Chronological
The first of Job’s three wise friends, Eliphaz, is a man guided by strong convictions and a belief in the accumulated knowledge of his ancestors. Because he thinks Job is suffering due to his own unintended sins, Eliphaz dwells on God’s responses to the wicked and the righteous, believing he will encourage Job to accept God’s correction of his sins. Although his intentions are good, Eliphaz does not realize that Job will have a different perspective on his words. Eliphaz’s intended encouragement instead upsets Job more. These powerful convictions are expressed in the wrong place and time.
6 Job answered Eliphaz.
2 Job: Would that my anguish were weighed,
laid on a scale together with the disaster I’ve suffered!
3 For there is not enough sand in the seas to outweigh it!
It’s no wonder my untamed words are but incoherent stammering.
4 The arrows of the Highest One[a] have sunk deeply into me;
my spirit drinks their poison.
The terrors of God assemble like soldiers marching against me.
5 Does a wild donkey bray in hunger in a field of fresh grass?
Does an ox low with pangs over plenty of feed?
6 If I were served a tasteless mush,
how could I eat it without at least adding salt?
Or is there even any sense of taste in the slime of a plant?[b]
7 I refuse to eat, and I gag at the thought of it.
This vile food sickens me.
8 If only my one request were answered,
if only God would grant me the fulfillment of my only hope:
9 That God would be willing to crush me, to kill me,
that God would release His hand and cut me off.
10 At least then I would have a crumb of consolation,
one source of joy in the midst of this relentless agony:
I never denied the words of the Holy One in my pain.
It is possible to imagine God’s creation as fabric on a loom and God as a weaver. The threads of the world are stretched out vertically on a large loom, creating the warp of the fabric; and God weaves the threads of our lives horizontally, pushing them back and forth quickly around the vertical threads with His shuttle, creating the weft of the fabric. Job pictures his life ending when the thread runs out (7:6), but here he asks God to release His guidance on Job’s life and cut him away from this world prematurely. To do so, God would cut across the warp, thus affecting all of creation and not just Job himself. Even though God does not grant Job’s wish, Job has no thought of suicide; he knows only God has the right to begin and end life.
11 Job: What strength do I have, that I should persist in this life?
And what is my life’s end, that I should forestall it?
12 Is my strength like that of stones?
Is my flesh like bronze?
13 Can I even hope to help myself,
or has any chance of help been driven away?
14 A despondent person deserves kindness from his friend,
even though he strays from the fear of the Highest One.
15 But you, my brothers, are unpredictable
like an unexpected flood of the wadi that quickly rises and then falls,
16 That contain dark, muddy swirls of thawing ice
that swell in the melting snow,
17 But whose flow is stopped in the summer heat
and that vanish in their gullies under the heat of the sun.
18 The path of their course winds along,
goes out into the desert and disappears.
19 You travelers have heard
how the experienced caravans from Tema searched for water,
how the travelers of Sheba expected to find it;
20 But their confidence turned to frustration and shame;
for when they arrived, they found no water, only disappointment.
21 Now you, too, have come to nothing.
You see my terror and are afraid for yourselves.
22 Have I ever asked you to give me anything,
or from your means to offer a bribe on my behalf?
23 Have I ever asked you to rescue me from my enemies’ hands,
or to deliver me from the clutches of powerful adversaries?
24 In all seriousness, teach me, and I will be silent.
Where I have erred? Help me understand.
25 True, honest words are painful,
but what does your chiding confirm?
26 Was it your intent to correct me?
Did you imagine that, desperate as I was, my words were nothing but wind?
27 Yes, it seems you’d have no qualms about sending an orphan into slavery
or selling out a friend.
28 Now do me the favor of looking at me;
look me in my face; I will not lie to your face.
29 Turn back; don’t let any more harm be done.
Turn back to me now; my reputation and integrity are at stake.
30 Is there any wickedness, any poisonous word on my tongue?
Don’t you think I can tell when I’ve tasted a ruinous lie?
7 Job: Don’t we humans struggle long and hard in our time on earth?
Don’t we live our lives as common laborers?
2 As slaves longing for shade,
as workers pining for wages,
3 So I am destined to receive only months of meaninglessness,
and nights of nothing but misery.
4 When I lie down at the end of day, I wonder,
“How soon till morning so I can arise?”
But the night stretches on,
and I toss and turn until sunrise.
5 My putrid skin is covered with maggots and a dirty crust.
It hardens and cracks and oozes again.
6 My days whisk by swifter than the shuttle in a weaver’s loom—
back and forth, and back and forth—
and then they come to their hopeless end.
7 My life, remember, is just a breath;
in death no more good will reach my eye.
8 Whoever sees me now, will not for long;
you’ll look for me, but I’ll be gone.
9 As clouds thin and finally vanish,
so it is when people enter the land of the dead.
Never will they come back up.
10 Never will they return to their homes
or will the place they lived recognize them anymore.
11 Like Eliphaz, I will not keep silent.
In the agony of my spirit, I will speak;
In the bitterness of my soul, I will complain.
12 Am I the raging sea, or the monster of the deep,
so threatening you must appoint a guard over me?
13 When I think my couch will comfort me
or my bed will soften my complaint,
14 You, Lord, intimidate me with dreams
and terrorize me with visions.
15 I’d rather be suffocated, even dead,
than live in these aching bones of mine.
Job compares his treatment to God’s defeat of two mythic enemies of creation: Yam and Tannin. Ancient Near Eastern legends say that before God created the world, the “formless void” that existed was called “the deep.” When God separated the heavens from the earth, He divided the formless void with the horizon, leaving the waters of the earth below (the oceans) and the waters of the heavens above (the blue skies and clouds). Yam the sea god and Tannin the sea monster tried to interfere in this separation. God of course defeated them, imprisoning them in the sea with sandbars. Job’s reference to this myth shows he believes God is treating him unfairly, punishing him as brutally as He did these subhuman, rebellious creatures. Job, on the other hand, has not been rebellious to God.
16 Job: I hate my life. I have no desire to keep on living.
Leave me alone, God, for I have only a short time left.
17 What are these human beings, that You make so much of them—
that You shower them with attention?
18 You examine them morning by morning;
You test them moment by moment.
19 How long will You stare at me?
I can’t even clear my throat of spit without an audience.
20 I have sinned. What have I done to You,
You who watch after humanity?
Why have You targeted me, a man whose life is just a breath?
Am I really such a heavy load for You?
21 So I’ve sinned inadvertently: can’t You pardon me?
Are my crimes such You can’t forgive my sins?
After all, I will lie in the dust, and it won’t be long
until You will look for me, but I’ll be gone.
8 Then the second of Job’s three friends, Bildad the Shuhite, addressed Job.
2 Bildad: How long will you say these things,
your words whipping through air like a powerful wind?
3 Does God corrupt justice,
or does the Highest One[c] corrupt the good?
4 If your children sinned against Him,
He merely administered the punishment due them for those sins.
5 But if you search for God
and make your appeal to the Highest One,
6 If you are pure and righteous,
I have no doubt He will arise for you and restore you to your righteous place.
7 From your modest beginnings,
the future will be bright before you.
8 Ask those who have come and gone!
Explore what their fathers learned and taught them.
9 For we are not of ages past, nor even of years gone by.
We are ignorant creatures of yesterday,
and our time on earth is only a shadow.
10 But the ancients are not similarly bound, are they?
Won’t they speak to and instruct you?
Won’t they draw up words from deep within?
11 Can papyrus grow tall without a marsh?
Can reeds flourish without water?
12 Even if they are hardy and unbroken,
without water they will dry up before any other plant.
13 So it goes with any who forget God.
The hope of the godless soon withers and dies.
14 His confidence breaks,
for he trusts in the tenuous threads of a spider’s web.[d]
15 When he leans into his house of silken threads for support,
it won’t hold;
Though his arms grab to steady him,
it will break—he will fall and never get back up.
16 Still the godless appears to be a hardy plant,
thriving in full sun, sending his shoots across the garden.
17 The roots twine and grip the stone heap
and search for a home among the rocks.
18 If he is pulled up, the place will disown him saying,
“I have never seen you.”
19 See, his sole joy consists of this:[e]
knowing that others will spring from the earth to take his place.
20 Do you see it? God will not reject the innocent;
He will not reject you or support agents of evil.
21 He will fill your mouth with laughter;
your lips will spill over into cries of delight.
22 Those who hate you will don the garment of shame,
and the home of the wicked will disappear.
Much like Eliphaz, Bildad believes people suffer as a result of their own sins. But his justification of that suffering is different. Bildad reasons that God is just; as God, He is justice personified. Because He is so perfectly just, God will not punish someone who is also just. Bildad’s logical but flawed conclusion is that Job must have sinned to deserve his current pain. Surprisingly, he manages to be even less effective than Eliphaz had been, alienating Job by reasoning that Job’s children must have sinned to deserve their deaths and implying that Job’s regular sacrifices on their behalf were not enough to save them.
9 Then Job spoke to them.
2 Job: Sure, I know all of this is correct,
but tell me this: how can a person set things straight with God?
3 If one wanted to argue with Him,
even in a thousand questions he would not be able to answer Him once.
4 His wise heart is vast; His strength immeasurable.
Who has ever challenged Him and remained safe and at peace?
5 He uproots mountains,
and they are unaware when He overturns them in His rage.
6 He shakes the earth out of its place
so that its foundation pillars shudder.
7 He commands the sun to go down and not rise,
and He sequesters the stars so they do not shine.
8 He single-handedly stretched out the heavens overhead
and walks on the back of the raging sea.
9 He fashioned the stars into constellations we know by name—
Bear, Orion, the Pleiades—
and the lights of the southern sky.
10 He does wonderful things, even confounding things,
and performs an infinite number of miracles.
11 Still, if He passes right by me, I don’t see Him;
if He brushes past, I don’t notice Him.
12 Ah, but if He were to steal like a thief in the market,
who could stop Him? No one has authority over Him.
Who could dare say to Him, “What are You doing?”
13 God does not restrain Himself in His anger.
Even the minions of Rahab—that monster of the sea and purveyor of chaos—
cower at His feet in subservience.
14 So then how do I argue with Him?
How can I find the right words to state my case to Him?
15 After all, I am the innocent one here, and I still can’t find an answer.
So I must continually appeal to the mercy of my judge.
16 But even if I were to call Him and He were to answer,
I still could not believe that He would listen to my complaint.
17 For He flattens me with a tornado
and multiplies my wounds for no reason.
18 He won’t even give me time to catch my breath;
instead He force-feeds me more bitterness.
19 If it is an issue of power, there is no question
He is the mighty one;
and if it is an issue of justice, who would ever appoint me?
20 Even though I am right in all of this, my own mouth sentences me.
Though I am blameless, my own lips cheat me.
21 I am blameless, but I don’t know myself.
I hate my life.
22 Well, then this is what I say: it’s all the same.
In the end, He kills off both the innocent and the depraved.
23 If a flood of disaster rushes in and kills,
He ridicules the anguish of its innocent victims.
24 The earth has been given over
and is under the dominion of some wicked hand.
God conceals these things from its judges, covering their faces, blinding their eyes.
If not He, then who is it?
25 As for me, my days are sprinting by like a runner.
Seeing nothing good, they seek escape.
26 They glide past in swift silence like reed boats on the river.
Now a blur, they dive like an eagle toward its prey.
27 If I tell myself, “I will forget all about my grievance against God,
I will simply abandon my long face and cheer up,”
28 Then I fear the suffering to come
because I know there’s no chance that You, Lord, will find me innocent.
29 So if the verdict is already in, if I have already been found guilty,
why should I bother to clear my name?
Why struggle in vain?
30 Though I wash my body in the pure melted snow
and scrub my hands thoroughly with the strongest soap,
31 You would toss me into a putrid pit,
and when I emerged, even my own clothes would hate me.
32 The Lord . . . He is no man, like me, whom I could answer,
no human being whom I could face in court.
33 There is no judge to stand between us
who can lay his hands on us both,
34 Who can remove God’s rod from my back
and stave off the terror of Him that haunts me.
35 I long to speak and defend myself without fear of Him and His reprisals;
but as things stand now and as I am within myself, that’s not possible.
The Voice Bible Copyright © 2012 Thomas Nelson, Inc. The Voice™ translation © 2012 Ecclesia Bible Society All rights reserved.