"Job is rebuked by his friends," by William Blake, 1805 (Morgan Library, New York)
Job 4 (New Living Translation)
One of my trusted advisers has suggested that I offer an abbreviated study on Job. So we will be looking at only 13 chapters of Job, instead of the full 42. It seems to me a merciful thing to do for you, my readers! (You are, of course, welcome to read the whole book on your own!)
Eliphaz’s First Response to Job
1Then Eliphaz the Temanite replied to Job:
Eliphaz came from Teman, a town south of the Dead Sea famous for its wise men. In this speech, he traces back all affliction to sin, through the natural operation of cause and effect. Eliphaz speaks again in chapter 15, with a clear depiction of the punishment of the wicked. Finally, in chapter 22, Eliphaz insists that Job has sinned and points out to him the path of restoration.
2 “Will you be patient and let me say a word?
For who could keep from speaking out?
3 “In the past you have encouraged many people;
you have strengthened those who were weak.
4 Your words have supported those who were falling;
you encouraged those with shaky knees.
5 But now when trouble strikes, you lose heart.
You are terrified when it touches you.
6 Doesn’t your reverence for God give you confidence?
Doesn’t your life of integrity give you hope?
7 “Stop and think! Do the innocent die?
When have the upright been destroyed?
1) Elphaz, for all his wisdom, bases his reasoning on this false assumption: that a good and innocent person never suffers.
8 My experience shows that those who plant trouble
and cultivate evil will harvest the same.
2) Why do bad things happen to good people? Eliphaz says, They don’t. He thinks Job must be a bad person. He thinks Job’s trouble is his own fault. This is his second false assumption: that those who suffer are being punished for their past sins.
9 A breath from God destroys them.
They vanish in a blast of his anger.
10 The lion roars and the wildcat snarls,
but the teeth of strong lions will be broken.
11 The fierce lion will starve for lack of prey,
and the cubs of the lioness will be scattered.
12 “This truth was given to me in secret,
as though whispered in my ear.
13 It came to me in a disturbing vision at night,
when people are in a deep sleep.
Eliphaz claims to have received this revelation through a hair-raising dream:
14 Fear gripped me,
and my bones trembled.
15 A spirit swept past my face,
and my hair stood on end.
16 The spirit stopped, but I couldn’t see its shape.
There was a form before my eyes.
In the silence I heard a voice say,
17 ‘Can a mortal be innocent before God?
Can anyone be pure before the Creator?’
18 “If God does not trust his own angels
and has charged his messengers with foolishness,
19 how much less will he trust people made of clay!
They are made of dust, crushed as easily as a moth.
20 They are alive in the morning but dead by evening,
gone forever without a trace.
21 Their tent-cords are pulled and the tent collapses,
and they die in ignorance.
Job 5
Eliphaz’s Response Continues
1 “Cry for help, but will anyone answer you?
Which of the angels will help you?
2 Surely resentment destroys the fool,
and jealousy kills the simple.
3 I have seen that fools may be successful for the moment,
but then comes sudden disaster.
4 Their children are abandoned far from help;
they are crushed in court with no one to defend them.
5 The hungry devour their harvest,
even when it is guarded by brambles.
The thirsty pant after their wealth.
6 But evil does not spring from the soil,
and trouble does not sprout from the earth.
7 People are born for trouble
as readily as sparks fly up from a fire.
As the Sparks Fly Upward
The little babe I held upon my knee
Had not yet banished from his sleeping eyes
The dreams of some lost world from which he came,
Nor missed some angel-choirèd paradise.
Strange little soul that claimed me not his own
By glance or smile, but with no seeing gaze
Looked to me who, all timid, dared to call
This wonder mine, and held it in amaze.
I prayed, ‘When comes the light of consciousness
Of things that be to hold him so he seek
To know what place life now had set him in,
And at whose mercy left, so young and weak,
‘Let it be mine, the face he first shall see
Bent on him, full of welcome and of joy,
So that his smile, on thus beholding love,
The pain of coming tears shall half destroy.
‘Or if some day he looks to learn, and I
Am not beside, oh! let it be the sun
Or some fair thing shall greet his seeing eyes,
So he shall find life good and well begun.’
Beside the fire I held him close, and sang
Some sweet child ditty, bidding him to sleep,
And broke the log to make it flame and glow;
Then in his eyes I saw a wonder creep.
Now peeped the soul from out his startled gaze.
‘Look first on me,’ I cried, ‘my little child!’
But from my kiss he held his face away,
And as the sparks flew up he saw and smiled.– Dora Sigerson Shorter, Irish poet (1866-1918)
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8 “If I were you, I would go to God
and present my case to him.
3) Here is the third false assumption Eliphaz bases his argument on: that Job, because he was suffering, must have done something wrong in God’s eyes. Job must repent.
9 He does great things too marvelous to understand.
He performs countless miracles.
10 He gives rain for the earth
and water for the fields.
11 He gives prosperity to the poor
and protects those who suffer.
12 He frustrates the plans of schemers
so the work of their hands will not succeed.
13 He traps the wise in their own cleverness
so their cunning schemes are thwarted.
14 They find it is dark in the daytime,
and they grope at noon as if it were night.
15 He rescues the poor from the cutting words of the strong,
and rescues them from the clutches of the powerful.
16 And so at last the poor have hope,
and the snapping jaws of the wicked are shut.
17 “But consider the joy of those corrected by God!
Do not despise the discipline of the Almighty when you sin.
Eliphaz reminds Job that God will graciously restore those who repent of their sins and turn to him. This, of course, is absolutely true.
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18 For though he wounds, he also bandages.
He strikes, but his hands also heal.
19 From six disasters he will rescue you;
even in the seventh, he will keep you from evil.
20 He will save you from death in time of famine,
from the power of the sword in time of war.
21 You will be safe from slander
and have no fear when destruction comes.
22 You will laugh at destruction and famine;
wild animals will not terrify you.
23 You will be at peace with the stones of the field,
and its wild animals will be at peace with you.
24 You will know that your home is safe.
When you survey your possessions, nothing will be missing.
25 You will have many children;
your descendants will be as plentiful as grass!
Ouch! Eliphaz, this seems cruel, given that Job has just lost his ten children.
26 You will go to the grave at a ripe old age,
like a sheaf of grain harvested at the proper time!
Psalm 91:9-10 (New Living Translation)
If you make the Lord your refuge,
if you make the Most High your shelter,
no evil will conquer you;
no plague will come near your home.
27 “We have studied life and found all this to be true.
Listen to my counsel, and apply it to yourself.”
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Music:
For all his misunderstandings, Eliphaz knew that God disciplines us when we do wrong for the sake of bringing us back to the right, and that God kindly restores us. And we know, because of Christ and his gift to us on the cross, that God does this through LOVE that is marvelous and wonderful. “I Stand Amazed” sung by Christ Tomlin.
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Simple Secrets of the kingdom
Study 13 — The Battle inside Yourself
Since God is at work in us, why do we not change completely over time? The reason is that the “old and unimproved” self is enslaved to ungodly habits, and keeps fighting with the “new and improved” person who is inside us. The battle for a life of fruitful living in Jesus continues until we die. In today’s study, Paul draws the battle zone between the old me, the flesh, and the new me, the inmost self. The daily solution to the battle is to get help from the only one who can strengthen our inmost self, Jesus Christ. Click here for AUDIO or VIDEO.
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New Living Translation (NLT)
Holy Bible. New Living Translation copyright© 1996, 2004, 2007 by Tyndale House Foundation. Used by permission of Tyndale House Publishers Inc., Carol Stream, Illinois 60188. All rights reserved.
