Reflections on Job and the Problem of Suffering
Part I: An Overview
Growing up, Job was one of my favorite books in the Bible. I wanted to be like Job. I wanted to face my suffering and through it all still be able to cry out in hope, “For I know that my Redeemer lives, and that at the last he will stand upon the earth” (Job 19:25, NRSV)[1]. Whatever Job meant in saying this, to me, it was all about the coming of Jesus, so of course reading that verse always had me excited.
How have you read Job? Have you ever felt a desire to be like Job?
Job is notorious for being the book on suffering, sometimes being read as a theodicy (how a good God and evil can both exist,) and sometimes as an answer to how we should respond to our own suffering.
When we do suffer, shouldn’t we want to be like Job? Of his response to his hardship the scripture says, “In all this Job did not sin or charge God with wrongdoing” (Job 1:26). I think this is a noble aim, but in Job’s case, it seems ironic that Job wouldn’t charge God with any wrongdoing since God commissioned the satan (see the brief insight on why I refer to ‘the satan’ rather than ‘Satan’ below) to bring about Job’s pain. So, in the least, could God be guilty by association? Hmmmm… Or maybe that’s not the problem Job addresses.
As you’ll start to see, I don’t have all the answers, and the number of questions I’m asking don’t stop adding up but follow along in this series of posts and we’ll attempt to face them together.
Before I go for now, here’s some brief insights on Job that will help us in this series:
· Job is considered wisdom literature along with Proverbs and Ecclesiastes.
· The genre of Job is mixed. Job 1–2 & Job 42:7–17 is written in prose, whereas everything in between those sections is written in poem, though not the kind I would recommend quoting to your significant other. Here’s Job’s friend, Bildad, with a good example of why not, “How long will you say these things, and the words of your mouth be a great wind?” (Job 8:1).
· Although Christian tradition and many English translations of scripture tend to recognize Satan as the figure in conversation with God in Job 1, the Hebrew text places the definite article we know as ‘the’ before the word we translate as accuser or Satan. This means this is not Satan as you might think, but an accuser who is employed by God to report on human behavior.
· It’s helpful to recognize the book of Job might not be attempting a literal account of history, but a narrative meant to elucidate certain theological issues. The people at The Bible Project note how the setting of Job is in the far away land of ‘Uz’, the characters are non-Israelites (Which is unique to the Hebrew scriptures,) and there is no clear historical setting. You can watch their helpful video here: https://bibleproject.com/explore/video/job/
Until the next post, I recommend reading Job 1–2 so you can begin to see some of what I’m writing about for yourself!
Link to part II here: https://rahinkle.medium.com/reflections-on-job-and-the-problem-of-suffering-3b9b6d75ac0a
[1] Unless otherwise noted, all scripture references will be the New Revised Standard Version.
