sweeping him away. Many scholars think 27:13–23 is the missing third speech of Zophar.
  28. 28Where Shall Wisdom Be Found?Job 28 · A poem in three movements. Humans dig mines for silver, gold, iron and copper; they cut shafts far from people, dangle on ropes, overturn mountains, bring hidden things to light, ways no bird of prey has seen. "But where shall wisdom be found?" It cannot be bought with gold of Ophir, onyx, sapphire, coral or topaz of Ethiopia. The deep and the sea say it is not in them; Abaddon and Death have only heard a rumour. God alone knows its place, and said to humanity: "Behold, the fear of the Lord, that is wisdom; and to depart from evil is understanding."
  29. 29Eyes to the Blind and Feet to the LameJob 29 · Job longs for the months when God watched over him, his children were around him and his path was washed in butter. When he went to the city gate, young men hid, the aged stood, princes stopped talking. He rescued the poor who cried and the fatherless, made the widow's heart sing, was eyes to the blind and feet to the lame, father to the poor, and broke the jaws of the wicked. He sat as chief, like a king among his troops, one who comforts mourners.
  30. 30A Brother to JackalsJob 30 · Now young men mock Job, men whose fathers he would not have set with his sheepdogs: outcasts who gnaw roots in the desert, live in the clefts of valleys and in caves, bray among the bushes. They spit at him. Terrors pursue him, pain gnaws by night. He cries to God and is not answered. He waited for good and evil came. "I am a brother to dragons, and a companion to owls. My skin is black upon me… My harp also is turned to mourning."
  31. 31Behold My SignatureJob 31 · Job's final speech is an oath of clearance, a list of sins each followed by a curse on himself if he has done it: looking lustfully at a young woman; falsehood; adultery; denying justice to his servants ("Did not he that made me in the womb make him?"); refusing the poor, the widow and the orphan; trusting gold; kissing his hand to the sun and moon; rejoicing at an enemy's ruin; refusing hospitality; hiding sin; abusing the land. "Behold, my desire is, that the Almighty would answer me." He signs his case. "The words of Job are ended."
  32. 32Elihu, Son of BarachelJob 32 · The three friends stop answering, because Job is righteous in his own eyes. A new speaker appears, never mentioned before: Elihu son of Barachel the Buzite, of the family of Ram. He is angry with Job for justifying himself rather than God, and with the friends for finding no answer yet condemning Job. He waited because he was young, but "there is a spirit in man": age is not wisdom. He is full of words, like new wineskins ready to burst.
  33. 33A Messenger, One Among a ThousandJob 33 · Elihu addresses Job by name: he too was formed from clay. Job has said, "I am clean… God finds occasions against me." Elihu answers that God is greater than man and speaks in more than one way: in dreams and night visions, to turn a man from pride; and through pain on his bed, until his soul draws near the pit. If there is a messenger with him, an interpreter, one among a thousand, to declare what is right for him, God will be gracious: "Deliver him from going down to the pit: I have found a ransom."
  34. 34Far Be It from God That He Should Do WickednessJob 34 · Elihu calls on wise men to judge: Job has said, "I am righteous: and God hath taken away my judgment," and "It profiteth a man nothing that he should delight himself with God." Far be it from God to do wickedness; he repays a person's work. If he withdrew his breath, all flesh would perish. God shows no partiality to princes, sees every step; there is no darkness where evildoers can hide. Job speaks without knowledge; let him be tried to the end.
  35. 35Can Your Goodness Benefit God?Job 35 · Elihu asks whether Job thinks he is more righteous than God. Look at the heavens: if Job sins, what does it do to God? If he is righteous, what does God gain? Wickedness and righteousness affect other humans. People cry out under oppression but do not say, "Where is God my maker, who giveth songs in the night?" They cry, but God does not answer because of their pride. Job's case is before God; he should wait.
  36. 36Behold, God Is GreatJob 36 · Elihu speaks on God's behalf: God is mighty and despises no one, does not preserve the wicked, gives justice to the poor. If people are bound in affliction, he shows them their sins and opens their ears to instruction; if they obey they prosper, if not they perish. He delivers the afflicted by their affliction. Then a hymn: God is great beyond knowing; he draws up drops of water, which distil as rain from the clouds; who can understand the spreading of the clouds and the thunder of his pavilion?
  37. 37Out of the North Cometh Golden SplendourJob 37 · Elihu's heart trembles at the thunder: God's voice rolls under the whole heaven, his lightning to the ends of the earth. He commands snow and rain, seals up every man's hand, sends whirlwind from the south and cold from the north, ice by the breath of God. "Hearken unto this, O Job: stand still, and consider the wondrous works of God." Can Job spread out the sky, strong as a cast metal mirror? "Out of the north cometh golden splendour: with God is terrible majesty."
  38. 38Where Wast Thou?Job 38 · "Then the LORD answered Job out of the whirlwind." God does not explain the heavenly test. He asks questions: where was Job when the earth was founded and the morning stars sang? Who shut in the sea with doors? Has Job commanded the dawn, walked in the depths, seen the gates of death? Where do light and darkness live? Who made the storehouses of snow and hail, the channels for rain on land where no one lives? Can Job bind the Pleiades or loose Orion, hunt prey for the lion, feed the raven's young?
  39. 39The Wild Ox and the OstrichJob 39 · God's questions turn to animals: does Job know when mountain goats give birth? Who set the wild donkey free to roam the salt land? Will the wild ox serve Job or plough his furrow? The ostrich leaves her eggs in the sand and forgets them, yet laughs at horse and rider. Did Job give the warhorse its strength, its neck clothed with thunder, saying "Ha, ha" among the trumpets? Does the hawk fly by his wisdom, the eagle nest on the crag at his command?
  40. 40Behold Now BehemothJob 40 · God asks if Job, who argued with the Almighty, will answer. Job says: "I am vile; what shall I answer thee? I will lay mine hand upon my mouth." God speaks again: will Job annul God's judgment to justify himself? Has he an arm like God's? Let him humble the proud and tread down the wicked. Then: "Behold now behemoth, which I made with thee; he eateth grass as an ox." Its strength is in its loins, its tail like a cedar, its bones like bronze; it lies under lotus plants and is not alarmed though the Jordan rushes into its mouth.
  41. 41Canst Thou Draw Out Leviathan?Job 41 (Hebrew 40:25–41:26) · Can Job catch Leviathan with a hook, make it beg, make a covenant with it, play with it like a bird, sell it to merchants? Lay a hand on it once and you will not do it again. Its scales are shields sealed together; its sneezes flash light, its eyes are like the dawn, flames and smoke pour from its mouth. Its heart is hard as stone; swords and spears are useless; it makes the deep boil like a pot. "Upon earth there is not his like… he is a king over all the children of pride."
  42. 42Now Mine Eye Seeth TheeJob 42 · Job answers: God can do everything; Job spoke of things too wonderful for him. "I have heard of thee by the hearing of the ear: but now mine eye seeth thee. Wherefore I abhor myself, and repent in dust and ashes," a verse with several possible meanings. Then God tells Eliphaz his anger burns against the three friends, "for ye have not spoken of me the thing that is right, as my servant Job hath." They must offer sacrifices and Job must pray for them. God restores Job twice over; his family comforts him; he has seven sons and three beautiful daughters, Jemimah, Keziah and Keren-happuch, who inherit with their brothers. Job lives 140 more years and dies "old and full of days." The Greek adds that he will rise again, and that he was Jobab, king of Edom.
  43. 43Investigation: Who Is the Accuser?Job 1–2; Zechariah 3; 1 Chronicles 21:1 · In Job 1–2 the figure who challenges Job's piety is ha-satan, "the adversary," a member of the heavenly court who acts only with God's permission. The Hebrew word satan is used of human opponents, of the angel of the LORD blocking Balaam, and of a court accuser in Zechariah 3. Only 1 Chronicles 21:1 may use it as a name. The Greek translators wrote diabolos, "slanderer." Later Jewish writings (Jubilees, the Dead Sea Scrolls) and the New Testament developed a personal Satan, the devil, opposed to God. Job stands early in that history.
  44. 44Investigation: The Righteous Sufferer Before JobJob 3–31; 38–42 · Job is not the first ancient text about a person who suffers without knowing why. The Sumerian "Man and His God" (copies c. 1800 BC), the Babylonian Ludlul bēl nēmeqi ("I will praise the lord of wisdom," composed c. 1300–1100 BC), the Babylonian Theodicy (an acrostic dialogue, c. 1000 BC), a sufferer's text found at Ugarit, and the Egyptian "Dispute between a Man and his Ba" all explore suffering, the gods and human limits. They share themes and forms with Job. None is its source, and Job differs from them in decisive ways.
  45. 45Investigation: Was Job Jobab?Job 1:1; 42:17 (Greek); Genesis 36:33–34 · The Hebrew book gives Job no genealogy, no date and no tribe. The Greek translation ends with an appendix that does: it says Job lived in Ausitis on the borders of Edom and Arabia, that his earlier name was Jobab, and lists him among the kings of Edom from Genesis 36. A Hellenistic Jewish writer, Aristeas the Exegete, made the same identification. The Talmud records rabbis placing Job in the times of the patriarchs, Moses, the judges, the Persian kings, or calling him a parable. These are interpretations, not independent historical evidence.
  46. 46Investigation: Job's Lawsuit Against GodJob 9; 13; 16; 19; 23; 31; 38–42 · Job's speeches use the language of an ancient lawsuit: contend, case, answer, be in the right, summon, witness, indictment. He wishes for an arbiter (9:33), prepares his case (13:18), appeals to a witness in heaven (16:19), asks God to stand surety for him (17:3), declares that his redeemer lives (19:25), seeks God's judgment seat (23:3) and signs his oath demanding a written charge (31:35). God answers (38:1) but turns the courtroom into a cosmos. The verdict (42:7) goes to Job.
  47. 47Investigation: Behemoth and LeviathanJob 40:15–41:34; Isaiah 27:1; Psalm 74:13–14; 104:26 · God's second speech ends with two creatures. Behemoth eats grass, lies in the reeds and is unbothered by the Jordan in flood; most scholars identify it as the hippopotamus. Leviathan has impenetrable scales, terrible teeth, breathes fire and makes the deep boil; it has been read as the crocodile, the whale, or the mythic sea-serpent known from Ugarit (Lotan). Later Jewish tradition made them primeval monsters. Some modern readers propose dinosaurs. The evidence, read whole, supports real animals painted with mythic colour, and no single identification should be made dogma.
  48. 48Investigation: Why Ancient Jobs DifferJob 1–42 · There is no single ancient Job. The Hebrew survives in fragments from Qumran and complete in medieval Masoretic codices. An Aramaic translation (11Q10) from Cave 11 preserves large parts of chapters 17–42. The Old Greek translation was about one-sixth shorter than the Hebrew; in the 3rd century Origen filled the gaps from Theodotion's Greek and marked the additions with asterisks. Later Greek manuscripts and printed Septuagints often keep the filled-out text without the marks. The Sahidic Coptic version preserves the shorter Greek. The library lets you see some of these differences.

How Job came to us

Who wrote it, how it was copied, and how it reached the Bible you hold. These lessons follow the book through history.

  1. ★How Job Came to UsJob is set in an unlocatable land with no date, and its author is unnamed. Tradition attributed it to Moses; many scholars date the poem to the 6th–4th centuries BC, though proposals range more widely. Ezekiel knew of a righteous Job. The Hebrew survives in fragments at Qumran (one in the old paleo-Hebrew script) and complete in medieval codices. Aramaic translations were made by the 1st century BC. The Old Greek was a shortened translation, filled out by Origen. Latin, Syriac and Coptic versions followed. Job sits among the Writings in Jewish Bibles and among the wisdom books in Christian Bibles.
  2. 6The SeptuagintJews in Egypt translated their Scriptures into Greek, creating the Bible of the early church and of the New Testament writers.
  3. 7The Dead Sea ScrollsA shepherd's discovery in 1947 gave us Bible manuscripts a thousand years older than any known before, and showed how faithfully the text was kept.
  4. 13Scribes, Jerome, and the MasoretesJerome gave the West its Latin Bible; Jewish scholars called the Masoretes guarded the Hebrew text letter by letter.

Journey of a Passage