The modern reader's Bible : a series of works from the sacred Scriptures presented in modern literary form...

THE MODERN READER

THE BOOK OF JOB

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Wisdom Series

The Book of Job

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THE MODERN READER'S BIBLE

A SERIES OF WORKS FROM THE SACRED SCRIPTURES PRESENTED
IN MODERN LITERARY FORM

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THE BOOK OF JOB

EDITED, WITH AN INTRODUCTION AND NOTES
BY

RICHARD G. MOULTON, M.A. (Camb.), Ph.D. (Penn.)

Professor of Literature in English in the
University of Chicago

MACMILLAN AND CO.

LONDON : MACMILLAN & CO., Ltd.
1896

All rights reserved

Copyright, 1896,
By MACMILLAN AND CO.

Nortoooli iPrcss

J. S. Cuehing & Co. - Berwick & Smith
Norwood Mass. U.S.A.

Introduction

To arrange works of art in order of merit, and discuss
which are to be considered greater and which less, is out-
side formal criticism. All the same it is an elementary in-
stinct of appreciation to express a sense of the greatness of
a particular work by claiming that it is greatest. If then
a jury of persons well instructed in literature were impan-
elled to pronounce upon the question what is the greatest
poem in the world's great literatures, while on such a ques-
tion unanimity would be impossible, yet I believe a large
majority would give their verdict in favour of that which is
the subject of the present volume, the Book of Job.

It deals with the most universal of all topics, the Mys-
tery of Suffering. Even the frivolous are driven by suffer-
ing to think about the meaning of life. For the theologian,
next to the existence of a good God, the most fundamental
question is the presence of pain and evil in a world he has
ordered. The significance of these terms is no less funda-
mental in philosophy. The whole of sociology rests upon
the same basis of human suffering. If the theory of pain
and evil is outside physical science, yet to fight against
these makes great part of its practical application. And of

-jS Introduction

poetry the larger half draws its inspiration from the tragedy
of life.

For the treatment of so universal a subject Hebrew
has advantages over other languages. It bases its verse
system on a parallelism which is also a function of prose ;
accordingly it constitutes a highly elastic medium, which
can shift at will from the measured beauties of verse to the
freedom of prose, while the verse itself can reflect any
change of feeling in some metrical variation. Again, what
seems at first a defect of Hebrew literature in reality in-
creases its range : the lack of a theatre to specialise drama
has caused the dramatic impulse to spread through other
literary forms, until epic, lyric, discourse, are all drawn to-
gether on a common basis of dramatic presentation. Thus
of the two distinguishing features of Hebrew, the one draws
together the different forms of poetry, and the other tends
to unite poetry with prose. Thus in the Book of Job all
these literary forms can be combined, and all the modes
of thinking of which these forms are the natural vehicles.
The bulk of the work is a philosophical discussion of the
question of suffering, and different mental attitudes to this
question are successively exhibited. But the philosophical
discussion is also a dramatic debate : with rise and fall of
passion, varieties of personal interest, quick changes in the
movement of thought ; while a background of nature, ever
present, makes a climax in a whirlwind which ushers us
into the supernatural. Interest of rhetoric is added for

Introduction 6«-

emphasis : the argument is swayed out of its course by sus-
tained outbursts of verbal workmanship, such as are wont
to rouse assemblies of men to strong feeling. Again, the
situation, which is to be discussed with all these varieties
of resource, is brought forward for discussion by a narrated
story ; a story so evenly poised between the two functions
of story — epic and history — that readers are divided on
the question whether the Book of Job is a narrative of fact
or an imagined parable. All this does not exhaust the
elements of this literary masterpiece. The human world
which endures and meditates on the suffering is in the
Book of Job presented as fringed round with another
world, the region of transcendental existence from which
prophecy draws its inspiration ; and the question which is
debated in the human drama has in the prologue been
solved in the mysteries of heaven.

Not only have we here the whole range of literary ex-
pression applied to a universal topic, but another note of
the universal is struck in the selection of the personages
in whose experience and meditation the topic is to be pre-
sented. It is no mere poet's caprice that has located the
story in the land of Uz. No doubt the scene is idealised ;
but the very name carries us to a conception of patriarchal
life, which is a middle point in human development in
touch with the whole of human experience. It is a full life
that these patriarchs lead ; there is no narrowness of ex-
ternal circumstances such as might cramp sympathy and

-^ Introduction

mental vision. The description of Job's wealth displays the
pastoral life united with the settled life of agriculture, and
house or tent is used indifferently to express a dwelling
place. The mention of camels implies traffic and mer-
chandise which would draw out of isolation into world
intercourse. Country has combined with city: we have
the administration of justice in the gate, — simple justice,
with its daysman to lay hands on combatants, its single
witness, its simple infamy of the stocks. The picture
stops short only of the enterprise and competition that
tend to swallow up life in adding to the means of liveli-
hood. The age of the patriarchs seems to make a
borderland in social evolution, from which the whole can
be studied ; and a speech of Job describes with scientific
precision the changes from the primitive commune to the
turbulence of crowded life. But for themselves these chil-
dren of the east have' adopted a stationary life : absorbed
in higher thoughts they are content to sit still and let the
world go by, as swift posts between great empires hurry
past them, or the caravans of Tema stay a night in their
neighbourhood, passing to and from the desert. In their
thoughts they are familiar with the whole range of the
larger world. They speak of kings and counsellors and
judges and priests ; of solitary sepulchral piles where the
great lie with their buried gold ; Egypt, under the name
Rahab, is a byword with them. They have marked the
lessons of nations in their rise and fall. They know of

Introduction ^

cities, the abode of the prosperous wicked, who cover their
faces with fatness and have collops of fat on their flanks ;
the place also of prisons, slaves, and taskmasters. They
talk familiarly of the gold of Ophir, and the topaz of
Ethiopia, and can picture every detail of the miner's
venture into the earth. War they know : the casting up
of military roads and encampments, the warrior with his
thick bosses of bucklers, his iron weapon and bow of brass ;
they know the chances of war, and have perhaps had their
share in redeeming from oppressors, and delivering the
fatherless from the casting of lots. They know also the
robber bands, whose god is their strong right hand, break-
ing upon the prosperous out of their lairs in desolate and
ruinous cities. Their knowledge extends even to the out-
casts of mankind, savages gaunt with want and famine,
gnawing the dry ground in the gloom of wasteness and
desolation, children of fools, driven out of the land. Of
all these extremes they are content only to know : they
have themselves attained the golden mean of restful
serenity, as far from the glitter of life as from its stains.

So, for all its simplicity, it is a stately life that is lived
by these patriarchs in the land of Uz. For the young
there are rounds of feasting on ceremonial days ; sisters
lend their presence to their brothers, for their joy is not
sensuous indulgence but festal mirth. The old also have
their days of observance, marked by solemnity and ritual
offerings. As brothers and sisters are in the world of

-^ Introduction

youth, so in mature life is the relationship of friends.
Visits of ceremony are exchanged between these friends,
and they behave with formal dignity of manners ; it is an
elementary instinct of order that leads Job's visitors to
move together in their weeping, and rending their gar-
ments, and casting dust upon their heads ; they sit down
on the ground " for seven days and seven nights " before
they can break in upon the silent majesty of grief. The
speech of these patriarchs is sparing because it is so
weighty: pointed words of wisdom, inherited riches of
tradition multiplied by long brooding and observation;
if there is occasion for more, it takes the shape of a formal
curse or ritual oath of innocence. Their moral principles
are as fixed as the laws of nature ; if one is violated, it is
as if a rock were removed out of its place. Their venera-
tion is for antiquity, for tradition uncorrupted from with-
out. The greatest of them feels that he is but of yesterday ;
no disputant can be expected to resist a cause supported
by one "much older than his father"; they or their
fathers have received wisdom from " those to whom the
land was given, and no stranger passed through it." The
greatest sensation of the poem, short of the supernatural
climax, is when the aged have to endure, in astonished
silence, youth breaking in to plead nervously for a view of
truth separated by but a hair's breadth from their own.
Thus, amid the various ideals which men have formed for
themselves, the ideal of the patriarchs is the stable life : a

Introduction S«-

life in league with the very stones of the field, that can
laugh at destruction and dearth ; a life of substance increas-
ing in the land, that there may be no lack of relief for the
distressed and hospitality to force upon the stranger : for
what use is there in wealth but this? While the wicked
are snatched away before their time, their own life is to
reach its end with the stateliness of a shock of corn carried
in in its season. Only with this last hope can they stave
off the one thing inevitable, dark horizon bounding the
light of their life — the thought of Sheol, into which every
man must at last go down to return no more, a land of
darkness without order, where in secret isolation he must
abide, half consciously wasting from flesh to shade, stranger
to all that has succeeded to his place, enduring to himself
what pain there may be of flesh, what mourning of spirit.

Life in this land of Uz is a life of poetry ; but it is
poetry without books. Not a hint is to be found of named
poets or quoted works. Job speaks of writing in a book
in the same breath with writing on the rock ; for inscrip-
tions, or the indictment of an adversary, writing may be
appropriate, but it never occurs to the speakers in this
story to associate it with poetry. The floating literature
of oral speech, in which the foundations of the world's
j?oetry were gradually fashioned, is here seen in full sway.
Moreover the people of our story are in close touch with
the fountain of poetry — external nature. Violent things
of nature have been within their experience: lightning

-^ Introduction

bolts that destroy Job's whole wealth of sheep in a
moment, winds from the wilderness laying low a hall of
feasting, earthquakes, monsters of sea and land, to that
remotest monster on the horizon of the imagination — the
swift, whirling serpent that whirls round the earth and at
times invades it, or darkens the sun in eclipse till pierced
by the might of God himself. And the things of every-
day nature make imagery for the poem : the rush, the flag,
the spider leaning on his web, the flower cut down, the
fallen tree, the landslip, the water wearing the stones.
Nay, so saturated are the speakers with nature sympathies
that they seem to pass beyond imagery ; it is more than a
fashion of speech when Job says that his steps are washed
with butter and the rock pours him out rivers of oil, that
his root is spread out on the waters, that God in his anger
lifteth him up to the wind, and causeth him to ride upon
it, and dissolveth him in the storm.

Above all, the life of the patriarchs is a life filled with
God. Though the language of the poem is Hebrew, and
the God worshipped is the God of the Hebrews revealed
under his various names, yet we have not here the Hebrew
religion as we know it in the rest of the Old Testament.
Whatever ' the land of Uz ' may be in geography, in
essence its people are the worshippers of the invisible
God from whom originally Abraham went forth, first of
missionaries, charged with the work of founding a people
who should uphold the worship of the unseen God against

Introduction sa-
nations of idolators, until in his seed all nations of the
earth should be blessed. Meanwhile, the patriarchs have
maintained the worship of the invisible God at home.
Throughout the whole work there is no mention of idols ;
the only false religion the most daring impiety can con-
ceive is to offer homage to the fairest works of the Creator
in the lights of heaven. Like Melchisedek, who gave his
blessing to Abraham while the chosen people was yet
unborn, like Balaam testifying from without Jehovah's
care over his own, so these patriarchs worship Israel's
God outside the ranks of Israel; if Abraham was the
Friend of God, Job is before the hosts of heaven pro-
nounced God's Servant on earth. Here then we see the
religion of the Bible as a religion without a Law, without
a Temple, with no national ritual, with nothing in which
the modern mind can recognise a Church. The only
revelation these patriarchs know is the vision vouchsafed
to the individual worshipper ; or rarely, at long intervals,
"an angel, an interpreter, one among a thousand" raised
up to tell the meaning of some strange experience. Their
creed, as rehearsed in heaven, is to fear God and eschew
evil. Their sense of God is as deep seated as their very
consciousness : when Job's wife, in momentary distraction,
bids him renounce God, it comes as an impulse to suicide.
Their elementary feelings are fresh, and the religious sense
in them is overpowering awe. It makes their whole life one
of hallowed restraint: the besetting God numbers their

-^ Introduction

steps, they " make a covenant with their eyes," they dread
lest they may for a moment walk with vanity ; with more
than the sensitive conscience of a Greek chorus they will
not curse an enemy, lest they may be asking for his life.
Divine providence they conceive as an enlargement of
their own ideals, redressing the wrongs of the poor, tak-
ing the crafty in their counsels ; mercy too mingles with
judgment, and he who maketh sore bindeth up. Sickness,
earthquake, and every human event is fraught with mean-
ing. The Divine presence fills the universe, from the
council of the holy ones on high down to the shades
shivering beneath the seas ; while in the nature that comes
between it is the Divine hand alone that stretcheth out the
north over empty space, and hangeth the earth upon noth-
ing. And at times there is a more awful sense of his
nearness :

Lo, he goeth by me, and I see him not:
He passeth on also, but I perceive him not.

For the Tempest is the Presence passing through the
startled earth, shrouded in the clouds with which he closeth
in the face of his throne and the thick darkness cast under
his feet. The craving to enter into that Presence is for
Job religious ecstasy.

In such an atmosphere as this the story is to move,
which shall first exhibit human suffering that is unique,
xiv

Introduction 8«-

and then concentrate upon this suffering light from succes-
sive points of view.

The Prologue introduces us to the Court of Heaven,
and presents the Lord surrounded by his council of holy
ones. Two days of the Lord are represented, days of
ceremony and ritual observance, — so it would seem from
the recurrence of formal phrases. The sons of God pass
in review before the throne, and are questioned as to the
provinces of the universe which they have in charge.
Among them comes '■ the Satan.' Most unfortunately,
the omission in English versions of the article has led the
popular mind astray on this incident. Unquestionably in
this passage, and the precisely similar passage in Zecha-
riah, the word is the title of an office, not the name of an
individual. The margin of the Revised Version gives
^ the Adversary ' ; the word expresses that he is the ad-
versary of the saints in the same way that an inspector or
examiner may be considered as adverse to those he in-
spects or examines. It is easy to understand how such a
title should pass over to form the name of an individual
— the Adversary of God, Satan the prince of Evil. In
the present case he describes his office as the inspection of
earth : " going to and fro in the earth, and walking up and
down in it " : he uses just the language applied in Zecha-
riah to the ministering Spirits who carry out the divine
decrees in our world. He appears on the scene among
the sons of God ; and there is nothing to distinguish his

-^ Introduction

reception from the reception of the rest. As other sons
of God may have one or another of the ' morning stars '
in their guardianship, so the Adversary is the Guardian
Spirit of the earth.

The Lord instances Job as his perfect servant on earth.
The Adversary, according to his function, indicates the
impossibihty of judging on this point, since Job's life is
wrapped in a prosperity that would make the worship of
the heart indistinguishable from an interested lip service,
to be abandoned as soon as the prosperity were with-
drawn. Those who come to this work with associations
of the other ' Satan ' not entirely dismissed see in the atti-
tude of the Adversary here personal malignity, or a scepti-
cal doubt as to the possibility of disinterested worship.
I can see neither. That there is no malignity is evident
from the absence of any expression of divine displeasure,
an absence the more marked from the fact that in the
precisely similar scene in Zechariah a too urgent Adver-
sary is rebuked by God. For the other suggestion, it
must be remembered that the question raised by the Lord
is nothing short of perfection on earth : in regard to so
high a state the smallest doubt must be pressed. No one
would see a sinister motive in a scientific experimenter,
who revised his plans because his experiment was shown
to be one degree short of being exhaustive. If it be ob-
jected that the idea of scientific experiment is out of har-
mony with the situation, I would ask what else is implied

Introduction 6«*-

in a < state of probation ' ? This much may safely be said :
so vast is the disproportion between the suffering of the
individual and the question of the possibility of earthly
perfection, that Job himself, could he have assisted at
that session of heaven's court, would have gladly assented
to the test of the Adversary.

By permission then of God we have the fire from heaven,
the winds of the wilderness, the forayers of the desert,
concentrating their powers in a single moment to bring
about a colossal ruin. It is encountered by as colossal a
patience. In orderly dignity Job goes through the ges-
tures of bereavement, bidding farewell to all the accessories
of life, which have left him only his naked manhood. But
when he turns to his God, he shows no tearful resignation,
but a grateful courtesy, that hastens to make mention of
the giver when the gift has been taken avv^ay.

The Lord hath given, and the Lord hath taken away :
Blessed be the Name of the Lord.

When the Council of Heaven reassembles God triumphs
in his servant. The Adversary no less honours him, in
proposing yet more implacable trial : he acts in the spirit
of some mechanician who tasks himself to devise some
terrific strain, in admiration of a substance which has
stood an extremity of testing. Nor is the Lord any more
doubtful of his servant : and the test is permitted. Job is
smitten in his person, with skin disease at once agonising

-5S Introduction

and loathsome. He must creep out, as unclean, from the
village, and sit down on the ash-mound with other beggars
and outcasts. There as he sits in his misery, his good
wife — no less patient than Job in all that had touched
herself — breaks down when she gazes on the suffering
which she can neither share nor relieve, and speaks wild
words, which Job gently rebukes. To him it seems mean-
ness that a man should accept from a wise providence
things of good, and draw back when its dispensations are
things of evil.

The Prologue has served its purpose of setting up, by
supernatural machinery, a spectacle of suffering equally
severe and undeserved. The questions generated by such
a spectacle it leaves to be debated in the limited sphere of
human knowledge. But already this prologue has in the
superhuman mysteries it has unveiled suggested a First
Solution of the Mystery of Suffering: Stffering a test of
saintship^ made the more severe as the saintship is stronger
to endure.

The materials for our drama are gathering. The suf-
ferer sits on the ash-mound as on a stage, with all sur-
rounding nature for scenery ; round about stand a chorus
of silent spectators, gazing on the fallen glory of their
land ; travellers too stop to wonder at the sight, some
smiting on their breasts as they go on their w^ay to spread
the sad story abroad, some lingering, like Elihu, to gather
wisdom. At last the three Friends of Job, in the pomp of

Introduction S«-

woe and exalted station, have arrived ; the spectators rev-
erently make way for them to ascend the mound and sit
opposite their comrade on the bare ground. The scene is
complete : yet all wait for the suffering hero himself to
break the painful silence.

He opens his mouth in a 'Curse.' Once more an infe-
licity of translation (corrected in the Revised Version) has
led the English reader astray. The word is quite different
from the expression for 'renouncing God,' used before.
In what Job proceeds to speak there is not the smallest
approach to the sin which the Adversary thought possible
for Job, and Job thought possible for his children. He
does not renounce God, but appeals to him ; he does not
complain of what has been taken, but only asks for the
stripped and suffering life to be brought to a speedy end ;
even Job's Friends attack, not what he says, but what he
has failed to say. What then is his 'Curse'? As the
Hecuba of Euripides cries in her total ruin :

Even here the unhappy have a muse,

so Job simply sets his woe to music — the music of an
unsurpassable lyric elegy. All variations of darkening
that fancy can suggest are invoked to blot out that day
which betrayed Job into Hfe. The dreaded Sheol is
viewed as a world of stately rest in comparison with the
singer's crushed life. And why should longer life be
thrust upon a heart that is broken?

^ Introduction

This last is the starting point of the whole discussion.
Though surely the gentlest of murmurs, it is enough to
show that Job has separated himself from that which is to
the Friends the truth of truths, and which may be here
presented as a Second offered Solution of the Mystery of
Suffering: that all Siffering is jtidginent upon sin. The
discussion that follows may be analysed in detail, and it
is so analysed in the notes to this volume : notes which
are arranged according to the metrical sections of the
poem, for — as the student of Comparative Literature will
be prepared to find — in so highly wrought a dramatic
poem a change of the metrical system accompanies every
change in the tone or movement of a scene. But it must
at the same time be remembered that this is a dramatic
debate even more than a philosophic discussion : passion
and personality are factors in the movement. The Friends
appear before us as persons absolutely committed to a
fixed theory of life. Their minds are closed: Job's ob-
jections do not disturb their confidence for a moment,
while they pour out in voluble eloquence generalities which
are in accord with their theory. And resistance to their
view of God's action they treat as resistance to God.
Against them is pitted a Job who has been the ideal of the
views they and he had held, but who has spiritual life
enough to cast them aside now that they have proved in-
sufficient ; he dares to have an open mind on a funda-
mental question of divine action ; though sei"vant of God

Introduction 8«-

he can appeal to him against his own visitation, and im-
peach God's providence in the name of God's justice.
Accordingly, minute connections of argument seem to me
less important than to catch the general play of feeling
and prominent trains of thought which are found in Job,
as he is thus tossed to and fro in waves of passionate
utterance, beating against the immovable rock of the
Friends' theory.

Eliphaz opens for the Friends with dignity and tender-
ness. He has the delicate task of hinting that the ideal
of human perfection has been shown by his afflictions to
be a sinner. But his opening words speak of nothing but
Job's kindness with other sufferers, and how he would
strengthen them with the consolation Eliphaz now offers
to himself. Thus the first word of the Friends' doctrine
is made a word of hope : if affliction were an accident,
springing without seed out of the ground, then indeed Job
might despair ; but since it is only they who have sown
iniquity that reap its fruit there must lie a way of return to
prosperity by forsaking the sin. The basis on which the
doctrine of the Friends rests — the infinite distance be-
tween God and finite man — is developed by Eliphaz in a
story of a Vision, in which a supernatural voice proclaimed
to the terrified sleeper that mortal man could not be just
before God : that thus from a visitation of God there can
be no appeal. Then Eliphaz passes to the happy restora-
tion which follows the divine correction, and finds a con-

-^ Introduction

elusion in a musical sonnet picturing the ideal life of the
restored Job.

When the other two Friends come in their turn to speak,
there is more rebuke in their tone, because they have Job's
resistance to meet. But substantially their position is
that of Eliphaz, Bildad supporting it from nature and
tradition, Zophar by dwelling on the infinity of God. And
both are careful to emphasise the happy future that will
follow on submission.

As Job meets these successive speeches, there is no calm-
ness in his tone, but he reaches the full height of passion
at once. He does not claim to be sinless, but he knows
that no sin of his can explain the total ruin which has de-
scended upon him : why cannot God forgive his iniquity
and let him die? The basis on which the Friends have
rested their doctrine he turns against them : it is just this
infinite distance between man and God which makes it im-
possible to bring his cause before the mighty Judge ; there
is no daysman to lay hands on his adversary equally with
himself; a God before whom the pillars of earth tremble,
and kings and counsellors are in his hands as spoils, is an
irresponsible omnipotence to whom the perfect man and
the sinner are alike nothing.

Though I be righteous, mine own mouth shall condemn

me:
Though I be perfect, it shall prove me perverse.
Though I be perfect, I will not regard myself;

Introduction B^

I despise my life,

It is all one ; therefore I say,

He destroyeth the perfect and the wicked.

Thus Job is led to what is one of his fixed trains of thought :
that this affliction is persecution : a persecution by God of
God's own handiwork. For God has poured him out like
milk and curdled him like cheese ; yet he watches against
him as if he were a sea-monster, and shows himself a mar-
vellous hunter, harassing a driven leaf. As to the doctrine
of judgment on the wicked, the very beasts of the field
know it : yet does that alter the fact that the tents of rob-
bers are found prospering, while the just man is made a
laughing-stock? Job thus recoils from the false friends
who have given him rebuke where consolation was due,
brooks found by the thirsty traveller to have run dry in the
sands of the desert. They will lie on God's behalf: Job
though God is slaying him will wait for him. So, by a
strange irony, Job's antagonism against his friends' miscon-
struction is leading him to appeal from them to the very
God he had before pronounced inscrutable, and in his
almightiness indifferent as between righteous and wicked.
At the climax of this portion of the drama the thoughts of
the hero sway to and fro — and the metre, with its ' pendu-
lum figure,' sways with them — between the effort to make
this appeal, and the overpowering awe of the Being to whom
he is to address his cause. And at this point the feeling of
awe gains the mastery ; in the final section Job falls back

-«8 Introduction

into the picturing of the hopeless life of man, too short and
feeble to attain the vindication which is its due : the fallen
tree may revive again, but man lieth down and ariseth no
more. Here we get the first gleam of that new thought,
which is to light up Job's despair from time to time : how
happy would Sheol itself be, if only there could come a
vindication of his cause beyond it.

Oh that thou wouldest hide me in Sheol,

That thou wouldest keep me secret, until thy wrath be past,

That thou wouldest appoint me a set time and remember me !

If a man die, shall he live again?

All the days of my warfare would I wait till my release should

come;
Thou shouldest call, and I would answer thee :
Thou wouldest have a desire to the work of thine hands.

But no : the thought is dismissed as unthinkable : man's
hope is destroyed with the slow certainty of the crumbling
landslip, and in the grave he suffers to himself, ignorant
of happiness or woe that is in the world above.

In the second round of speeches there is intensification
of feeling on both sides. The speakers interrupt one an-
other; each supports his views, not with argument only,
but with tours-de-force of sustained rhetoric, enumerating
instances or elaborating pictures. On the side of the
Friends there is no advance except in the expression of
their views. But Job's thoughts and feelings are still de-
veloping. The appeal to God, as to which he had before

Introduction ^

wavered, is now made : and for the Friends he has only
contempt. Again, whereas his complaint before was the
difficulty of bringing his case before the Divine tribunal, he
now declares in set terms that God subverteth him in his
cause. As he enlarges on the misery of his persecution,
he is so prostrated as to appeal to the Friends themselves
for pity. But, the more hope is excluded in other direc-
tions, the more strongly the strange new hope moves him ;
and from his lowest despair he springs suddenly to the
thought of vindication beyond death, before hinted at and
dismissed, now an inspiration and a certainty.

Oh that my words were now written !
Oh that they were inscribed in a book !
That with an iron pen and lead
They were graven in the rock for ever !

For I know that my Vindicator liveth,

And that He shall stand up at the last upon the earth;

And after my skin hath been thus destroyed,

Yet without my flesh shall I see God !

Whom I shall see on my side,

And mine eyes shall behold, and not another.

In the last speech of the cycle another important ad-
vance is made by Job. Hitherto he had, almost carelessly,
both recognised the doctrine of judgment and flung out
facts against it. But now that it has been pressed upon
him again and again Job is compelled to look the doc-

-^ Introduction

trine fairly in the face. He trembles at the doubts which
begin to gather in his mind.

Even when I remember I am troubled,
And horror taketh hold on my flesh.

He begins to describe the visible impunity of the wicked,
nay, their prosperity through life and honourable burial ;
the stock objections used to bolster up the appearance of
providential equity he tears to pieces. His own case is
forgotten for the time; what can the Friends say as to
these doubts?

They have nothing to say; nothing at all in their
formal speeches, and even if the arguments Job answers
are supposed to be interjected by the Friends, yet these
are not really arguments, only re-statements of the theory
in other terms. But in this final round of speeches their
heated tone subsides : the case has become too serious for
passion. They seem to speak under a sense of making
final pronouncement; and it would appear as if each
charged himself with bringing to a climax a different ele-
ment of the common contention. Eliphaz feels bound to
drop the general terms he had used in the hope that Job
would be his own accuser; he nov/ enumerates actual
transgressions. But he seeks to soften down the effect
by dwelling on the theme of submission and restoration,
now touched for the last time. Bildad deals with the
basis of the doctrine ; and the distance between finite and

Introduction S«-

infinite overpowers us as we read of the authority that is
arbiter among the sanctities, architect of the universe,
artist finding flaws in heaven's own brightness.

Lo, these are but the outskirts of his ways ;
And how small a whisper do we hear of him !
But the thunder of his power who can understand?

Zophar reiterates for the last time the doctrine of unfailing
judgment on sin, and brings it to a worthy peroration.
This fear of God and his judgments Zophar makes the
foundation of all wisdom, in the most famous passage of
the whole poem. No miner for all his skill can find wis-
dom among the precious things he brings out of the earth.
God alone knows its place; and when he wrought the
structure of his creation he linked wisdom with the fear of
the Lord, understanding with the retreat from evil.

Job also carries to a climax each train of thought which
has appeared in his former speeches. The cruel accusa-
tions of Eliphaz intensify his appeal to the heavenly vindi-
cator ; though in this narrow life Job looks forward and
backward, to the left and to the right, without finding him,
yet —

He knoweth the way that I take ;

When he hath tried me, I shall come forth as gold.

Calmed by this meditation. Job returns to the doubts
which closed the last cycle ; no longer in a hesitating and

-^ Introduction

tremulous tone, but in deliberate and orderly exposition
he shows how '"times are not found to be laid up by the
Almighty "in the earth. He describes the violence and
injustice of the world, and how by these the weaker are
driven to a life of distress ; how the distress is aggravated
by its close contact with wealth ; how such social growth
crowds life in the cities and begets the crimes of city vio-
lence; how finally is formed a purely criminal class, at
war with the light itself. As he proceeds we feel that it
is no longer a question of anomalies in the doctrine of
judgment, but rather whether the impunity of the wicked
is not to be enumerated among the recognised ways of
God's providence. The sense of persecution is brought
out by Job in a pair of companion pictures, what he was
and what he is : — what he was, when God's light shined
upon him, the poor hailed him as a saviour, and the great
hushed their speech at his presence ; what he is now,
when the very children of outcasts jostle him about, and
God himself has turned to be cruel to him. Last of all
Job reaches the direct accusations of Eliphaz. He an-
swers them not with argument, but makes his appeal from
the accusers to the supreme Judge in the formal oath of
innocence : he goes through a catechism of evil deeds and
thoughts far more stringent than Eliphaz had suggested,
and in the most solemn manner invokes doom if he be
guilty. Beyond this the simple judicial conceptions of
the age cannot go: personal dignity moreover permits

Introduction B«-

no more, and Job waves his hand in dismissal of the con-
troversy :

The words of Job are ended.

We enter upon another section of the poem, and a new
actor appears upon the scene. Among the spectators
about the ash-mound was EUhu, of the family of Ram.
He is a foreigner, and his speech abounds in Aramaisms.
He is moreover a young man, and the decorum of patri-
archal life is to be broken in upon by the wisdom of youth.
Elihu feels to the full the bashfulness of a young man in-
terposing in a conversation of elders. But he feels also
the fervour of youth, longing to champion orthodoxy ; he
has moreover juvenile confidence in the clearer grasp of
truth which his generation possesses. And yet, for all his
dissociating himself from the speeches of the Friends, we
who read at this distance of time need effort to catch
wherein his case differs from that already presented.
Both enlarge upon the immeasurable distance between
God and man. Both are full of the judgment upon sin-
ners. All that Elihu seems to do is to emphasise one side
of the common contention which had been less empha-
sised by the Friends. His contribution to the poem may
then be presented as a Third offered Solution of the Mys-
tery of Suffering: Suffering is judgmejit warning the sin-
ner by repent ajtce to escape from heavier judgment.

Elihu ascends the mound, and confronts the seated

^ Introduction

elders. He takes fifty-two lines to say he is going to
speak: a curious zig-zag metre admirably reflects his
struggles between nervousness and a growing enthusiasm
for his cause. At last he settles to his argument. Such
vision as Eliphaz has described is a warning from God ;
but not less of a divine warning is to be found in the sick-
ness which chastens a sufferer with pain upon his bed and
with continual strife in his limbs. All that is needed is
that some "interpreter, one among a thousand" should
bring home the lesson and lead the way to restoration :
and Elihu no doubt has an ambitious thrill of hope that
he has been raised up to fulfil that function in the present
case. At the end he appeals directly to Job, and will
pause for his answer. But Job vouchsafes no answer, and
receives the new light with silent indifference.

Then Elihu turns to the three Friends, and hopes to
unite them, and all other men of wisdom and understand-
ing, with himself in protest against Job, whom he describes
as drinking scorn like water, and adding a rebellious spirit
to actual sin. In his second speech he dwells — as the
Friends had done before him — on presumptuous sins
against God, and on God's unerring providence. He be-
gins to hint of further judgment, and that Job may be
" tried unto the end." Both at opening and close he makes
pointed appeals to the aged Friends. But he cannot draw
any notice from them : they will not recognise a youthful
champion.

Introduction ^

Doubly slighted, Elihu can yet, from a single glance at
the sky, draw an inspiration that strengthens him to con-
front both his adversaries.

I will answer thee,

And thy companions with thee.

Look unto the heavens, and see.

His new answer proves to be the old topic, handled so
fully by the former speakers, of the infinite distance be-
tween God and man. He combines it with his own argu-
ment as to the blindness of sinful men, who will complain
of the suffering and yet refuse to read its lessons. And he
continues to hint of v/orse things to come, if Job should
be visited in anger.

Still he is met by silence. There is something almost
pathetic in the way this youthful disputant, in his struggles
for recognition from his severe elders, is driven to greater
extremes of self-assertion :

Truly my words are not false :

One that is perfect in knowledge is with thee.

Though he is to fetch his knowledge from afar, yet it
proves to be no more than the oft reiterated theme of
God's judgments on the mighty in defence of the weak :
if these be slighted there is reserved a final destruction.
And already Job seems ripe for such destruction : he is
" full of the judgement of the wicked."

-^ Introduction

So far youth has been exhibited on its weaker side : from
this point we see it in another light. The brilliant atmos-
phere around begins to show ominous signs of change, and
Elihu catches the thought that the further judgment of
which he has been warning Job is that moment impending.
With youth's keen responsiveness to nature he eagerly
drinks in every detail of the growing change, and through
his words we are able to see the gradual rise of the whirl-
wind. We have spreadings of clouds, small drops of
water, such lightning and mutter of thunder as makes the
cattle stand expectant of the " storm that cometh up."
Then some heavier crash makes Elihu tremble and his
heart move out of its place : now beasts go to their dens
as the thunder thunders with a voice of majesty, and
the lightning reaches the ends of the earth. It is a tem-
pest of all the winds of heaven : Elihu and his companions
have to endure the sultry sweep of the south, under which
their garments are felt too warm for them, and the icy
breath of the north, that mingles snow with the mighty
rain. The thick storm cloud overhead balances itself as it
descends and wraps all in a darkness that appals even
Elihu.

Teach us what we shall say unto him,

For we cannot order our speech by reason of darkness.

Shall it be told him that I would speak?

If a man speak, surely he shall be swallowed up.

Introduction 8«*-

At last there comes a transition beyond even tempest.
The whirlwind, in mystic fashion, spreads the thick clouds
round the horizon like a curtain shutting in holy ground.
From the cleared sky come flashes of intolerable brightness.
Lastly, in that northern quarter from which Hebrew imag-
ination looks for the advance of Divine judgments, is seen
a " terrible majesty " of " golden splendour " ; and the roar
of the whirlwind has become an articulate Voice.

The Divine Intervention is the finale and climax of the
whole drama. But its purport is, I believe, commonly
misunderstood. It is often supposed to be an indignant
denial of Job's right to question the ways of God. That
this is not its significance a single consideration is suf-
ficient to show. Such denial of the right to question had
been the position of the Friends : Job had resisted, and
questioned. Yet in the epilogue God is represented as
declaring that the Friends had not said of him the thing
that was right, as his servant Job had. Nor can this be
met by the suggestion that Job had made submission,
whereas the Friends had not, and were therefore under
the Divine displeasure because of their misinterpretation of
the visitation on Job. The Friends have not been called
upon for submission : no part of the Divine Intervention
is addressed to them, nor does it bear upon their case. It
is impossible to interpret the epilogue except as a pro-
nouncement on the side of Job, however much there may
be of rebuke for his wilder utterances. Unless then we

-^ Introduction

are to say that the Divine Intervention pronounces on one
side and the Epilogue on the other, it cannot be that the
former is a denial of the right to question.

It is a different thing, and nearer the truth, to lay down
that the Divine Intervention denies \h.^ possibility of Job's
reading the meaning of God's visitation. Indeed, this is
unquestionably part of the significance of this section.
But to say this is to say nothing : such inscrutability of
providence is a commonplace of the whole poem : the
Friends and Elihu proclaim it. Job himself has recognised
it in strong language. It would seem that the emphasis
upon this topic is a necessity arising from the very char-
acter of the literary task here attempted. The poet has
undertaken to dramatise God's ways in heaven and earth,
God himself being introduced as one of dramatis persojice ;
the instinct of reverence makes him seek to counterpoise
such bold imagination by making prominent at every
point the awful distance between the creature and the
Creator.

To arrive at the exact significance of this portion of the
Book of Job we must examine further. It must be remem-
bered that we have here, not an outburst of angry rebuke,
but an elaborate and unique poem, with a strong tone of
thought supported by a wealth of details. When we study
these details, we find presented a conception of Deity very
different from what might have been anticipated. The
God of Judgment confounding the mighty in their pride.

Introduction B^

which the Friends had conceived, and with which Elihu
had threatened Job, is not the God pictured in the details
of the Divine Intervention. In a single section of it (48)
the Divine function of judge does appear : but the brevity
of this section, and its place in the whole, combine to
represent it as subordinate. And even here the drift is
not what the Friends or Elihu would have desired. The
Divine speaker seems to be pointing out Job's helplessness
to execute the office of vindicator even among the proud
ones of humanity ; how much less (it is implied) is he
adequate to the more remote ways of providence exhibited
in the rest of the speech out of the whirlwind.

The Deity of the Divine Intervention is not the God
of Judgment but the Soul of External Nature. Job had
at one point of the discussion pictured a God beyond the
possibilities of human understanding : no two conceptions
can be more unlike than the God so conceived by Job
and the God here presented by Himself. One note there
is in common : the half scornful ease of fathomless
energy. But Job's thought was an Infinite Inaccessibility :
here we have an Infinite Sympathy. He is the God of
Nature, but here revealed in the joyous spontaneities
of nature. Omniscience, omnipotence, omnipresence are
of course implied ; but what is made prominent is an all-
pervasive sympathy, embracing the vastnesses that strain
the imagination, but penetrating also to the smallest things
and things most remote from human interest. Though the

^>3 Introduction

Creator of the world, he is not here a creator by fiat, but
an earth-builder, rejoicing in his task to secure its founda-
tions and determine its measures, while the corner-stone
is laid with the morning stars singing together and all the
sons of God shouting for joy. There is power in his
shutting up ocean with bars it may not pass : there is
another conception in his watching for it as it issues from
the womb, making a garment for it of cloud, and swad-
dling bands of thick darkness. There is power in the
dayspring taking hold of the ends of the earth and shak-
ing the wicked out of their darkness : there is the artist's
joy also in viewing the earth under this dawning light
change as clay under a seal, while the dulled landscape
suddenly stands forth as a patterned garment. What to
man are the mysteries of the stars, of the ocean depths,
of darkness, of light, of death itself, of the sources of the
snow and hail, these make the common round of this
Nature Power: who walks through the heavens binding
the clusters of the Pleiades, loosing the bands of Orion,
leading the signs of the Zodiac in their season, guiding
the Bear with her train ; he enters the springs of the sea,
or walks in the fathomless recesses of the deep ; now visits
the gates of death, now takes the way to the dwelling of
light, arranges by what angle the lightning shall fork,
keeps treasuries of hail and snow against the day of battle.
We have here, not the flood and tempest overwhelming
the nations, but the rain with glorious redundancy rejoic-

Introduction B^

ing to rain on the wilderness where no man is, satisfying
the waste and lonely land with his gift of the tender
springing grass ; or he watches the sport of the dust run-
ning into a mass, and the clods having their time of
embracing, as he pours out for them the bottles of heaven.
Man has his ox, that eats out of his crib, and harrows after
him the valleys : but here is sympathy with the passionate
liberty of the wild ass which scorns the noisy city and the
driver's shout, finding a palace of freedom in the salt
wilderness and a pasture meadow in the rocky tableland.
Here is sympathy with the hawk soaring southwards, with
the eagle in her spy-house of inaccessible crags, with the
lioness crouching for the spring, with the food-winning
anxieties of the raven, with all the family cares of the
desert goat — the numbering of the months, the bowing
in travail, the moment of casting out her sorrows, the
young ones growing in good liking, their going forth at
last to return to the parent no more. The stupid ostrich,
with not enough of nature's first instinct to guard her eggs
against the chance footfall, even she has her time, when
she lifteth up herself on high and puts to scorn the horse
and his rider. But what of this war horse with the quiv-
ering mane, who has his joy in the terrors of mankind,
swallowing the ground in the fierceness of his spirit as the
trumpet and shouting tell of battle at hand! What of the
nature monsters on the dim border of man's knowledge —
Behemoth, " which I made with thee," with man's strong-

-98 Introduction

est things for but fragments of his frame, the cedar's swing
for his tail, bones of brass, Umbs of iron bars, with the
mountain for his storehouse of food, the waterflood a care-
less trifle to him ; Leviathan himself, with a panoply that
all man's ways of war cannot break through, ocean turn-
ing white as he passes !

When such a conception of Deity has been taken in —
joyous sympathy with the infinities of great and small
throughout the universe — then we are able to see how
this Divine Intervention makes a distinct section of the
whole work. For the hopeless suffering in which there is
nothing of guilt what treatment can be better than to lose
the individual pain in sympathetic wonder over nature in
her inexhaustible variety? But the connection can be more
logically indicated. The mystery of suffering is not to be
solved within the limits of human knowledge ; and an im-
perfect or tentative solution could not be put into the mouth
of Deity. But what the Divine Intervention in this drama
does is to lift the discussion into a wider sphere. Job
and his friends had fastened their attention upon suffering
and evil, and had broken down under the weight of the
mystery : but the individual experience now seems a small
thing in the range of all nature's ways. Hence we have a
Fou7-th Solution of the Mystery of Suffering: That the
whole universe is an 7infathoj7ted mystery, and the Evil in
it is not more mysterious than the Good and the Great.
The problem of the poem may be insoluble ; but there is

Introduction Q^

an advance towards a solution when it can be compre-
hended in a wider category.

But it may be objected, Job makes submission and re-
pents : of what sin, according to this reading of the Divine
Intervention, does he repent ? Sin might be found, if nec-
essary, in the wild picturings of providence into which his
helplessness under false accusations betrayed him. But
surely it lowers the tone of the climax to look for positive
transgressions. Job, conscious of innocence as regards
the contentions of the Friends, had passionately desired to
come into the very presence of his Judge. His desire is
granted : but in the purity of that presence the whiteness
of innocence abhors itself in dust and ashes.

The drama terminates, and the narrative story is re-
sumed, to introduce a brief Epilogue. The purport of
this Epilogue has been already anticipated. God is rep-
resented as declaring that his anger is kindled against the
Friends of Job, because they had not said of him the thing
that was right, as his servant Job had ; they are com-
manded to offer sacrifice, and Job is to intercede for them.
We have here a I^z/t/i Solution of the Mystery of Suffer-
ing— the right attitude to this Mystery: That the bold
faith of Job ^ which could appeal to God against the justice
of God'^s own visitation^ was more acceptable to Him than
the servile adoration of the Friends, who had sought to dis-
tort the facts in order to magnify God. As Job intercedes
for his Friends, God also turns his own captivity ; wealth

-^ Introduction

and prosperity are granted him greater than before, and
he dies happy and full of years.

The whole of the Book of Job has now been traversed.
It remains to speak of its relation to the rest of Wisdom
literature.

That we have here a Hebrew poem outside the system
of Hebrew religion seen in the rest of the Old Testament
need create no difficulty. The other books of wisdom are
associated with an order of wise men who stand apart
from the distinctively religious life of Israel, in full har-
mony with it, but not resting on it for their philosophy.
It makes no difference to the framework of Ecclesiastictis
that the son of Sirach identifies Wisdom with the Law,
or celebrates the succession of the Fathers. Ecclesiastes
and Wisdom use Solomon only as an illustration; and
though the latter elaborately reads providential meaning
into the deliverance of the chosen people, yet it does this
without in any way resting on the Law or the Prophets.

It is obvious that the subject matter which is worked up
into the speeches of Job is wisdom in its most technical
sense. The habits of thought and turn of sentences are
the same here and in the other wisdom books ; many times
the same sentences are common to both, with expansions
or condensations. As the original gnomic couplets were
found to have developed into the essays of Ecclesiasticus^
so here they have developed into dramatic speeches and

xl

Introduction 8«^

rhetoric perorations. Moreover, the very special concep-
tion of wisdom which the earlier books associated with
the harmony of all creation enters into the final section
of Job: the germ of the Divine Intervention is found in
the great monologue of Proverbs, though in the drama
the ordering of the universe is directly attributed to God
himself, and not to any mediating ' Wisdom.'

Further, the topic of Job is the main thought of Wisdom
literature, brought into question by a particular application
of it in actual life. In all books of wisdom the real subject
is judgment, the sifting between the evil and the good.
The violation of this judgment in the visible prosperity of
the sinner is me::tio:\2d as a thought not to be entertained
in Proverbs, is provided against in the arguments of Eccle-
siasticus ; it drives the Preacher to his despair, while the
Wisdom of Solo7non devotes a discourse to the reversal of
the seeming prosperity hereafter. In Job the converse
of this — the affliction of the righteous — makes the whole
situation discussed ; and in the actual discussion it is the
prosperity of the wicked which is the most prominent
topic.

Again, the attitudes of mind successively exhibited to
the question at issue in the dramatic debate have their
relations to the other books of wisdom. The Friends, in
their immovable dogma that all suffering must be judg-
ment upon sin, are precisely at the mental standpoint of
the earliest wisdom. The slight variation from this of
xli

-^ Introduction

Elihu is well within the scope of the early books ; Prov-
erbs has a sonnet in which is emphasised the meaning of
the divine chastenings, and the son of Sirach says how the
unrepentant is forcing the current of the river. Moreover
Job himself, if we consider only his philosophic attitude
to the question at issue, is in the position of Ecclesiastes.
The system of his world has broken down ; his despair,
like that of the Preacher, seems to delight in emphasising
the ruin of a universe with its providence gone ; like the
Preacher he dwells upon the gloominess of the life broken
off by the grave ; like the Preacher, and much more than
he. Job retains his confidence in God and his immovable
loyalty to right. It is hardly necessary to add that Job
has in addition to this a personality immeasurably deeper
and wider than that of Ecclesiastes, and a religious expe-
rience into which the Preacher had never had access.

What is the relation between Job and the fourth of the
books of wisdom ? The Wisdom of Solomon assumes as
a postulate of thought the immortality which the earlier
wisdom ignored, and Ecclesiastes noticed only to deny.
This master thought of possibilities beyond the grave is in
Job seen in its first faint beginnings. The other person-
ages of the poem, and Job himself in ordinary states of
feeling, know of nothing later than the crumbling away
of the individual life in the dark seclusion of Sheol. The
extremity of his woe draws out of Job, in moments of pas-
sionate inspiration, conceptions of what may be reserved
xlii

Introduction 8«*-

for him beyond the grave. Four times such elevation of
faith flashes out. The first time the new thought comes
as little more than a figure of speech. Job is recoiling
from his Friends and their false pleas on God's behalf;
for himself he cries,

Though he slay me, yet will I wait for him :
Nevertheless I will maintain my ways before him.

What Job actually says here might have been said by
Ecclesiastes : that he will never give in to the untruth
urged upon him. But as an exaggerated way of saying
this he uses words which imply a waiting beyond death
for God. At the close of the same speech the thought
comes out, now as a fancy dwelt upon with lingering love
— how Sheol would be sweet, were he but waiting in it for
a release when his time of justification should arrive : but
the fancy is dismissed with emphasis of despair. Later in
the discussion he rises out of his deepest distress with a
sudden inspiration; and here the vindication after his
flesh has been destroyed by death has become a sure
hope, which he would grave deep in the rock for ever.
Once again his confidence in future vindication appears,
and it has now passed to the still higher stage of calm
assurance : though the Judge is not to be seen in his
searchings through the world, yet

He knoweth the way that I take ;
When he hath tried me, I shall come forth as gold,
xliii

-58 Introduction

The hope of immortality which was to crown the latest
work of Scriptural philosophy is seen struggling into birth
in the Book of Job.

We may say then, taking a general survey, that the
philosophical observation of life, which is the basis of all
Wisdom literature, enters into the Book of Job in applica-
tion to a particular situation; that the various stages of
development in the philosophic attitude which had made
the separate books of wisdom, have, in general though not
exact correspondence, their reflections in the poem, em-
bodied in the dramatic personages and the attitudes they
take to the mystery of life's sufferings ; and these varying
attitudes to the question of life are drawn into a unity by
the movement of a dramatic plot. The Book of Job is
Wisdom literature dramatised.

But it is more than this ; it contains an element which
is no part of wisdom. The hymns to Wisdom of Proverbs
and Ecclesiasticiis may be termed devotion, but in Job we
have the devout life itself in all its fulness : the personal
relation of the individual soul to God, and its correlative,
the relation of God to the individual soul ; the stages of
spiritual struggle and doubt, of triumph and reconciliation.
We have yet more. The prologue invades the sphere of
Prophecy, which, in discourse or dramatic vision, under-
takes to reveal what transcends human knowledge. So
here amid the sanctities of heaven is presented a solution
of life's mysteries which human minds may guess at, but
xliv

Introduction B^

not know. The Book of Job dramatises the spirit of Wis-
dom literature; and then encircles this with the wider
spirit of Prophecy and the devout life.

The text in this as other volumes of the Modern Read-
er's Bible is that of the Revised Version, for the use of
which I must express my obligations to the University
Presses of Oxford and Cambridge. From this text (in-
cluding the marginal alternatives) I never depart, as re-
gards the individual sentences ; but the form in which the
matter is presented I adapt to modern literary presenta-
tion. In the present case such editing involves slight
change in the division of the matter between the different
speakers. This is fully explained at the commencement
of the Notes. The poem is divided according to its
metrical sections ; but a Reference Table at the end con-
nects these with the Chapters and Verses of the Bible,
xlv

The Book of Job

The Book of Job

A DRAMATIC POEM

FRAMED IN

AN EPIC STORY

PERSONS OF THE STORY

The Lord

The Sons of God, or Guardian Spirits

The Adversary: Guardian Spirit of the Earth

Job

The Wife of Job

The Friends of Job

Messengers

The Scene of the Story changes between Heaven and the
House of Job in the Land of Uz.

PERSONS OF THE DRAMA

Job

Eliphaz the Temanite 1

Bildad the Shuhite \ Friends of Job

Zophar the Naamathite J

Elihu the Buzite: a Young Man

Spectators (mute)

Voice out of the Whirlwind

Scene of the Drama : The Ash-Mound outside a Village in
the Land of Uz.

PAGE

Story Prologue 9

I. The Curse 15

II. The Debate 19

III. The Oath of Clearing 85

IV. The Interposition of Elihu .... 89
V. The Divine Intervention . . . . ,107

Story Epilogue 121

Story Prologue

Job ; and that man was perfect and upright, and one that
feared God, and eschewed evil. And there were born
unto him seven sons and three daughters. His substance
also was seven thousand sheep, and three thousand camels,
and five hundred yoke of oxen, and five hundred she-asses,
and a very great household ; so that this man was the great-
est of all the children of the east./ And his sons went and
held a feast in the house of each one upon his day ; and
they sent and called for their three sisters to eat and to
drink with them. And it was so, when the days of their
feastings were gone about, that Job sent and sanctified
them, and rose up early in the morning, and offered burnt
offerings according to the number of them all; for Job
said, It may be that my sons have sinned, and renounced
God in their hearts. Thus did Job continually.

Now there was a day when the sons of God came to
present themselves before the Lord, and the Adversary
came also among them.

And the Lord said unto the Adversary, "Whence
comest thou ? "

Then the Adversary answered the Lord, and said,
9

^ The Book of Job

" From going to and fro in the earth, and from walking
up and down in it."

And the Lord said unto the Adversary, " Hast thou
considered my servant Job? for there is none hke him
in the earth, a perfect and an upright man, one that feareth
God, and escheweth evil."

Then the Adversary answered the Lord, and said,
"Doth Job fear God for nought? Hast not thou made
an hedge about him, and about his house, and about all
that he hath, on every side? thou hast blessed the work
of his hands, and his substance is increased in the land.
But put forth thine hand now, and touch all that he hath,
and he will renounce thee to thy face."

And the Lord said unto the Adversary, " Behold, all
that he hath is in thy power ; only upon himself put not
forth thine hand."

So the Adversary went forth from the presence of the
Lord. And it fell on a day when his sons and his
daughters were eating and drinking wine in their eldest
brother's house, that there came a messenger unto Job,
and said :

The oxen were plowing,

and the asses feeding beside them ;

and the Sabeans fell upon them

and took them away ;

yea, they have slain the servants with the edge of the sword ;

and I only am escaped alone to tell thee !

lo

Story Prologue S«-

While he was yet speaking, there came also another and
said:

The fire of God is fallen from heaven,

and hath burned up the sheep, and the servants,

and consumed them ;

and I only am escaped alone to tell thee !

Whilk he was yet speaking, there came also another and
said:!

The Chaldeans made three bands,

and fell upon the camels,

and have taken them away,

^a, and slain the servants vi'ith the edge of the sword ;

and I only am escaped alone to tell thee !

While le was yet speaking, there came also another and
said:

Thy sons and thy daughters

were e^ing and drinking wine in their eldest brother's house ;

and behold,

\here came a great wind from the wilderness,

and smote the four corners of the house,

and it fell upon the young men,

and they are dead ;

md I only am escaped alone to tell thee !

Then JoT^ arose, and rent his mantle, and shaved his
head, and f^l down upon the ground, and worshipped ;
and he said

->S The Book of Job

Naked came I out of my mother's womb,
And naked shall I return thither !

The Lord gave, and the Lord hath taken away :
Blessed be the Name of the LORD !

In all this Job sinned not, nor charged God with foolishiess.

Again there was a day when the sons of God cane to
present themselves before the Lord, and the Adversary
came also among them to present himself before the 1.0RD.

And the Lord said unto the Adversary, " From vhence
comest thou ? "

And the Adversary answered the Lord, anl said,
" From going to and fro in the earth, and from valking
up and down in it."

And the Lord said unto the Adversary, " HiSt thou
considered my servant Job? for there is none lik: him in
the earth, a perfect and an upright man, one th?: feareth
God, and escheweth evil : and he stiU holdetl fast his
integrity, althojutgh thou movedst me against him^^to
destroy him without cause." ^'

And the Adversary answered the Lord, md said,
"Skin for skin, yea, all that a man hath will e give for
his life. But put forth thine hand now, an touch his
bone and his^esh, and he will renounce thee 3 thy face."

And the Lord said unto the Adversary, Behold, he
is in thine hand ; only spare his life."

Story Prologue S<-

So the Adversary went forth from the presence of the
Lord, and smote Job with sore boils from the sole of his
foot unto his crown. And he took him a potsherd to
scrape himself withal ; and he sat among the ashes.

Then said his wife unto him, " Dost thou still hold fast
thine integrity? renounce God, and die."

But he said unto her, "Thou speakest as one of the
foolish women speaketh. What? shall we receive good
at the hand of God, and shall we not receive evil ? "

In all this did not Job sin with his lips.

Now when Job's three friends heard of all this evil that
was come upon him, they came every one from his own
place ; Eliphaz the Temanite, and Bildad the Shuhite, and
Zophar the Naamathite : and they made an appointment
together to come to bemoan him and to comfort him.
And when they lifted up their eyes afar off, and knew him
not, they lifted up their voice, and wept ; and they rent
every one his mantle, and sprinkled dust upon their heads
toward heaven. So they sat down with him upon the
ground seven days and seven nights, and none spake a
word unto him ; for they saw that his grief was very great.

After this opened Job his mouth, and cursed his day.
13

/

THE CURSE
JOB

Let the day perish wherein I was born ;

And the night which said, There is a man child conceived!

Let that day be darkness ;

Let not God regard it from above,

Neither let the light shine upon it !

Let darkness and the shadow of death claim it for

their own ;
Let a cloud dwell upon it ;
Let all that maketh black the day terrify it!

As for that night, let thick darkness seize upon it ;
Let it not rejoice among the days of the year ;
Let it not come into the number of the months!
Lo, let that night be barren ;
Let no joyful voice come therein!
Let them curse it that curse the day,
IS

I, 2 ^ The Book of Job

Who are ready to rouse up leviathan!

Let the stars of the twilight thereof be dark!

Let it look for light, but have none ;

Neither let it behold the eyelids of the morning :

Because it shut not up the doors of my mother's womb,
Nor hid trouble from mine eyes!

Why died I not from the womb ?

Why did I not give up the ghost when I came out of the
belly?
Why did the knees receive me?

Or why the breasts, that I should suck?

For now should I have lien down and been quiet ;

I should have slept ; then had I been at rest.
With kings and counsellors of the earth,
Which built solitary piles for themselves ;
Or with princes that had gold,
Who filled their houses with silver ;

Or as an hidden untimely birth I had not been ;

As infants which never saw light.

There the wicked cease from troubling ;
And there the weary be at rest.
i6

The Curse 8«-

There the prisoners are at ease together ;
They hear not the voice of the taskmaster.
The small and great are there ;
And the servant is free from his master.

Wherefore is light given to him that is in misery,
And life unto the bitter in soul ?

Which long for death, but it cometh not ;

And dig for it more than for hid treasures ;

Which rejoice exceedingly,

And are glad when they can find the grave.
Why is light given to a man whose way is hid,
And whom God hath hedged in ?

For my sighing cometh before I eat,

And my roarings are poured out like water.

For the thing which I fear cometh upon me,

And that which I am afraid of cometh unto me.

I am not at ease, neither am I quiet,

Neither have I rest : but trouble cometh !
c 17

//

THE DEBATE
ELIPHAZ

3

If one assay to commune with thee, wilt thou be grieved?

But who can withhold himself from speaking?
Behold, thou hast instructed many,
And thou hast strengthened the weak hands.
Thy words have upholden him that was falling,
And thou hast confirmed the feeble knees.
But now it is come unto thee, and thou faintest ;
It toucheth thee, and thou art troubled.

Is not thy fear of God thy confidence,

And thy hope the integrity of thy ways ?

Remember, I pray thee, who ever perished, being innocent?
Or where were the upright cut off ?

According as I have seen, they that plow iniquity,
And sow trouble, reap the same.

By the breath of God they perish,

And by the blast of his anger are they consumed.
19

-^ The Book of Job

The roaring of the Hon, and the voice of the fierce lion,

And the teeth of the young hons are broken.

The old lion perisheth for lack of prey,

And the whelps of the lioness are scattered abroad.

Now a thing was secretly brought to me,
And mine ear received a whisper thereof.

In thoughts from the visions of the night,

When deep sleep falleth on men,

Fear came upon me and trembling,

Which made all my bones to shake.

Then a spirit passed before my face ;

The hair of my flesh stood up.

It stood still, but I could not discern the appearance
thereof;

A form was before mine eyes :

There was silence, and I heard a voice, saying,

'' Shall mortal man be just before God?
Shall a man be pure before his Maker?

Behold, he putteth no trust in his servants ;

And his angels he charge th with folly :

How much more them that dwell in houses of clay,

Whose foundation is in the dust.

Which are crushed before the moth !

Betwixt morning and evening they are destroyed :

The Debate B«*-

They perish for ever without any regarding it.
Is not their tent-cord plucked up within them ?
They die, and that without wisdom."

Call now : is there any that will answer thee?

And to which of the holy ones wilt thou turn?

For vexation killeth the foolish man,

And jealousy slayeth the silly one.

I have seen the foolish taking root :
But suddenly I cursed his habitation.
His children are far from safety,
And they are crushed in the gate,
Neither is there any to deliver them.
Whose harvest the hungry eateth up.
And taketh it even out of the thorns,
And the snare gapeth for their substance.
For affliction cometh not forth of the dust.
Neither doth trouble spring out of the ground ;
But man is born unto trouble.
As the sparks fly upward.

And unto God would I commit my cause :

Which doeth great things and unsearchable
Marvellous things without number :

3 ^ The Book of Job

Who giveth rain upon the earth,
And sendeth waters upon the fields :

So that he setteth up on high those that be low ;

And those which mourn are exalted to safety.

He frustrateth the devices of the crafty,

So that their hands cannot perform their enterprise.

He taketh the wise in their own craftiness :

And the counsel of the froward is carried headlong.

They meet with darkness in the day-time,

And grope at noonday as in the night.

But he saveth from the sword of their mouth,

Even the needy from the hand of the mighty.

So the poor hath hope.

And iniquity stoppeth her mouth.

Behold, happy is the man whom God correcteth :

Therefore despise not thou the chastening of the Al-
mighty.

For he maketh sore, and bindeth up ;

He woundeth, and his hands make whole.

He shall deliver thee in six troubles ;
Yea, in seven there shall no evil touch thee.
In famine he shall redeem thee from death ;
And in war from the power of the sword.
Thou shalt be hid from the scourge of the tongue ;
Neither shalt thou be afraid of destruction when it
Cometh.

The Debate d^ 3,4

At destruction and dearth thou shalt laugh :

Neither shalt thou be afraid of the beasts of the earth.
For thou shalt be in league with the stones of the field ;

And the beasts of the field shall be at peace with thee.
And thou shalt know that thy tent is in peace ;

And thou shalt visit thy fold and shalt miss nothing.
Thou shalt know also that thy seed shall be great,

And thine offspring as the grass of the earth.
Thou shalt come to thy grave in a full age,

Like as a shock of corn cometh in in its season.
Lo this, we have searched it, so it is ;
Hear it, and know thou it for thy good

JOB

Oh that my vexation were but weighed,

And my calamity laid in the balances together!

For now it would be heavier than the sand of the seas :

Therefore have my words been rash.

For the arrows of the Almighty are within me,

The poison whereof my spirit drinketh up :

The terrors of God do set themselves in array against me.

Doth the wild ass bray when he hath grass ?
Or loweth the ox over his fodder?
23

4,5 ^ The Book of Job

Can that which hath no savour be eaten without salt ?
Or is there any taste in the white of an egg?
What things my soul refused to touch,
These are as my loathsome meat.

Oh that I might have my request ;

And that God would grant me the thing that I long for!

Even that it would please God to crush me ;

That he would let loose his hand and cut me off!

Then should I yet have comfort ;

Yea, I would exult in pain that spareth not :

For I have not denied the words of the Holy One.

What is my strength that I should wait ?

And what is mine end, that I should be patient?

Is my strength the strength of stones?

Or is my flesh of brass ?

Is it not that I have no help in me,

And that sound wisdom is driven quite from me ?

5

To him that is ready to faint kindness should be shewed

from his friend ;
Even to him that forsaketh the fear of the Almighty.
My brethren have dealt deceitfully as a brook.
As the channel of brooks that pass away ;
24

The Debate d^ 5

Which are black by reason of the ice,

And wherein the snow hideth itself:

What time they wax warm, they vanish :

When it is hot, they are consumed out of their

place.
The paths of their way are turned aside,
They go up into the waste and perish.
The caravans of Tema looked,
The companies of Sheba waited for them ;
They were ashamed because they had hoped ;
They came thither and were confounded.

For now ye are nothing ;

Ye see a terror, and are afraid.

Did I say. Give unto me?

Or, Offer a present for me of your substance ?

Or, Deliver me from the adversary's hand ?

Or, Redeem me from the hand of the oppressors ?

Teach me and I will hold my peace ;

And cause me to understand wherein I have erred.

How forcible are words of uprightness !

But what doth your arguing reprove ?

Do ye imagine to reprove words ?

Seeing that the speeches of one that is desperate are
as wind.

Yea, ye would cast lots upon the fatherless.

And make merchandise of your friend.
25

5 ^ The Book of Job

Now therefore be pleased to look upon me ;

For surely I shall not lie to your face.
Return, I pray you, let there be no injustice ;

Yea, return again, my cause is righteous.
Is there injustice on my tongue?

Cannot my taste discern mischievous things?

Is there not a time of service to man upon earth ?
And are not his days like the days of an hireling?

As a servant that earnestly desireth the shadow,

And as an hireling that looketh for his wages,

So am I made to possess months of vanity.

And wearisome nights are appointed to me.

When I lie down, I say, When shall I arise?

But the night is long ;

And I am full of tossings to and fro

Unto the dawning of the day.

My flesh is clothed with worms and clods of dust ;

My skin closeth up and breaketh out afresh.

My days are swifter than a weaver's shuttle,

And are spent without hope.

Oh remember that my life is wind :

Mine eye shall no more see good.
The eye of him that seeth me shall behold me no more :

Thine eyes shall be upon me, but I shall not be.
26

The Debate 8«- 5

As the cloud is consumed and vanisheth away,

So he that goeth down to Sheol shall come up no
more.

He shall return no more to his house,

Neither shall his place know him any more.

Therefore I will not refrain my mouth ;
I will speak in the anguish of my spirit ;
I will complain in the bitterness of my soul.

Am I a sea, or a sea-monster,

That thou settest a watch over me ?

When I say. My bed shall comfort me,

My couch shall ease my complaint :

Then thou scarest me with dreams,

And terrifiest me through visions :

So that my soul chooseth strangling.

And death rather than these my bones.

I loathe my life ;

I would not live alway ;

Let me alone ;

For my days are vanity.

What is man, that thou shouldest magnify him,

And that thou shouldest set thine heart upon him,

And that thou shouldest visit him every morning,

And try him every moment ?

How long wilt thou not look away from me.

Nor let me alone till I swallow down my spittle?
27

5,6 -^ The Book of Job

If I have sinned, what can I do unto thee, O thou watcher
of men?
Why hast thou set me as a mark for thee.
So that I am a burden to myself?
And why dost thou not pardon my transgression,
And take away mine iniquity ?
For now shall I lie down in the dust ;
And thou shalt seek me diligently, but I shall not be!

BILDAD

6

How long wilt thou speak these things?
And how long shall the words of thy mouth be like a
mighty wind ?

Doth God pervert judgement?

Or doth the Almighty pervert justice?

If thy children have sinned against him,

And he have delivered them into the hand of their

transgression :
If thou wouldest seek diligently unto God,
And make thy supplication to the Almighty ;
If thou wert pure and upright, surely now he would

awake for thee,
And make the habitation of thy righteousness pros-
perous.

The Debate ^ 6

And though thy beginning was small,
Yet thy latter end should greatly increase.

For inquire, I pray thee, of the former age.
And apply thyself to that which their fathers have searched
out :

(For we are but of yesterday, and know nothing,

Because our days upon earth are a shadow :)

Shall not they teach thee and tell thee.

And utter words out of their heart?

Can the rush grow up without mire?
Can the flag grow without water?

Whilst it is yet in its greenness, and not cut down.

It withereth before any other herb.

So are the paths of all that forget God ;

And the hope of the godless man shall perish :

Whose confidence shall break in sunder,

And whose trust is a spider's web.

He shall lean upon his house, but it shall not

stand :
He shall hold fast thereby, but it shall not endure.
He is green before the sun, and his shoots go forth over

his garden ;
His roots are wrapped about the heap, he beholdeth the
place of stones.

29

6,7 ^ The Book of Job

If he be destroyed from his place,

Then it shall deny him, saying, I have not seen thee.

Behold, this is the joy of his way,

And out of the earth shall others spring.

Behold, God will not cast away a perfect man,
Neither will he uphold the evil-doers.

He will yet fill thy mouth with laughter.

And thy lips with shouting.

They that hate thee shall be clothed with shame,

And the tent of the wicked shall be no more.

JOB

7

Of a truth I know that it is so :
But how can man be just with God?

If he be pleased to contend with him.

He cannot answer him one of a thousand.

He is wise in heart and mighty in strength :

Who hath hardened himself against him and prospered ?

Which removeth the mountains and they know it not,
When he overturneth them in his anger.
30

The Debate ^

Which shaketh the earth out of her place,
And the pillars thereof tremble.
Which commandeth the sun and it riseth not ;
And sealeth up the stars.

Which alone stretcheth out the heavens,

And treadeth upon the waves of the sea.

Which maketh the Bear, Orion, and the Pleiades,

And the chambers of the south.

Which doeth great things past finding out ;

Lo, he goeth by me, and I see him not :
He passeth on also, but I perceive him not.
Behold he seizeth the prey, who can hinder him?
Who will say unto him, What doest thou ?

God will not withdraw his anger ;

The helpers of Rahab do stoop u»nder him.

How much less shall I answer him.

And choose out my words to reason with him!

Whom, though I were righteous,
Yet would I not answer ;
I would make supplication to mine adversary.
31

-^ The Book of Job

If I had called,
And he had answered me ;

Yet would I not believe that he hearkened unto my
voice.

For he breaketh me with a tempest,
And muitiplieth my wounds without cause.
He will not suffer me to take my breath.
But filleth me with bitterness.

If we speak of the strength of the mighty,

Lo, he is there !

And if of judgement,

Who will appoint me a time ?

Though I be righteous, mine own mouth shall con-
demn me :
Though I be perfect, it shall prove me perverse.
Though I be perfect, I will not regard myself;

I despise my life.

It is all one ; therefore I say,

He destroy eth the perfect and the wicked.

If the scourge slay suddenly,
He will mock at the trial of the innocent.
32

The Debate 8«- 7,8

The earth is given into the hand of the wicked :
He covereth the faces of the judges thereof.

If it be not he,
Who then is it?

Now my days are swifter than a post :
They flee away, they see no good.
They are passed away as the swift ships :
As the eagle that swoopeth on the prey.

If I say,

" I will forget my complaint,

I will put off my sad countenance.

And be of good cheer : "

I am afraid of all my sorrows,

I know that thou wilt not hold me innocent

I shall be condemned ;
Why then do I labour in vain ?

If I wash myself v/ith snow water,
And make my hands never so clean :
Yet wilt thou plunge me in the ditch,
And mine own clothes shall abhor me.
D 33

6, 9 -^TheBookofJob

For he is not a man as I am, that I should answer

him,
That we should come together in judgement ;
There is no daysman betwixt us,
That might lay his hand upon us both :

Let him take his rod away from me,

And let not his terror make me afraid,

Then would I speak and not fear him :
For I am not so in myself.

My soul is weary of my life ;
I will give free course to my complaint ;
I will speak in the bitterness of my soul.
I will say unto God, Do not condemn me ;
Shew me wherefore thou contendest with me.

Is it good unto thee that thou shouldest oppress,
That thou shouldest despise the work of thine hands,

And shine upon the counsel of the wicked?

Hast thou eyes of flesh.

Or seest thou as man seeth ?

Are thy days as the days of man.

Or thy years as man's days.

That thou inquirest after mine iniquity,

And searchest after my sin,
34

The Debate 8«- g

Although thou knowest that I am not wicked ;

And there is none that can deliver out of thine
hand?
Thine hands have framed me
And fashioned me together round about ;

Yet thou dost destroy me.
Remember, I beseech thee, that thou hast fashioned me
as clay ;

And wilt thou bring me into dust again ?
Hast thou not poured me out as milk.
And curdled me like cheese ?
Thou hast clothed me with skin and flesh,
And knit me together with bones and sinews.
Thou hast granted me life and favour,
And thy visitation hath preserved my spirit.

Yet these things thou didst hide in thine heart ;

I know that this is with thee :
If I sin,

Then thou markest me,

And thou wilt not acquit me from mine iniquity.
If I be wicked.

Woe unto me ;
And if I be righteous.

Yet shall I not lift up my head.

Being filled with ignominy.

And looking upon mine affliction.
35

g, lo -^ The Book of Job

And if my head exalt itself,

Thou huntest me as a lion,

And again thou shewest thyself marvellous upon me.

Thou renewest thy witnesses against me,

And increasest thine indignation upon me ;

Host after host is against me.

Wherefore then hast thou brought me forth out of the

womb ?
I had given up the ghost, and no eye had seen me.
I should have been as though I had not been ;
I should have been carried from the womb to the

grave.

Are not my days few?

Cease then, and let me alone,
That I may take comfort a little,
Before I go whence I shall not return :

Even to the land of darkness and of the shadow of death :
A land of thick darkness, as darkness itself;
A land of the shadow of death, without any order ;
And where the light is as darkness.
36

The Debate ^

ZOPHAR

Should not the multitude of words be answered ?

And should a man full of talk be justified?

Should thy boastings make men hold their peace?

And when thou mockest, shall no man make thee
ashamed ?
For thou sayest, My doctrine is pure,
And I am clean in thine eyes.

But Oh that God would speak,

And open his lips against thee ;

And that he would shew thee the secrets of wisdom :

For sound wisdom is manifold.
Know therefore that God exacteth of thee
Less than thine iniquity deserveth.

Canst thou by searching find out God ?

Canst thou find out the Almighty unto perfection?

It is high as heaven ;

What canst thou do?

Deeper than Sheol ;

What canst thou know?

The measure thereof is longer than the earth,

And broader than the sea.

If he pass through, and shut up,
37

II ^ The Book of Job

And call unto judgement, then who can hinder him ?

For he knoweth vain men :

He seeth iniquity also, and him that considereth not.

But vain man is void of understanding.

Yea, man is born as a wild ass's colt.

If thou set thine heart aright.
And stretch out thine hands toward him ;
If iniquity be in thine hand, put it far away.
And let not unrighteousness dwell in thy tents ;

Surely then shalt thou lift up thy face without spot ;

Yea, thou shalt be stedfast, and shalt not fear :

For thou shalt forget thy misery ;

rhou shalt remember it as waters that are passed away :

And thy life shall be clearer than the noonday ;

Though there be darkness, it shall be as the morning.

And thou shalt be secure,

Because there is hope ;

Yea, thou shalt search about thee,

And shalt take thy rest in safety.

Also thou shalt lie down.

And none shall make thee afraid ;

Yea, many shall make suit unto thee.

But the eyes of the wicked shall fail.

And they shall have no way to flee.

And their hope shall be the giving up of the ghost.
38

The Debate 8«-

JOB

No doubt but ye are the people,
And wisdom shall die with you.

But I have understanding as well as you ;

I am not inferior to you :

Yea, who knoweth not such things as these?

I am as one that is a laughing-stock to his neighbour,
A man that called upon God, and he answered him.
The just, the perfect man is a laughing-stock.

In the thought of him that is at ease there is contempt

for misfortune,
It is ready for them whose foot slippeth.

The tents of robbers prosper,

And they that provoke God are secure.

That bring their god in their hand.

But ask now the beasts, and they shall teach thee ;
And the fowls of the air, and they shall tell thee ;

Or, speak to the earth, and it shall teach thee ;
And the fishes of the sea shall declare unto thee :
39

12, 13 ^ The Book of Job

Who knoweth not in all these that - the hand of the Lord

hath wrought this ? "
In whose hand is the soul of every living thing,
And the breath of all mankind.

13

" Doth not the ear try words,

" Even as the palate tasteth its meat?

" With aged men is wisdom,

" And in length of days understanding,

With Him is wisdom and might :
He hath counsel and understanding.
Behold, he breaketh down,
And it cannot be built again ;
He shutteth up a man.
And there can be no opening.
Behold, he withholdeth the waters,
And they dry up.
Again he sendeth them out,
And they overturn the earth.

With Him is strength and sound wisdom ;

The deceived and the deceiver are His.
He leadeth counsellors away spoiled,
And judges maketh he fools.
40

The Debate 8«- 13, 14

He looseth the bond of kings,

And bindeth their loins with a girdle.

He leadeth priests away spoiled,

And overthroweth the mighty.

He removeth the speech of the trusty,

And taketh away the understanding of the elders.

He poureth contempt upon princes,

And looseth the belt of the strong.

He discovereth deep things out of darkness,

And bringeth out to light the shadow of death.

He increaseth the nations,

And destroyeth them ;

He spreadeth the nations abroad,

And bringeth them in.

He taketh away the heart of the chiefs of the people of

the earth.
And causeth them to wander in a wilderness where

there is no way.
They grope in the dark without light.
And he maketh them to stagger like a drunken man.

Lo, mine eye hath seen all this,
Mine ear hath heard and understood it.
What ye know, the same do I know also :
I am not inferior unto you.
41

14 ->3 The Book of Job

Surely I would speak to the Almighty,
And I desire to reason with God.

But ye are forgers of lies,

Ye are all physicians of no value.

Oh that ye would altogether hold your peace !

And it should be your wisdom.
Hear now my reasoning,
And hearken to the pleadings of my lips.

Will ye speak unrighteously for God,

And talk deceitfully for him ?

Will ye respect his person?

Will ye contend for God?

Is it good that he should search you out ?

Or as one deceiveth a man, will ye deceive him ?

He will surely reprove you,

If ye do secretly respect persons.

Shall not his excellency make you afraid,

And his dread fall upon you ?

Your memorable sayings are proverbs of ashes.

Your defences are defences of clay.

Hold your peace, let me alone, that I may speak.
And let come on me what will.
At all adventures I will take my flesh in my teeth.
And put my life in mine hand.
Though he slay me, yet will I wait for him :
42

The Debate Q^ 14

Nevertheless I will maintain my ways before him.

He also shall be my salvation ;

For a godless man shall not come before him.

Hear diligently my speech,

And let my declaration be in your ears.

Behold now, I have ordered my cause;

I know that I shall be justified.

Who is he that will contend with me?

For now if I hold my peace I shall give up the ghost.

Only do not two things unto me.

Then will I not hide myself from thy face :

Withdraw thine hand far from me ;

And let not thy terror make me afraid :

Then call thou, and I will answer ;

Or let me speak, and answer thou me.
How many are mine iniquities and sins?
Make me to know my transgression and my sin.
Wherefore hidest thou thy face,
And holdest me for thine enemy?

Wilt thou harass a driven leaf?

And wilt thou pursue the dry stubble ?

For thou writest bitter things against me,

And makest me to inherit the iniquities of my
youth :

Thou puttest my feet also in the stocks,

And markest all my paths ;

Thou drawest thee a line about the soles of my feet :
43

14, 15 -^ The Book of Job

Though I am Uke a rotten thing that consumeth,
Like a garment that is moth-eaten.

15
Man that is born of a woman
Is of few days and full of trouble ;
He Cometh forth like a flower, and is cut down,
He fleeth also as a shadow and continueth not.

And dost thou open thine eyes upon such an one,
And bringest me into judgement with thee ?

Who can bring a clean thing out of an unclean ? Not

one!
Seeing his days are determined,
The number of his months is with thee.
And thou hast appointed his bounds that he cannot

pass ;

Look away from him, that he may rest,

Till he shall accomplish, as an hireling, his day.

For there is hope of a tree, if it be cut down.
That it will sprout again.

And that the tender branch thereof will not cease ;
44

The Debate 8«- 15

Though the root thereof wax old in the earth,
And the stock thereof die in the ground^
Yet through the scent of water it will bud,
And put forth boughs like a plant.

But man dieth, and wasteth away :

Yea, man giveth up the ghost, and where is he ?

As the waters fail from the sea,

And the river decayeth and drieth up,

So man lieth down and riseth not ;

Till the heavens be no more they shall not awake,

Nor be roused out of their sleep.

Oh that thou wouldest hide me in Sheol,

That thou wouldest keep me secret, until thy wrath be

past.
That thou wouldest appoint me a set time and remember

me!

If a man die, shall he live again?

All the days of my warfare would I wait, till my release

should come ;
Thou shouldest call, and I would answer thee :
Thou wouldest have a desire to the work of thine

hands.

15, i6 ^ The Book of Job

But now thou numberest my steps :
Dost thou not watch over my sin?
My transgression is sealed up in a bag.
And thou fastenest up mine iniquity.

And surely the mountain falling cometh to nought,
And the rock is removed out of its place,
The waters wear the stones,

The overflowings thereof wash away the dust of the
earth :

And thou destroyest the hope of man :

Thou prevailest for ever against him, and he passeth ;

Thou changest his countenance, and sendest him away ;

His sons come to honour, and he knoweth it not ;

And they are brought low, but he perceiveth it not of them ;

Only for himself his flesh hath pain,

And for himself his soul mourneth.

ELIPHAZ

l6

Should a wise man make answer with vain knowledge.
And fill his belly with the east wind ?

Should he reason with unprofitable talk.

Or with speeches wherewith he can do no good?

46

The Debate 6«- i6

Yea, thou doest away with fear,
And restrainest devotion before God.

For thine iniquity teacheth thy mouth,

And thou choosest the tongue of the crafty.

Thine own mouth condemneth thee, and not I ;

Yea, thine own lips testify against thee.

Art thou the first man that was born ?

Or wast thou brought forth before the hills?
Hast thou heard the secret counsel of God?

And dost thou restrain wisdom to thyself?

What knowest thou, that we know not?

What understandest thou, which is not in us ?
With us are both the grayheaded and the very aged men.

Much elder than thy father.

Are the consolations of God too small for thee
And the word that dealeth gently with thee ?

Why doth thine heart carry thee away ?

And why do thine eyes wink ?

That thou turnest thy spirit against God,

And lettest such words go out of thy mouth.

What is man, that he should be clean ?
And he which is born of a woman, that he should be
righteous ?

47

16^17 -^ The Book of Job

Behold, he putteth no trust in his holy ones ;
Yea, the heavens are not clean in his sight :
How much less one that is abominable and corrupt,
A man that drinketh iniquity like water!

17

I will shew thee, hear thou me ;

And that which I have seen I will declare :

(Which wise men have told from their fathers, and
have not hid it ;

Unto whom alone the land was given,

And no stranger passed among them :)

The wicked man travaileth with pain all his days.

Even the number of years that are laid up for the oppressor.

A sound of terrors is in his ears ;

In prosperity the spoiler shall come upon him :

He believeth not that he shall return out of darkness,

And he is waited for of the sword :

He wandereth abroad for bread, saying. Where is it?

He knoweth that the day of darkness is ready at his hand :

Distress and anguish make him afraid ;

They prevail against him, as a king ready to the battle :
Because he hath stretched out his hand against God,
And behaveth himself proudly against the Almighty ;
He runneth upon him with a stiff neck,
48

The Debate Q^ 17

With the thick bosses of his bucklers :

Because he hath covered his face with his fatness,

And made collops of fat on his flanks ;

And he hath dwelt in desolate cities,

In houses which no man inhabited,

Which were ready to become heaps.
He shall not be rich, neither shall his substance continue,
Neither shall their produce bend to the earth.
He shall not depart out of darkness ;
The flame shall dry up his branches,
And by the breath of his mouth shall he go away.

Let him not trust in vanity, deceiving himself:
For vanity shall be his recompence.
It shall be accomplished before his time,
And his branch shall not be green.
He shall shake off his unripe grape as the vine,
And shall cast off his flower as the olive.

For the company of the godless shall be barren,
And fire shall consume the tents of bribery.

They conceive mischief.

And bring forth iniquity,

And their belly prepareth deceit
E 49

i8 -^ The Book of Job

JOB

I have heard many such things :

Miserable comforters are ye all.
Shall vain words have an end ?

Or what provoketh thee that thou answerest?
I also could speak as ye do ;

If your soul were in my soul's stead,
I could join words together against you,

And shake mine head at you.
But I would strengthen you with my mouth,

And the solace of my lips should assuage your grief.

Though I speak, my grief is not assuaged :

And though I forbear, what am I eased ?

But now he hath made me weary :

Thou hast made desolate all my company.

And thou hast laid fast hold on me, which is a witness

against me :
And my leanness riseth up against me, it testifieth to my

face.
He hath torn me in his wrath, and persecuted me ;
He hath gnashed upon me with his teeth :
Mine adversary sharpeneth his eyes upon me.
50

The Debate 8«- i8

They have gaped upon me with their mouth ;

They have smitten me upon the cheek reproachfully :

They gather themselves together against me.

God delivereth me to the ungodly,

And casteth me into the hands of the wicked.

I was at ease, and he brake me asunder ;

Yea, he hath taken me by the neck, and dashed me to pieces :

He hath also set me up for his mark.

His archers compass me round about.

He cleaveth my reins asunder, and doth not spare ;

He poureth out my gall upon the ground.

He breaketh me with breach upon breach ;

He runneth upon me Hke a giant.

I have sewed sackcloth upon my skin,

And have laid my horn in the dust.

My face is foul with weeping,

And on my eyelids is the shadow of death ;

Although there is no violence in mine hands,

And my prayer is pure.

O earth, cover not thou my blood.
And let my cry have no resting place.
Even now, behold, my Witness is in heaven,
And He that voucheth for me is on high.
My friends scorn me :
But mine eye poureth out tears unto God,
That one might plead for a man with God,
As a son of man pleadeth for his neighbour.
SI

i8 -« The Book of Job

For when a few years are come,
I shall go the way whence I shall not return.
My spirit is consumed, my days are extinct,
The grave is ready for me.

Surely there are mockers with me,

And mine eye abideth in their provocation.

Give now a pledge, be surety for me with thyself;

Who is there that will strike hands with me ?

For thou hast hid their heart from understanding :

Therefore shalt thou not exalt them.

He that denounceth his friends for a prey,

Even the eyes of his children shall fail.
He hath made me also a byword of the people ;
And I am become an open abhorring.
Mine eye also is dim by reason of sorrow,
And all my members are as a shadow.
Upright men shall be astonied at this.
And the innocent shall stir up himself against the godless.
Yet shall the righteous hold on his way.
And he that hath clean hands shall wax stronger and
stronger.

But return ye, all of you, and come now !

And I shall not find a wise man among you.
My days are past, my purposes are broken off,
Even the thoughts of my heart.
They change the night into day :
The light, say they, is near unto the darkness.
52

The Debate S«^ i8, 19

If I look for Sheol as mine house ;

If I have spread my couch in the darkness ;

If I have said to corruption, Thou art my father ;

To the worm, Thou art my mother, and my sister ;

Where then is my hope ?

And as for my hope, who shall see it ?

It shall go down to the bars of Sheol,

When once there is rest in the dust.

BILDAD

19
How long will ye lay snares for words?

Consider, and afterwards we will speak.
Wherefore are we counted as beasts.

And are become unclean in your sight ?

Thou that tearest thyself in thine anger,

Shall the earth be forsaken for thee ?

Or shall the rock be removed out of its place?

Yea, the light of the wicked shall be put out,
And the spark of his fire shall not shine.

The light shall be dark in his tent.

And his lamp above him shall be put out.
S3

19 ^ The Book of Job

The steps of his strength shall be straitened,

And his own counsel shall cast him down.
For he is cast into a net by his own feet,

And he walketh upon the toils.
A gin shall take him by the heel.

And a snare shall lay hold on him.
A noose is hid for him in the ground.

And a trap for him in the way.
Terrors shall make him afraid on every side,

And shall chase him at his heels.
His strength shall be hungerbitten,

And calamity shall be ready for his halting.
It shall devour the members of his body,

Yea, the firstborn of death shall devour his members.
He shall be rooted out of his tent wherein he trusteth ;

And he shall be brought to the king of terrors.
There shall dwell in his tent that which is none of his :

Brimstone shall be scattered upon his habitation.
His roots shall be dried up beneath,

And above shall his branch be cut off.
His remembrance shall perish from the earth,

And he shall have no name in the street.
He shall be driven from light into darkness,

And chased out of the world.
He shall have neither son nor son's son among his
people.

Nor any remaining where he sojourned.
54

TheDebateS«^ 19,20

They that come after shall be astonied at his day,
As they that went before were affrighted.

Surely such are the dwellings of the unrighteous,

And this is the place of him that knoweth not God.

JOB

20

How long will ye vex my soul,

And break me in pieces with words ?
These ten times have ye reproached me :

Ye are not ashamed that ye deal hardly with me.
And be it indeed that I have erred,

Mine error remaineth with myself.
If indeed ye will magnify yourselves against me,

And plead against me my reproach :
Know now that God hath subverted me in my cause,

And hath compassed me with his net.

Behold, I cry out of wrong.

But I am not heard ;
I cry for help.

But there is no judgement.
He hath fenced up my way that I cannot pass.

And hath set darkness in my paths.
55

20 -^ The Book of Job

He hath stripped me of my glory,

And taken the crown from my head.
He hath broken me down on every side, and I am gone :

And mine hope hath he plucked up like a tree.
He hath also kindled his wrath against me,

And he counteth me unto him as one of his adver-
saries.
His troops come on together, and cast up their way
against me,

And encamp round about my tent.
He hath put my brethren far from me,

And mine acquaintance are wholly estranged from me.
My kinsfolk have failed.

And my familiar friends have forgotten me.
They that dwell in mine house, and my maids, count me
for a stranger ;

I am an alien in their sight.
I call unto my servant, and he giveth me no answer,

Though I intreat him with my mouth.
My breath is strange to my wife,

And my supplication to the children of my body.
Even young children despise me ;

If I arise, they speak against me.
All my inward friends abhor me :

And they whom I loved are turned against me.
My bone cleaveth to my skin and to my flesh,

And I am escaped with the skin of my teeth.
56

TheDebateS«^ 2<

Have pity upon me, have pity upon me, O ye my friends,
For the hand of God hath touched me !

Why do ye persecute me as God,

And are not satisfied with my flesh ?

Oh that my words were now written!
Oh that they were inscribed in a book !
That with an iron pen and lead
They were graven in the rock for ever!

For I know that my vindicator liveth.

And that He shall stand up at the last upon the earth ;

And after my skin hath been thus destroyed,

Yet without my flesh shall I see God !

Whom I shall see on my side.

And mine eyes shall behold, and not another.

— My reins are consumed within me —

\_He nearly faints. A pause.

If ye say. How we will persecute him !

And that the root of the matter is found in him ;
Be ye afraid of the sword :

For wrathful are the punishments of the sword,
That ye may know there is a judgement —
57

ax ->6 The Book of Job

ZOPHAR {mterrupting)

Therefore do my thoughts give answer to me,
Even by reason of my haste that is in me.
I have heard the reproof which putteth me to shame,
And the spirit of my understanding answereth me.

Knowest thou not this of old time,

Since man was placed upon earth,
That the triumphing of the wicked is short.
And the joy of the godless but for a moment?

Though his excellency mount up to the heavens,
And his head reach unto the clouds ;
Yet he shall perish for ever like his own dung :
They which have seen him shall say. Where is he ?

He shall fly away as a dream, and shall not be found :
Yea, he shall be chased away as a vision of the night.
The eye which saw him shall see him no more ;
Neither shall his place any more behold him.
His children shall seek the favour of the poor,
And his hands shall give back his wealth.
His bones are full of his youth,
58

The Debate Q^ 21

But it shall lie down with him in the dust.

Though wickedness be sweet in his mouth,

Though he hide it under his tongue ;

Though he spare it, and will not let it go,

But keep it still within his mouth ;
Yet his meat in his bowels is turned,
It is the gall of asps within him.

He hath swallowed down riches,
And he shall vomit them up again :
God shall cast them out of his belly.
He shall suck the poison of asps :
The viper's tongue shall slay him.
He shall not look upon the rivers,
The flowing streams of honey and butter.

That which he laboured for
Shall he restore,
And shall not swallow it down ;

According to the substance that he hath gotten.
He shall not rejoice.

For he hath oppressed and forsaken the poor ;

He hath violently taken away an house which he
builded not.

Because he knew no quietness in his greed,
He shall not save aught of that wherein he delighteth.

There was nothing left that he devoured not,
Therefore his prosperity shall not endure.

In the fulness of his sufficiency
59

21,22 ^ The Book of Job

He shall be in straits :

The hand of every one that is in misery shall come upon
him.

When he is about to fill his belly,
God shall cast the fierceness of his wrath upon him^
And shall rain it upon him while he is eating.

He shall flee from the iron weapon,
And the bow of brass shall strike him through ;
He draweth it forth and it cometh out of his body :
Yea, the glittering point cometh out of his gall ;
Terrors are upon him ;
All darkness is laid up for his treasures :
A fire not blown by man shall devour him ;
It shall consume that which is left in his tent.
The heavens shall reveal his iniquity,
And the earth shall rise up against him.
The increase of his house shall depart.
His goods shall flow away in the day of his wrath.

This is the portion of a wicked man from God,
And the heritage appointed unto him by God.

JOB

22

Hear diligently my speech,
And let this be your consolations.
60

The Debate Q^

Suffer me, and I also will speak :

And after that I have spoken, mock on.
As for me, is my complaint to man ?

And why should I not be impatient ?
Mark me, and be astonished,

And lay your hand upon your mouth.
Even when I remember I am troubled,

And horror taketh hold on my flesh.

Wherefore do the wicked live.

Become old, yea, wax mighty in power ?
Their seed is established with them in their sight,

And their offspring before their eyes.
Their houses are safe from fear,

Neither is the rod of God upon them.
Their bull gendereth, and faileth not,

Their cow calveth, and casteth not her calf.
They send forth their little ones like a flock.

And their children dance.
They sing to the timbrel and harp.

And rejoice at the sound of the pipe.
They spend their days in prosperity.

And in a moment they go down to Sheol.
Yet they said unto God, " Depart from us,

For we desire not the knowledge of thy ways,
61

22,23 ^TlieBookofJob

What is the Almighty that we should serve him ?

And what profit should we have if we pray unto
him?"

23

ELIPHAZ {interrupting)

Lo, their prosperity is not in their hand :
The counsel of the wicked is far from me.

JOB

How oft is it that the lamp of the wicked is put out?
That their calamity cometh upon them?
That God distributeth sorrows in his anger?
That they are as stubble before the wind,
And as chaff that the storm carrieth away ?

B I LD AD {interrupting)
God layeth up his iniquity for his children.

JOB

Let Him recompense it unto himself, that he may know it.
Let his own eyes see his destruction,
And let him drink of the wrath of the Almighty.
For what pleasure hath he in his house after him,
When the number of his months is cut off in the midst ?
62

The Debate e«- «3

ZOPHAR {interrupting)

Shall any teach God knowledge,
Seeing he judgeth those that are high ?

JOB

One dieth in his full strength,

Being wholly at ease and quiet :

His breasts are full of milk.

And the marrow of his bones is moistened.

And another dieth in bitterness of soul,

And never tasteth of good.

They lie down alike in the dust,

And the worm covereth them.

{The Friends offer to interrupt.

Behold, I know your thoughts.

And the devices which ye wrongfully imagine against

me.
For ye say, "Where is the house of the prince?
And where is the tent wherein the wicked dwelt ? "

Have ye not asked them that go by the way?
And do ye not know their tokens ?
That the evil man is spared in the day of calamity ?
63

23,24 ^ The Book of Job

That they are led away in the day of wrath ?

Who shall declare his way to his face?

And who shall repay him what he hath done ?

Moreover he is borne to the grave,

And they shall keep watch over his tomb ;

The clods of the valley are sweet unto him,

And all men draw after him,

As there were innumerable before him.

How then comfort ye me in vain,

Seeing in your answers there remaineth only falsehood?

ELIPHAZ

Can a man be profitable unto God?

Surely he that is wise is profitable unto himself.

Is it any pleasure to the Almighty that thou art

righteous ?
Or is it gain to him that thou makest thy ways

perfect ?
Is it for thy fear of him that he reproveth thee,
That he entereth with thee into judgement?

Is not thy wickedness great?
Neither is there any end to thine iniquities.
64

The Debate S^

24

For thou hast taken pledges of thy brother for nought,

And stripped the naked of their clothing.

Thou hast not given water to the weary to drink,

And thou hast withholden bread from the hungry.

But as for the mighty man, he had the land,

And the honourable man, he dwelt in it.

Thou hast sent widows away empty,

And the arms of the fatherless have been broken.

Therefore snares are round about thee,

And sudden fear troubleth thee.

Or darkness that thou canst not see,

And abundance of waters cover thee.

Is not God in the height of heaven ?

And behold the height of the stars, how high they are!

And thou sayest, "What doth God know?

Can he judge through the thick darkness ?

Thick clouds are a covering to him, that he seeth
not;

And he walketh in the circuit of heaven."

Wilt thou keep the old way
Which wicked men have trodden ?
Who were snatched away before their time,
Whose foundation was poured out as a stream :
Who said unto God, Depart from us ;
And, What can the Almighty do for us?
F 65

24, 25 -^TheBookofJob

Yet he filled their houses with good things :
But the counsel of the wicked is far from me.

The righteous see it, and are glad ;

And the innocent laugh them to scorn :

Saying, Surely they that did rise up against us are cut off,

And the remnant of them the fire hath consumed.

25
Acquaint now thyself with him and be at peace :

Thereby good shall come unto thee.
Receive, I pray thee, the law from his mouth,

And lay up his words in thine heart.

If thou return to the Almighty,
Thou shalt be built up ;

If thou put away unrighteousness far from thy tents.

And lay thou thy treasure in the dust,

And the gold of Ophir among the stones of the brooks ;
And the Almighty shall be thy treasure,
And precious silver unto thee.

For then shalt thou delight thyself in the Almighty,
And shalt lift up thy face unto God.

Thou shalt make thy prayer unto him,
And he shall hear thee ;
And thou shalt pay thy vows.

Thou shalt also decree a thing,
66

TheDebateS«- 25,26

And it shall be established unto thee ;
And light shall shine upon thy ways.

When they cast thee down,
Thou shalt say, There is lifting up ;
And the humble person he shall save.
He shall deliver even him that is not innocent :
Yea, he shall be delivered through the cleanness of thine
hands.

JOB

Even today is my complaint rebellious :
My stroke is heavier than my groaning.

Oh that I knew where I might find him,
That I might come even to his seat!

I would order my cause before him,

And fill my mouth with arguments.

I would know the words which he would answer me.

And understand what he would say unto me.

Would he contend with me in the greatness of his

power?
Nay, but he would give heed unto me ;
There the upright might reason with him ;
So should I be delivered for ever from my judge.

26, 27 ^ T h e B o o k o f J o b

Behold I go forward,

But he is not there ;

And backward,

But I cannot perceive him :

On the left hand, when he doth work,

But I cannot behold him ;

He hideth himself on the right hand.

That I cannot see him.

But he knoweth the way that I take ;

When he hath tried me, I shall come forth as gold.

27

My foot hath held fast to his steps ;

His way have I kept, and turned not aside.

I have not gone back from the commandment of his

lips;
I have treasured up the words of his mouth more than

my necessary food.

But he is in one mind,

And who can turn him ?
And what his soul desireth,
Even that he doeth.

For he performeth that which is appointed for me :
And many such things are with him.
68

The Debate ^ 27,28

Therefore am I troubled at his presence ;
When I consider, I am afraid of him .

For God hath made my heart faint,

And the Almighty hath troubled me ;
Because I was not cut off before the darkness,
Neither did he cover the thick darkness from my face.

Why are times not laid up by the Almighty ?

And why do not they which know him see his days ?

There are that remove the landmarks ;

They violently take away flocks, and feed them.

They drive away the ass of the fatherless.

They take the widow's ox for a pledge.
They turn the needy out of the way :
The poor of the earth hide themselves together.

Behold, as wild asses in the desert they go forth to their
work,
Seeking diligently for meat ;
The wilderness yieldeth them food for their children.

They cut his provender in the field ;
And they glean the vintage of the wicked.
69

28 ^^ The Book of Job

They He all night naked without clothing,

And have no covering in the cold.

They are wet with the showers of the mountains, •

And embrace the rock for want of a shelter.

There are that pluck the fatherless from the breast,
And take in pledge that which is on the poor ;
So that they go about naked without clothing :

And being an-hungered they carry the sheaves ;
They make oil within the walls of these men ;
They tread their wine-presses, and suffer thirst.

From out of the populous city men groan,
And the soul of the wounded crieth out :
Yet God imputeth it not for folly.

These are of them that rebel against the light ;
They know not the ways thereof,
Nor abide in the paths thereof.

The murderer riseth with the light.
He killeth the poor and needy ;
And in the night he is as a thief.

The eye also of the adulterer waiteth for the twilight :
Saying, No eye shall see me ;
And he putteth a covering on his face.
70

The Debate S<- 28, 29

In the dark they dig through houses :

They shut themselves up in the daytime,
They know not the Hght.

For the morning is to all of them
As the shadow of death ;
For they know the terrors of the shadow of death.

29

" He is swift upon the face of the waters ;

" Their portion is cursed in the earth ;

" He turneth not by the way of the vineyards.
" Drought and heat consume the snow waters :

" So doth Sheol those which have sinned ;

" The womb shall forget him, the worm shall feed
sweetly on him.
" He shall be no more remembered,
" And unrighteousness shall be broken as a tree :

" Even he that devoureth the barren that beareth not,
"And doeth not good to the widow."

Yet God by his power maketh the mighty to continue :
They rise up, when they believed not that they should live.

God giveth them to be in security.
And they rest thereon ;
And his eyes are upon their ways.
71

29,30 ^TheBookofJob

They are exalted; yet a little while, and they are
gone:
Yea, they are brought low, they are gathered in, as

all other ;
And are cut off as the tops of the ears of corn.
And if it be not so now, who will prove me a liar,
And make my speech nothing worth ?

BILDAD

Dominion and fear are with him ;

He maketh peace in his high places.

Is there any number of his armies ?

And upon whom doth not his light arise?
How then can man be just before God? J-
Or how can he be clean that is born of a woman?

Behold, even the moon hath no brightness,

And the stars are not pure in his sight :
How much less man, that is a worm!
And the son of man, which is a worm !

The Shades tremble

Beneath the waters and the inhabitants thereof.

Sheol is naked before him,

And Destruction hath no covering.
72

The Debate 8^-^ 30,31

He stretcheth out the north over empty space,

And hangeth the earth upon nothing.

He bindeth up the waters in his thick clouds ;

And the cloud is not rent under them.

He closeth in the face of his throne,

And spreadeth his cloud upon it.

He hath described a boundary upon the face of the
waters,

Unto the confines of Hght and darkness.

The pillars of heaven tremble

And are astonished at his rebuke.

He stirreth up the sea with his power,

And by his understanding he smiteth through Rahab.

By his spirit the heavens are garnished ;

His hand hath pierced the swift serpent.
Lo, these are but the outskirts of his ways ;
And how small a whisper do we hear of him!
But the thunder of his power who can understand?

JOB
31

How hast thou helped him that is without power!

How hast thou saved the arm that hath no strength!
How hast thou counselled him that hath no wisdom.

And plentifully declared sound knowledge!
73

31,32 ^ The Book of Job

To whom hast thou uttered words ?
And whose spirit came forth from thee?

As God Uveth,

Who hath taken away my right ;

And the Almighty,

Who hath vexed my soul ;

All the while my breath is in me,

And the Spirit of God is in my nostrils :

Surely my lips shall not speak unrighteousness,

Neither shall my tongue utter deceit.

God forbid that I should justify you ;

Till I die I will not put away mine integrity from me ;

My righteousness I hold fast, and will not let it go :

My heart shall not reproach me, so long as I live.

ZOPHAR
32
Let mine enemy be as the wicked,
And let him that riseth up against me be as the
unrighteous !
For what is the hope of the godless, when God cutteth
him off,
When he taketh away his soul ?
Will God hear his cry,

When trouble cometh upon him?
74

The Debate 6«-

32

Will he delight himself in the Almighty,

And call upon God at all times ?
I will teach you concerning the hand of God ;

That which is with the Almighty will I not conceal.
Behold, all ye yourselves have seen it ;

Why then ar« ye become altogether vain?
This is the portion of a wicked man with God,

And the heritage of oppressors, which they receive from
the Almighty.

If his children be multipHed, it is for the sword ;

And his offspring shall not be satisfied with bread.
Those that remain of him shall be buried in death,
And his widows shall make no lamentation.

Though he heap up silver as the dust.
And prepare raiment as the clay ;
He may prepare it, but the just shall put it on,
And the innocent shall divide the silver.

He buildeth his house as the moth.

And as a booth which the keeper maketh.

He lieth down rich, but he shall not be gathered ;

He openeth his eyes, and he is not.

Terrors overtake him like waters ;

A tempest stealeth him away in the night ;
75

32,33 ^TheBookofJob

The east wind carrieth him away, and he departeth,
And it sweepeth him out of his place.

For God shall hurl at him, and not spare :
He would fain flee out of his hand.
Men shall clap their hands at him,
And shall hiss him out of his place.

Surely there is a mine for silver,
And a place for gold which they refine.
Iron is taken out of the earth,
And brass is molten out of the stone.
Man setteth an end to darkness,
And searcheth out to the furthest bound
The stones of thick darkness and of the shadow of
death.
He breaketh open a shaft away from where men sojourn ;
They are forgotten of the foot that passeth by ;
They hang afar from men, they swing to and fro.
As for the earth, out of it cometh bread ;
And underneath it is turned up as it were by fire.
The stones thereof are the place of sapphires,
And it hath dust of gold.
That path no bird of prey knoweth,
Neither hath the falcon's eye seen it :
76

The Debate S^-

33

The proud beasts have not trodden it,

Nor hath the fierce Hon passed thereby.

He putteth forth his hand upon the flinty rock ;

He overturneth the mountains by the roots.

He cutteth out passages among the rocks ;

And his eye seeth every precious thing.

He bindeth the streams that they trickle not ;

And the thing that is hid bringeth he forth to Hght.

But where shall wisdom be found ?
And where is the place of understanding?
Man knoweth not the price thereof;
Neither is it found in the land of the living.
The deep saith, It is not in me :
And the sea saith, It is not with me.
It cannot be gotten for gold,

Neither shall silver be weighed for the price thereof.
It cannot be valued with the gold of Ophir,
With the precious onyx, or the sapphire.
Gold and glass cannot equal it.

Neither shall the exchange thereof be jewels of fine
gold.
No mention shall be made of coral or of crystal :
Yea, the price of wisdom is above rubies.
The topaz of Ethiopia shall not equal it,
Neither shall it be valued with pure gold.
Whence then cometh wisdom?
77

33, 34 ^^ The Book of Job

And where is the place of understanding?

Seeing it is hid from the eyes of ail living,

And kept close from the fowls of the air.

Destruction and Death say,

We have heard a rumour thereof with our ears.

God understandeth the way thereof,

And he knoweth the place thereof.

For he looketh to the ends of the earth,

And seeth under the whole heaven ;

To make a weight for the wind ;

Yea, he meteth out the waters by measure.

When he made a decree for the rain,

And a way for the lightning of the thunder :

Then did he see it and declare it ;

He established it, yea, and searched it out.

And unto man he said,
Behold, the fear of the Lord, that is wisdo]^ :
And to depart from evil is understanding.

JOB

Oh that I were as in the months of old.

As in the days when God watched over me ;
When his lamp shined upon my head,

78

The Debate 8«- 34

And by his Hght I walked through darkness ;
As I was in the ripeness of my days,
When the secret of God was upon my tent ;

When the Almighty was yet with me,

And my children were about me ;

When my steps were washed with butter.

And the rock poured me out rivers of oil!

When I went forth to the gate unto the city,
When I prepared my seat in the street.

The young men saw me and hid themselves,

And the aged rose up and stood ;

The princes refrained talking.

And laid their hand on their mouth ;

The voice of the nobles was hushed,

And their tongue cleaved to the roof of their mouth.

For when the ear heard me, then it blessed me ;
And when the eye saw me, it gave witness unto me :

Because I delivered the poor that cried,

The fatherless also, that had none to help him.

The blessing of him that was ready to perish came
upon me :

And I caused the widow's heart to sing for joy.

I put on righteousness and it clothed me :
My justice was as a robe and a diadem.
79

34 -^TheBookofJob

I was eyes to the blind,

And feet was I to the lame.

I was a father to the needy,

And the cause of him that I knew not I searched out.

And I brake the jaws of the unrighteous,

And plucked the prey out of his teeth.

Then I said, I shall die in my nest.

And I shall multiply my days as the phoenix :

My root is spread out to the waters.

And the dew lieth all night upon my branch :

My glory is fresh in me.

And my bow is renewed in my hand.

Unto me men gave ear and waited.

And kept silence for my counsel.

After my words they spake not again ;

And my speech dropped upon them ;
And they waited for me as for the rain ;
And they opened their mouth wide as for the latter rain.

If I laughed on them they believed it not ;

And the light of my countenance they cast not down.

I chose out their way, and sat as chief.

And dwelt as a king in the army, as one that com-
forteth the mourners.
80

The Debate ^ 35

35
But now they that are younger than I have me in derision,
Whose fathers I disdained to set with the dogs of my
flock:

Yea, the strength of their hands, whereto

should it profit me,

Men in whom ripe age is perished?

They are gaunt with want and famine ;

They gnaw the dry ground,

In the gloom of wasteness and desolation.

They pluck salt-wort by the bushes ;

And the roots of the broom are their meat.

They are driven forth from the midst of men ;

They cry after them as after a thief.

In the clefts of the valleys must they dwell,

In holes of the earth and of the rocks.

Among the bushes they bray ;

Under the nettles they are gathered together.

They are children of fools, yea, children of base
men ;

They were scourged out of the land

And now I am become their song.

Yea, I am a byword unto them.

They abhor me, they stand aloof from me,

And spare not to spit in my face.

For he hath loosed his cord and afflicted me,

And they have cast oiT the bridle before me.

G 81

35,36 "^ The Book of Job

Upon my right hand rise the rabble ; they thrust aside my

feet,
And they cast up against me their ways of destruction :
They mar my path, they set forward my calamity,

Even men that have no helper

As through a wide breach they come :

In the midst of the ruin they roll themselves upon me.

Terrors are turned upon me,

They chase mine honour as the wind ;

And my welfare is passed away as a cloud.

36
And now my soul is poured out within me ;
Days of affliction have taken hold upon me.

In the night season my bones are pierced in me.

And the pains that gnaw me take no rest.

By the great force of my disease is my garment dis-
figured :

It bindeth me about as the collar of my coat.

He hath cast me into the mire.

And I am become like dust and ashes.

I cry unto thee, and thou dost not answer me :

I stand up, and thou lookest at me.

Thou art turned to be cruel to me :
With the might of thy hand thou persecutest me.
82

The Debate S«- 36

Thou liftest me up to the wind, thou causest me to

ride upon it ;
And thou dissolvest me in the storm.

For I know that thou wilt bring me to death,
And to the house appointed for all living.

Howbeit doth not one stretch out the hand in his fall ?

Or in his calamity therefore cry for help ?

Did not I weep for him that was in trouble ?
Was not my soul grieved for the needy?

When I looked for good, then evil came ;

And when I waited for light, there came darkness.

My bowels boil and rest not ;

Days of affliction are come upon me.

I go mourning without the sun :

I stand up in the assembly, and cry for help.

I am a brother to jackals,

And a companion to ostriches.

My skin is black, and falleth from me,

And my bones are burned with heat.

Therefore is my harp turned to mourning,

And my pipe into the voice of them that weep.
83

///

THE OATH OF CLEARING
JOB {rising and lifting his hands)

37

I made a covenant with mine eyes ;

How then should I look upon a maid ?

For what is the portion of God from above,
And the heritage of the Almighty from on high ?
Is it not calamity to the unrighteous,
And disaster to the workers of iniquity?
Doth not he see my ways,
And number all my steps?

If I have walked with vanity,

And my foot hath hasted to deceit ;

(Let me be weighed in an even balance,
That God may know mine integrity ;)

If my step hath turned out of the way.

And mine heart walked after mine eyes,

And if any spot hath cleaved to mine hands :
Then let me sow, and let another eat;
Yea, let the produce of my field be rooted out.
85

37

-^ The Book of Job

If mine heart have been enticed unto a woman,
And I have laid wait at my neighbour's door :
Then let my wife grind unto another,
And let others bow down upon her.
For that were an heinous crime ;
Yea, it were an iniquity to be punished by the

judges :
For it is a fire that consumeth unto Destruction,
And would root out all mine increase.
If I did despise the cause of my manservant.
Or of my maidservant, when they contended with me :
What then shall I do when God riseth up ?
And when he visiteth, what shall I answer him ?
Did not he that made me in the womb make

him?
And did not one fashion us in the womb ?
If I have withheld the poor from their desire.
Or have caused the eyes of the widow to fail ;
Or have eaten my morsel alone,
And the fatherless hath not eaten thereof;

(Nay, from my youth he grew up with me as with

a father.
And I have been her guide from my mother's
womb ;)
If I have seen any perish for want of clothing,
Or that the needy had no covering ;
If his loins have not blessed me,
86

The Oath of Clearing 8^ 37

And if he were not warmed with the fleece of my

sheep ;
If I have Hfted up my hand against the fatherless,
Because I saw my help in the gate :
Then let my shoulder fall from the shoulder

BLADE,

And mine arm be broken from the bone.

For calamity from God was a terror to me,
And by reason of his excellency I could do
nothing.

If I have made gold my hope.

And have said to the fine gold, Thou art my con-
fidence ;
If I rejoiced because my v^^ealth was great.
And because mine hand had gotten much ;
If I beheld the sun when it shined,
Or the moon walking in brightness ;
And my heart hath been secretly enticed,
And my mouth hath kissed my hand :

This also were an iniquity to be punished by the
judges :

For I should have lied to God that is above.
If I rejoiced at the destruction of him that hated me.
Or lifted up myself when evil found him ;

(Yea, I suffered not my mouth to sin

By asking his life with a curse ;)
87

37 ^TheBookofJob

If the men of my tent said not,

Who can find one that hath not been satisfied with

his flesh?
The stranger did not lodge in the street ;
But I opened my doors to the traveller ;
If, like Adam, I covered my transgressions,
By hiding mine iniquity in my bosom ;
Because I feared the great multitude.
And the contempt of families terrified me.
So that I kept silence, and went not out of the door :

Oh that I had one to hear me!

Lo, here is my signature, let the Almighty answer
me;

And that I had the indictment which mine adver-
sary hath written !

Surely I would carry it uj)on my shoulder ;

I would bind it unto me as a crown!

I would declare unto him the number of my steps ;

As a prince would I go near unto him ! —
If my land cry out against me,
And the furrows thereof weep together ;
If I have eaten the fruits thereof without money.
Or have caused the owners thereof to lose their life :
Let thistles grow instead of wheat,
And cockle instead of barley!

The words of Job are ended! \He sits down.

88

TV

INTERPOSITION OF ELIHU

So these three men ceased to answer Job, because he
was righteous in his own eyes.

Then was kindled the wrath of Elihu the son of Bara-
chel the Buzite, of the family of Ram : against Job was
his wrath kindled, because he justified himself rather than
God. Also against his three friends was his wrath kin-
dled, because they had found no answer, and yet had con-
demned Job. Now Elihu had waited to speak unto Job,
because they were elder than he. And when Elihu saw
that there was no answer in the mouth of these three
men, his wrath was kindled.

ELIHU

38

I am young,

And ye are very old :
Wherefore I held back,

And durst not shew you mine opinion.
89

38 ^TheBookofJob

I said, Days should speak,

And multitude of years should teach wisdom.

But there is a spirit in man,

And the breath of the Almighty giveth them under-
standing.
It is not the great that are wise,
Nor the aged that understand judgement.

Therefore I say. Hearken to me ;

I also will shew mine opinion.

Behold, I waited for your words,
I listened for your reasons.
Whilst ye searched out what to say.
Yea, I attended unto you,

And, behold, there was none that convinced Job,

Or that answered his words, among you.

Beware lest ye say, " We have found wisdom ;

God may vanquish him, not man : "
For he hath not directed his words against me ;
Neither will I answer him with your speeches.
They are amazed, they answer no more :
They have not a word to say.

And shall I wait because they speak not,

Because they stand still, and answer no more?

I also will answer my part,

I also will shew mine opinion.
90

Interposition of Elihu Q^ 38

For I am full of words ;

The spirit within me constraineth me ;

Behold, my belly is as wine which hath no vent;

Like new bottles which are ready to burst.

I will speak that I may find relief;

I will open my lips and answer.

Let me not, I pray you, respect any man's person ;

Neither will I give flattering titles unto any man.

For I know not to give flattering titles ;

Else would my Maker soon take me away.

Howbeit, Job, I pray thee, hear my speech,

And hearken to all my words.
Behold now, I have opened my mouth,
My tongue hath spoken in my mouth.
My words shall utter the uprightness of my heart :
And that which my lips know they shall speak sincerely.
The spirit of God hath made me,
And the breath of the Almighty giveth me life.

If thou canst, answer thou me ;

Set thy words in order before me, stand forth.

Behold, I am according to thy wish in God's stead.

I also am formed out of the clay :

Behold, my terror shall not make thee afraid,

Neither shall my pressure be heavy upon thee.

91

39, 40 -59TheBookofJob

39

Surely thou hast spoken in mine hearing,

And I have heard the voice of thy words, saying,

" I am clean without transgression ;

" I am innocent, neither is there iniquity in me :

" Behold, he findeth occasions against me,

" He counteth me for his enemy ;

" He putteth my feet in the stocks,

" He marketh all my paths."
Behold, I will answer thee, in this thou art not just ;
For God is greater than man.
Why dost thou strive against him.
For that he giveth not account of any of his matters ?

40
For God speaketh once.
Yea twice, though man regardeth it not.

In a dream, in a vision of the night.
When deep sleep falleth upon men,
In slumberings upon the bed ;

Then he openeth the ears of men.

And sealeth their instruction.

That he may withdraw man from his purpose,

And hide pride from man ;

92

Interposition of Elihu3«- 40

He keepeth back his soul from the pit,
And his life from perishing by the sword.

He is chastened also with pain upon his bed,

And with continual strife in his bones :

So that his life abhorreth bread.

And his soul dainty meat.

His flesh is consumed away, that it cannot be seen ;

And his bones that were not seen stick out.

Yea, his soul draweth near unto the pit,

And his life to the destroyers.

If there be with him an angel,
An interpreter, one among a thousand,
To shew unto man what is right for him ;
Then he is gracious unto him, and saith,
" Deliver him from going down to tJie pit,
I have found a ransom."
His flesh shall be fresher than a child's ;
He returneth to the days of his youth :
He prayeth unto God,
And he is favourable unto him ;
So that he seeth his face with joy :
And he restoreth unto man his righteousness.
He singeth before men, and saith, " I have sinned,
And perverted that which was right, and it profited me
not:

93

40, 41 ^ The Book of Job

He hath redeemed my soul from going into the pit,
And my life shall behold the light."

Lo, all these things doth God work,

Twice, yea thrice, with a man ;

To bring back his soul from the pit.

That he may be enlightened with the light of the living.

Mark well, O Job, hearken unto me :

Hold thy peace, and I will speak.
If thou hast anything to say, answer me:

Speak, for I desire to justify thee.
If not, hearken thou unto me :

Hold thy peace, and I will teach thee wisdom.

[^He looks to yob : Job makes no sign.

EliJm tnr7is to the three Friends.

ELIHU
41

Hear my words, ye wise men.

And give ear unto me, ye that have knowledge.
For the ear trieth words.

As the palate tasteth meat.

94

Interposition of Elihu ^ 41

Let us choose for us that which is right :
Let us know among ourselves what is good.

For Job hath said, " I am righteous,
And God hath taken away my right :

Notwithstanding my right I am accounted a liar ;

My wound is incurable, though I am without trans-
gression."

What man is like Job,

Who drinketh up scorning like water?
Which goeth in company with the workers of iniquity,

And walketh with wicked men.
For he hath said,
" It profiteth a man nothing
That he should delight himself with God."

Therefore hearken unto me.
Ye men of understanding :

Far be it from God, that he should do wickedness ;

And from the Almighty, that he should commit iniquity.
For the work of a man shall he render unto him,
And cause every man to find according to his ways.

Yea, of a surety, God will not d® wickedly.
Neither will the Almighty pervert judgement.

Who gave him a charge over the earth ?

Or who hath disposed the whole world ?
95

41

-^ The Book of Job

If he set his heart upon man,

If he gather unto himself his spirit and his breath ;

All flesh shall perish together,

And man shall turn again unto dust.

If now thou hast understanding, hear this :
Hearken to the voice of my words.

Shall even one that hateth right govern ?

And wilt thou condemn him that is just and mighty?

Is it fit to say to a king. Thou art vile,
Or to nobles, Ye are wicked?

How much less to him that respecteth not the persons
of princes.

Nor regardeth the rich more than the poor.

For they all are the work of his hands.

In a moment they die, even at midnight ;
The people are shaken and pass away,
And the mighty are taken away without hand.

For his eyes are upon the ways of a man,

And he seeth all his goings.

There is no darkness, nor shadow of death.

Where the workers of iniquity may hide themselves.

For he needeth not further to consider a man.
That he should go before God in judgement.
96

Interposition of Elihu6«- 41

He breaketh in pieces mighty men in ways past find-
ing out,
And setteth others in their stead.

Therefore he taketh knowledge of their works ;
And he overturneth them in the night, so that they are
destroyed.

He striketh them as wicked men

In the open sight of others ;

Because they turned aside from following him,
And would not have regard to any of his ways :

So that they caused the cry of the poor to come unto
him,

And he heard the cry of the afflicted.

When he giveth quietness.
Who then can condemn?

And when he hideth his face,

Who then can behold him ?

Whether it be done unto a nation,

Or unto a man, alike :

That the godless man reign not,

That there be none to ensnare the people.

For hath any said unto God,

" I have borne chastisement, though I offend not :

H 97

41, 42 ^ The Book of Job

That which I see not teach thou me :

If I have done miquity, I will do it no more? "
Shall his recompence be as thou wilt, that thou refusest it?
For thou must choose, and not I :
Therefore speak what thou knowest.

Men of understanding will say unto me,
Yea, every wise man that heareth me :

Job speaketh without knowledge.

And his words are without wisdom.
Would that Job were tried unto the end,

Because of his answering like wicked men.
For he addeth rebellion unto his sin.
He clappeth his hands among us.
And multiplieth his words against God.

{Elihu looks to the three Friends: they give no sign.
He looks upward and continues.

ELIHU

42

Thinkest thou this to be thy right.

Or sayest thou, My righteousness is more than God's,
That thou sayest. What advantage will it be unto thee ?

And, What profit shall I have more than if I had sinned?
98

Interposition of Elihu 8^ 42

I will answer thee,
And thy companions with thee.

Look unto the heavens, and see;

And behold the skies, which are higher than thou.

What doest thou against him ?
And if thy transgressions be multiplied,
What doest thou unto him?

If thou be righteous, what givest thou him ?

Or what receiveth he of thine hand?
Thy wickedness may hurt a man as thou art ;

And thy righteousness may profit a son of man.

By reason of the multitude of oppressions they cry out ;

They cry for help by reason of the arm of the mighty.
But none saith, " Where is God my Maker,
Who giveth songs in the night ;
Who teacheth us more than the beasts of the earth,
And maketh us wiser than the fowls of heaven?"

There they cry, but none giveth answer,

Because of the pride of evil men.
Surely God will not hear vanity.
Neither will the Almighty regard it.
99

42, 43 ^TheBookofJob

How much less when thou sayest thou beholdest him not,
The cause is before him, and thou waitest for him!

But now because he hath not visited in his anger,
Neither doth he greatly regard arrogance ;

Therefore doth Job open his mouth in vanity ;
He multiplieth words without knowledge.

43

Suffer me a little, and I will shew thee,
For I have yet somewhat to say on God's behalf.

I will fetch my knowledge from afar.

And will ascribe righteousness to my Maker.

For truly my words are not false :

One that is perfect in knowledge is with thee.

Behold, God is mighty,
And despiseth not any ;

He is mighty in strength of understanding.

He preserveth not the life of the wicked :

But giveth to the afflicted their right.

He withdraweth not his eyes from the righteous ;

But with kings upon the throne
He setteth them forever,
And they are exalted :

Interposition of Elihu6«^ 43

And if they be bound in fetters,

And be taken in the cords of affliction ;

Then he sheweth them their work and their trans-
gressions,

That they have behaved themselves proudly.

He openeth also their ear to instruction,

And commandeth that they return from iniquity.

If they hearken and serve him,

They shall spend their days in prosperity,
And their years in pleasantness.

But if they hearken not,

They shall perish by the sword.

And they shall die without knowledge.

But they that are godless in heart lay up anger :
They cry not for help when he bindeth them.

They die in youth.

And their life perisheth among the unclean.

He delivereth the afflicted by his affliction,

And openeth their ear in oppression.

Yea, he would have led thee away out of distress
Into a broad place, where there is no straitness ;
And that which is set on thy table should be full of
fatness.

43^44 -^3 The Book of Job

But thou art full of the judgement of the wicked :
Judgement and justice take hold on thee.
For beware lest wrath lead thee away into mockery.

Neither let the greatness of the ransom turn thee aside.
Will thy riches suffice that thou be not in distress,
Or all the forces of thy strength ?

Desire not the night, when peoples are cut off in their
place.
Take heed, regard not iniquity :
For this hast thou chosen rather than affliction.

[From this point the signs of an approaching
storm become visible in the sky,

44

Behold, God doeth loftily in his power :

Who is a teacher like unto him?

Who hath enjoined him his way?

Or who can say, Thou hast wrought unrighteousness?
Remember that thou magnify his work,

Whereof men have sung.

All men have looked thereon ;

Man beholdeth it afar off.

Behold, God is great, and we know him not ;
The number of his years is unsearchable.

Interposition of Elihu8«- 44

For he draweth up the drops of water,

Which distil in rain from his vapour :

Which the skies pour down

And drop upon man abundantly.

Yea, can any understand the spreadings of the clouds,

The thunderings of his pavilion ?
Behold, he spreadeth his light around him ;
And he covereth the bottom of the sea.

For by these he judgeth the peoples ;

He giveth meat in abundance.

He covereth his hands with the lightning ;

And giveth it a cliarge that it strike the mark.

The noise thereof telleth concerning him,

The cattle also concerning the storm that cometh up.

[A loud peal of thunder : the storm steadily increases.

At this also my heart trembleth,

And is moved out of its place.

Hearken ye unto the noise of his voice,

And the sound that goeth out of his mouth.

He sendeth it forth under the whole heaven,
And his lightning unto the ends of the earth.
After it a voice roareth ;
He thundereth with the voice of his majesty :
And he stayeth them not when his voice is heard.
God thundereth marvellously with his voice;
103

44 -^ The Book of Job

Great things doeth he,

Which we cannot comprehend.

For he saith to the snow,

Fall thou on the earth ;

Likewise to the shower of rain,

And to the showers of his mighty rain.
He sealeth up the hand of every man ;
That all men whom he hath made may know it.
Then the beasts go into coverts,
And remain in their dens.

Out of the chamber of the south cometh the storm :

And cold out of the north.

By the breath of God ice is given :

And the breadth of the waters is congealed.

Yea, he ladeth the thick cloud with moisture ;

He spreadeth abroad the cloud of his lightning :

And it is turned round about by his guidance.

That they may do whatsoever he commandeth them

Upon the face of the habitable world :

Whether it be for correction.

Or for his land.

Or for mercy, that he cause it to come.

\_T/ie stor7n has become a whirlwind; the whole scene
is wrapped in thick darkness, broken by flashes of
lightning.

104

Interposition of Elihu Q^ 45

45
Hearken unto this, O Job :

Stand still, and consider the wondrous works of
God.
Dost thou know how God layeth his charge upon them,

And causeth the lightning of his cloud to shine ?
Dost thou know the balancings of the clouds,

The wondrous works of him which is perfect in know-
ledge ?
Thou whose garments are warm

When he quieteth the earth by the south wind :
Canst thou with him spread out the sky,
Which is strong as a molten mirror?
Teach us what we shall say unto him ;

For we cannot order our speech by reason of darkness.
Shall it be told him that I would speak ?

If a man speak, surely he shall be swallowed up.
{Supernatural brightness mingles strattgely with the
darkness of the storm.

And now men cannot look on the light when it is bright
in the skies,
When the wind hath passed, and cleansed them.
Out of the north cometh golden splendour :

God hath upon him terrible majesty.
Touching the Almighty, we cannot find him out; he is
excellent in power ;

105

45 -^ The Book of Job

And to judgement and plenteous justice he doeth no
violence.
Men do therefore fear him :

He regardeth not any that are wise of heart.
l_T/ie roar of the whirlwind gives place to a VOICE.
io6

V

DIVINE INTERVENTION

VOICE OUT OF THE WHIRLWIND

46

Who is this that darkeneth counsel by words without

knowledge ?
Gird up now thy loins like a man ;
For I will demand of thee, and declare thou unto me.

Where wast thou when I laid the foundations of the earth?
Declare, if thou hast understanding

Who determined the measures thereof, if thou knowest?

Or who stretched the line upon it ?

Whereupon were the foundations thereof fastened ?

Or who laid the corner stone thereof;

When the morning stars sang together,
And all the sons of God shouted for joy?

Or who shut up the sea with doors.

When it brake forth, and issued out of the womb ;
When I made the cloud the garment thereof,
And thick darkness a swaddling band for it,
107

46 ^ The Book of Job

And prescribed for it my decree,

And set bars and doors,

And said, " Hitherto shalt thou come, but no further ;

And here shall thy proud waves be stayed ? "
Hast thou commanded the morning since thy days began,
And caused the dayspring to know its place ;

That it might take hold of the ends of the earth,

And the wicked be shaken out of it ?

It is changed as clay under the seal ;

And all things stand forth as a garment :

And from the wicked their light is withholden,

And the high arm is broken.
Hast thou entered into the springs of the sea?
Or hast thou walked in the recesses of the deep?
Have the gates of death been revealed unto thee ?
Or hast thou seen the gates of the shadow of death ?
Hast thou comprehended the breadth of the earth ?

Declare, if thou knowest it all

Where is the way to the dwelling of light.
And as for darkness, where is the place thereof;
That thou shouldest take it to the bound thereof.
And that thou shouldest discern the paths to the house
thereof?

Doubtless, thou knowest, for thou wast then born,

And the number of thy days is great !

Hast thou entered the treasuries of the snow,
Or hast thou seen the treasuries of the hail,
io8

Divine Intervention 8«- 46

Which I have reserved against the time of trouble,

Against the day of battle and war?
By what way is the light parted,
Or the east wind scattered upon the earth ?
Who hath cleft a channel for the waterflood,
Or a way for the lightning of the thunder ;

To cause it to rain on a land where no man is ;

On a wilderness, wherein there is no man ;

To satisfy the waste and desolate ground ;

And to cause the tender grass to spring forth ?
Hath the rain a father?
Or who hath begotten the drops of dew ?
Out of whose womb came the ice?
And the hoary frost of heaven, who hath gendered it ?

The waters are hidden as with stone.

And the face of the deep is frozen.
Canst thou bind the cluster of the Pleiades,
Or loose the bands of Orion ?
Canst thou lead forth the signs of the Zodiac in their

season?
Or canst thou guide the Bear with her train?
Knowest thou the ordinances of the heavens ?
Canst thou establish the dominion thereof in the earth?
Canst thou lift up thy voice to the clouds.
That abundance of waters may cover thee ?
Canst thou send forth lightnings, that they may go.
And say unto thee, Here we are ?
109

46 -5S The Book of Job

Who hath put wisdom in the inward parts ?
Or who hath given understanding to the mind?
Who can number the clouds by wisdom ?
Or who can pour out the bottles of heaven,

When the dust runneth into a mass,

And the clods cleave fast together?
Wilt thou hunt the prey for the lioness ?
Or satisfy the appetite of the young lions,

When they couch in their dens,

And abide in the covert to lie in wait ?
Who provideth for the raven his food,

When his young ones cry unto God,

And wander for lack of meat ?
K no west thou the time when the wild goats of the rock

bring forth ?
Or canst thou mark when the hinds do calve ?
Canst thou number the months that they fulfil ?
Or knowest thou the time when they bring forth?

They bow themselves, they bring forth their young,

They cast out their sorrows.

Their young ones are in good liking.

They grow up in the open field ;

They go forth, and return not again.
Who hath sent out the wild ass free ?
Or who hath loosed the bands of the wild ass?

Whose house I have made the wilderness.

And the salt land his dwelling place ;
no

Divine Intervention 8«- 46

He scorneth the tumult of the city,
Neither heareth he the shoutings of the driver.
The range of the mountains is his pasture,
And he searcheth after every green thing.

Will the wild-ox be content to serve thee?

Or will he abide by thy crib.''

Canst thou bind the wild-ox with his band in the
furrow ?

Or will he harrow the valleys after thee ?

Wilt thou trust him, because his strength is great ?

Or wilt thou leave to him thy labour?

Wilt thou confide in him, that he will bring home thy
seed,

And gather the corn of thy threshing-floor?

The wing of the ostrich rejoiceth ;

But are her pinions and feathers kindly?
For she leaveth her eggs on the earth,
And warmeth them in the dust,
And forgetteth that the foot may crush them.
Or that the wild beast may trample them.
She is hardened against her young ones, as if they

were not hers :
Though her labour be in vain, she is without fear ;
Because God hath deprived her of wisdom,
Neither hath he imparted to her understanding.
What time she lifteth up herself on high,
She scorneth the horse and his rider.
Ill

46 -^ The Book of Job

Hast thou given the horse his might?

Hast thou clothed his neck with the quivering mane?

Hast thou made him to leap as a locust?

The glory of his snorting is terrible.

He paweth in the valley, and rejoiceth in his
strength :

He goeth out to meet the armed men.

He mocketh at fear and is not dismayed ;

Neither turneth he back from the sword.

The quiver rattleth against him,

The flashing spear and the javelin.

He swalloweth the ground with fierceness and rage ;

Neither standeth he still at the voice of the trumpet.

As oft as the trumpet soundeth he saith, Aha!

And he smelleth the battle afar off,

The thunder of the captains, and the shouting.
Doth the hawk soar by thy wisdom.
And stretch her wings toward the south ?
Doth the eagle mount up at thy command.
And make her nest on high ?

She dwelleth on the rock, and hath her lodging
there,

Upon the crag of the rock and the stronghold.

From thence she spieth out the prey ;

Her eyes behold it afar off.

Her young ones also suck up blood :

And where the slain are, there is she.

Divine Intervention 6«- 46,47,48

Shall he that cavilleth contend with the Almighty?
He that argueth with God, let him answer it.

[A lull in the storm.

JOB

47

Behold, I am of small account ; what shall I answer thee?
I lay mine hand upon my mouth.

Once have I spoken, and I will not answer ;
Yea twice, but I will proceed no further.

\The whirlwind continues.

VOICE OUT OF THE WHIRLWIND

Gird up thy loins now like a man :

I will demand of thee, and declare thou unto me.

Wilt thou even disannul my judgement?

Wilt thou condemn me, that thou mayest be justified?
Or hast thou an arm like God?
And canst thou thunder with a voice like him?
I 113

48, 49 ^ The Book of Job

Deck thyself now with excellency and dignity ;
And array thyself with honour and majesty.
Pour forth the overflowings of thine anger :
And look upon everyone that is proud, and abase him.

Look on everyone that is proud, and bring him low ;
And tread down the wicked where they stand.
Hide them in the dust together ;
Bind their faces in the hidden place.

Then will I also confess of thee

That thine own right hand can save thee.

49

Behold now behemoth, which I made with thee ;

He eateth grass as an ox.
Lo now, his strength is in his loins.

And his force is in the muscles of his belly.
He moveth his tail like a cedar :

The sinews of his thighs are knit together^
His bones are as tubes of brass ;

His limbs are like bars of iron.
He is the chief of the ways of God ;

He only that made him can make his sword to ap-
proach unto him.
Surely the mountains bring him forth food ;

Where all the beasts of the field do play.
114

Divine Intervention 6«^ 49

He lieth under the lotus trees,

In the covert of the reed, and the fen.
The lotus trees cover him with their shadow ;

The willows of the brook compass him about.
Behold, if a river overflow, he trembleth not :

He is confident, though Jordan swell even to his mouth.
Shall any take him when he is on the watch,

Or pierce through his nose with a snare .'*

Canst thou draw out leviathan with a fish hook?

Or press down his tongue with a cord ?
Canst thou put a rope into his nose?

Or pierce his jaw through with a hook?
Will he make many supplications unto thee ?

Or will he speak soft words unto thee?
Will he make a covenant with thee,

That thou shouldest take him for a servant forever?
Wilt thou play with him as with a bird ?

Or wilt thou bind him for thy maidens?
Shall the bands of fishermen make traffic of him?

Shall they part him among the merchants?
Canst thou fill his skin with barbed irons,

Or his head with fish spears ?

Lay thine hand upon him ;
Remember the battle,
And do so no more.
"S

49 -^ The Book of Job

Behold the hope of him is in vain :

Shall not one be cast down even at the sight of

him?
None is so fierce that he dare stir him up.
Who then is he that can stand before me?

Who hath first given unto me, that I should repay

him?
Whatsoever is under the whole heaven is mine.

I will not keep silence concerning his limbs,

Nor his mighty strength, nor his comely proportion.
Who can strip off his outer garment ?

Who shall come within his double bridle?
Who can open the doors of his face ?

Round about his teeth is terror.
His strong scales are his pride,

Shut up together as with a close seal.
One is so near to another,

That no air can come between them.
They are joined one to another ;

They stick together, that they cannot be sundered.
His neesings flash forth light,

And his eyes are like the eyelids of the morning.
Out of his mouth go burning torches,

And sparks of fire leap forth.
Out of his nostrils a smoke goeth.

As of a seething pot and burning rushes.
ii6

Divine Intervention 8«^

49

His breath kindleth coals,

And a flame goeth forth from his mouth.
In his neck abideth strength,

And terror danceth before him.
The flakes of his flesh are joined together :

They are firm upon him, they cannot be moved.
His heart is as firm as a stone ;

Yea, firm as the nether millstone.
When he raiseth himself up, the mighty are afraid :

By reason of consternation, they are beside them-
selves.
If one lay at him with the sword, it cannot avail ;

Nor the spear, the dart, nor the pointed shaft.
He counteth iron as straw,

And brass as rotten wood.
The arrow cannot make him flee :

Slingstones are turned with him into stubble.
Clubs are counted as stubble :

He laugheth at the rushing of the javelin.
His underparts are like sharp potsherds :

He spreadeth as it were a threshing wain upon the
mire.
He maketh the deep to boil like a pot :

He maketh the sea like ointment.
He maketh a path to shine after him ;

One would think the deep to be hoary.
117

49, 50 -^TheBookofJob

Upon earth there is not his like,

That is made without fear.
He beholdeth everything that is high :

He is king over all the sons of pride.

\Tke storm begins to abate.

50
JOB

I know that thou canst do all things,

And that no purpose of thine can be restrained.

VOICE OUT OF THE WHIRLWIND {retreating)
Who is this that hideth counsel without knowledge?

JOB

Therefore have I uttered that which I understood not,
Things too wonderful for me, which I knew not.
Hear, I beseech thee, and I will speak.

VOICE OUT OF THE WHIRLWIND {more distant)

I will demand of thee, and declare thou unto me.
118

Divine Intervention 8«- 50

JOB

I had 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.

{The storfn ceases.
119

Story Epilogue

And it was so, that after the Lord had spoken these
words unto Job, the Lord said to Eliphaz the Temanite,
"My wrath is kindled against thee, and against thy two
friends : for ye have not spoken of me the thing that is
right, as my servant Job hath. Now, therefore, take unto
you seven bullocks and seven rams, and go to my servant
Job, and offer up for yourselves a burnt offering ; and my
servant Job shall pray for you ; for him will I accept, that I
deal not with you after your folly ; for ye have not spoken
of me the thing that is right, as my servant Job hath."

So Eliphaz the Temanite and Bildad the Shuhite and
Zophar the Naamathite went, and did according as the
Lord commanded them : and the Lord accepted Job.

And the Lord turned the captivity of Job, when he
prayed for his friends : and the Lord gave Job twice as
much as he had before. Then came there unto him all
his brethren, and all his sisters, and all they that had been
of his acquaintance before, and did eat bread with him in
his house: and they bemoaned him, and comforted him
concerning all the evil that the Lord had brought upon
him : every man also gave him a piece of money, and
everyone a ring of gold.

-^ The Book of Job

So the Lord blessed the latter end of Job more than
his beginning : and he had fourteen thousand sheep, and
six thousand camels, and a thousand yoke of oxen, and a
thousand she-asses. He had also seven sons and three
daughters. And he called the name of the first Jemimah ;
and the name of the second, Keziah ; and the name of
the third, Keren-happuch. And in all the land were no
women found so fair as the daughters of Job : and their
father gave them inheritance among their brethren.

And after this Job lived an hundred and forty years,
and saw his sons, and his sons' sons, even four generations.
So Job died, being old and full of days.

Notes

The Rearrangement of Speeches in the Third Round

It will be seen that in the third round of speeches I have
varied from the division between the three speakers as it ap-
pears in A. V. and R. V. No alteration from the language of
the R. V. is made : but verses 2-4 of chapter xxvi are trans-
ferred to the commencement of chapter xxvii, and a corre-
sponding change is supposed in the headings of speeches.

Then answered Eliphaz the Temanite, and said —

Chapter xxii.
Then Job answered and said —

Chapters xxiii, xxiv.
Then answered Bildad the Shuhite, and said —

Chapter xxv, continued in xxvi. 5-14.
Then Job answered and said —

Chapter xxvi. 2-4, continued in xxvii. 2-6.
Then answered Zophar the Naamathite, and said —

From chapter xxvii. 7 to end of chapter xxviii.
Then Job answered and said —

Chapters xxix, xxx, xxxi.

In the present edition these headings are replaced by the
speakers' names, as is usual in dramatic works.

The reasons on which this rearrangement is based are as
follows.

125 •

^ The Book of Job

1. The utmost caution should be used in accepting conjectural
emendations affectisg the sense of individual sentences; but
the principle does not apply to changes in points of form, such
as the arrangement of speeches, especially as the sacred books
have passed through centuries in w^hich the principles of paral-
lelism were lost.

2. All critics recognise the difficulty of the text as it stands
between chapters xxvi and xxviii (inclusive), which has the
effect of making Job take up a position antagonistic to his
former contention and to his subsequent words; and some
commentators resort to violent explanations, such as prolonged
irony, etc.

3. The most marked feature of literary style in the book is
its extreme parallelism ; this makes it most improbable that the
third colloquy should be imperfect, by the omission of a speech
from Zophar, and a reply to him from Job. Moreover, the
change in the introductory formulas when chapters xxvli and
xxix are reached — viz. : And Job again took tip his parable and
said instead of the usual Job answered and said — is very sus-
picious.

4. The conjecture here adopted is substantially that of Gratz,
which is to a large extent the same as Cheyne's. Some eminent
critics (e.g. Davidson, Driver) are deterred from seeking a third
speech for Zophar by the shortness of Bildad's third speech
(chapter xxv), which they take as an indication that the con-
troversy is becoming exhausted. But the present conjecture
lengthens Bildad's speech and removes this objection.

5. This rearrangement satisfies the important canon that

126

Notes Q^

emendations should explain how the distortions arose: other-
wise, optima lectio pessima. Zophar (in the present arrange-
ment) says (32) :

/ will teach you concerning the hand of God ;
That which is with the Almighty tvill I not conceal.

Then, turning to his companions, to include them in his protest
against Job, he continues :

Behold, all ye yourselves have seen it ;
Why then are ye become altogether vain ?

(The all is explained by the presence of an audience; Elihu,
for example, being one. The second line means : why are ye
treated as of no consequence?) This is a perfectly natural re-
mark. But in a traditional age, which thought more of sen-
tences than the poetic scene, the plural all ye led the reciter or
copyist to connect the speech with Job addressing the Friends.
So the mistake crept in.

The Question of Interruptions

In addition to the change in the division of speeches discussed
in the last note, the question arises whether certain passages in
what appear as speeches of Job in the received text are not to
be understood as interruptions by the other speakers. Five pas-
sages are affected by this question : the commencement of sec-
tion 13, the first half of section 29, and three short passages in
section 23. In all these cases the words must be understood
127

^ The Book of Job

either as actually spoken by the other speakers, or as imaginary ob-
jections of theirs cited by Job for the purpose of answering them.

The absence of any break in the received text has httle weight :
the considerations adduced in the last note show that the head-
ings of speeches have not the same authority as the speeches
themselves. The evidences on this question seem to me uncer-
tain; on the whole, I have been led to different conclusions in
respect to the different passages.

The clearest case seems to be section 23 : and I have here
assigned the three passages to the three Friends respectively,
(i) The fact that there are three is significant: the sense of
symmetry running through the whole poem is so distinct that it
is easier to understand a triple interruption than the interven-
tion of a single objector. (2) It comes as a confirmation that
the three passages fit in with the individual speakers in the
order in which they always speak. The words falling in this
arrangement to Eliphaz are :

Loy their prosperity is not iti their hand :
The counsel of the wicked is far fro7n me.

Now the first of these lines is an echo of the picture painted by
Ehphaz in his speech of this cycle (page 48, Hne 10), and the
second line occurs in his next speech (page 66, Hne 2). Bil-
dad's interruption is :

God layeth up his iniquity for his children.

It will be remembered that Bildad is the only one to allude (in

his first speech, section 6) to the overthrow of Job's children;

128

Notes B^

and though he suggests guilt on their part, yet he evidently
treats this as part of the general judgment in which Job himself
is involved. And Zophar's interruption —

S/iai/ any teach God knowledge, etc.,

is in tune with the opening of his first speech (page 37). Too
much stress, however, must not be laid on this consideration, as
the arguments of the three Friends all through have much in
common. (3) A further confirmation comes a few lines further
on :

Behold, I know your thoughts, etc.,

as if more interruptions were coming, and Job anticipates them.
(4) It is another strong confirmation of this arrangement that
these interruptions occur in just that part of the poem where
they might most naturally be expected. Sections 22, 23 may be
considered the turning-point of the debate : hitherto Job had
only resisted the doctrine of judgment; here he proceeds, not
without trembling at his own boldness, to suggest that the re-
verse of judgment appears as one of the regular ways of provi-
dence. Such a bold turn would naturally call out immediate
protest.

The case is very different in section 29. The whole rhythmic
form of this is against the idea of interruption. Job recites a
popular view of the end of the prosperous wicked in a figure of
(?, 2, and puts his own reading of providence in a figure of 2, 8.
Such antistrophic inversion is precisely in keeping with the mat-
ter, on the view that Job speaks the whole. In section 23, on
the contrary, the rhythmic form is that of interruption; the ob-

K 129

-^ The Book of Job

jections making irregular breaks, and the answers advancing by
augmentation (5, 5, 8, 11) .

The most difficult case is the first four lines of section 13.
Here the rhythmic form is interruption, as in 23. The words
would suit Zophar, who seems to admit interrupting at the com-
mencement of his speech in section 21. But it is a solitary
break, and can perfectly well be read as a citing of objection by
Job. The evidence here seems equally balanced, and I have
left the arrangement to stand as in the received text.

A kindred question, but much more difficult, — indeed, to me
the most perplexing question of form in the whole poem, —
arises in the last section (50). Job's speech of submission is
interrupted by the words :

PVAo is this that hideth counsel without knowledge ?

and again, later, by the words :

I will dejuand of thee, and declare thou unto me.

Are we to understand these words to be spoken at the time by
the Voice out of the Whirlwind : or are they echoes by Job of
the Divine words spoken before? It seems to me that the
considerations on both sides of the question are very evenly
balanced.

It will be noted that these sentences are the opening words of
the Divine Intervention, the first slightly, and the second con-
siderably abridged; the second also commences the Divine
speech following Job's former submission, and the word * de-
130

Notes 6€-

clare ' has come as a challenge to Job more than once in the
course of the speech out of the storm. If the fi»6t of these in-
terrupting lines stood alone, it might be preferable to assign it to
Job : it would fit easily with its context. The second, though
possible, is yet difficult to understand in Job's mouth; coming
after Job's

Hear, I beseech thee, and I will speak —

it makes a very abrupt break in the drift of the speech, without
any special point to compensate for this. On the other hand,
the dramatic gain is very great if the other view be taken.
From Job's first words the tempest begins to retreat, in harmony
with Job's submission; and such retreat of the storm can be
powerfully indicated by the breaking out of the characteristic
words, which each time sound more in the distance. It is as
if two more Divine remonstrances were commencing with the
opening formula of the other two, but each is arrested by Job's
words of submission. This need not seem too mechanical a
mode of dealing with the Divine utterances, seeing that the
crash of thunder is throughout suggested by the abrupt inter-
rogatories which make the substance of the speech out of the
storm. When again it is considered how very elaborately the
approach of the whirlwind was indicated in the words of Elihu,
it will seem not unreasonable to expect that some dramatic effect
should be connected with its retreat : the broken echoes of the
first crash make just the effect required, and it fits in with this
suggestion that the lines in question are the former sentences
abridged.

-^ The Book of Job

I feel I am taking a bold step in introducing this arrangement
without more distinct support from the text. But after long
consideration I have convinced myself that this is on the whole
the preferable alternative.

On the Metrical System of Job

The metrical system of Job is the metrical system of Wisdom

verse in general, with just the modifications and enlargements

Dramatic which we should expect in dramatic as distin-

Effect of guished from didactic poetry. For in all dramatic

Metrical poetry metre is an outward reflection of dramatic

Variations . . . , ^^ • c ^ • • • i

spirit ; but in the application of this principle an

important misunderstanding is to be avoided.

The literary significance of metre is a thing quite distinct
from the principles revealed when verse is analysed from the
linguistic point of view. The distinctions of rhythms and
metres, their feet and other component parts, their possible
modifications and laws of recurrence, all these belong to
prosody ; but a very small part of all this has any connection
with literature. The distinction I have in mind may perhaps be
expressed most simply by saying that the literary student is
concerned, not with metres, but with metrical variations. He
must be sensitive to transitions between one metrical style and
another ; but he need not seek to associate a particular literary
significance with a particular metre.

To a limited extent indeed this last may be done. In Greek
132

Notes 6«-

Comedy the scholar is aware that anapsests have an association
with (mock) grandeur, and the long iambic lines are devoted
to ribald satire. In the Peace of Aristophanes trochaic meas-
ures are used quite as a leit-77iotif to accompany the presence
of the country party. Similarly in the poem which is the sub-
ject of the present volume it will be found that Job and Elihu
employ a much greater variety of different metres than the
three Friends : a difference entirely in accord with the contrast
between the staid insistence upon orthodoxy of the one party,
and the passionate strength of Job, or the youthful fervour of
his last critic. It is curious, moreover, that introversion appears
nowhere but in the speeches of Job; while by Elihu alone is
used a special rhythm which will be described below under the
name Augmenting Alternation, and which is exquisitely expres-
sive of the position of the speaker at the particular point of the
argument.

But this association of a particular metre with a particular
meaning is an exceptional thing. The principle which is found
to run through dramatic literature in various languages is that
a change from one metrical style to another always reflects a
change in the spirit or tone of the scene. "Whether the reader
is occupied with the sustained anapaests and strophic passages
of Greek Tragedy, or with the anapaests and trochees of a
parabasis in Greek Comedy, or with the distribution of trochees
and iambic verse in Latin Comedy, above all when he is appre-
ciating the delicate use of verse and prose in the plays of
Shakespeare, he will find that a transition from a passage in
which one metre has been predominating to a passage in which
133

^ The Book of Job

another metre is to rule means a change of thought, as clearly
as when the reader of a printed book comes upon a new chap-
Metrical ^^^ ^^^^ ^ iresh title. In the Book of Job this
Variations usage is so fundamental that it makes the basis on
in Job which the whole can be analysed : the changes of
metre tally with the stages in the argument. I have accordingly
arranged the poem on this principle. I have divided it into
metrical units, numbered from one to fifty : the meaning of the
term is only that between one of these divisions and the next
the metre changes, as for example from antistrophic to stanza
system, or vice versa. Such an arrangement enables me, in
the notes which follow, to treat together points of metre and
steps in the progress of the argument.

First it may be well to pass in review the leading features of
metrical effect, the details of which will be analysed in the
notes.

In the opening volume of this series I laid down the princi-

_ .^ , pies of the metrical system which is found to pre-

Recapitula- ^ ., . ^^^. , ^ , , . , ^ ^ .

tion of Prin- vail in Wisdom poetry; and to this the reader is

ciples of Wis- referred. The distinction was made between the

om e res gtanza structure, familiar in modern poetry, and

the Antistrophic structure, in which, as in Greek, the stanzas

run in pairs; the passage from strophe to antistrophe being in

harmony with grammatical or rhetorical relations in the thought

expressed. It was seen that the antistrophic structure admitted

Introductions and Conclusions of independent form; and at

any point of Wisdom verse might be found single independent

couplets, like passages of musical recitative breaking strict time.

134

Notes ^

These elementary structures were found to be intensified by
distinct Elaborations. The simple succession of strophes each
followed by its antistrophe {aa' dd' cc'), which is so common in
Greek, associates itself with the Pendulum Structure which is
prevalent through all Hebrew literature, the swaying to and fro
between two thoughts; and Wisdom poetry also exhibits the
Irregular Pendulum, where there is the swaying backwards and
forwards without the equality of stanzas. Other arrangements
of strophes were those named Interlacing and Inversion, the
one represented by the scheme ad a'b' and the other by the
scheme ab b'a'. Duplication naturally expresses an arrange-
ment by which in a series of stanzas (say) of the form ^, j one
is found of the form 4, 6. A single example was found in Pro-
verbs of Augmenting — a succession of stanzas in which the
number of lines continually increased. Variation was found
where two stanzas, equal in the number of their lines and
agreeing in the proportion of their dissimilar parallelism, yet
distributed this dissimilar parallelism differently, as where a
stanza abaaab was answered by the form ababaa. One more
elaboration was named Interruption : the regularity of a stanza
interrupted by a mass of independent form, the interrupting
mass representing a corresponding break in the thought.

The same metrical elements, and the same elaborations of
metre, appear in the dramatic poetry of Job, with
greater variety and elasticity. And a slight addi- JJ?s"oTjor*"
tion is to be made to the list.

The antistrophic and stanza structures are the basis of the
whole. The famous celebration of Wisdom with which Zophar
135

^ The Book of Job

brings to a conclusion the arguments of the Friends is a com-
plete sonnet, of complex strophe, antistrophe, and conclusion.
Antistrophic ^^^ ^^^^ special form of sonnet designated Num-
and Stanza ber Sonnet is found once, in the opening speech
Structures q£ Eliphaz; this is constructed on the number
seven, and is worked out in couplets. Recitative couplets are
freely used, and twice (19, 46) they are extended to triplets.
Considerable use is made in yod of Alternate

«"fi?fv!«. Parallelism. In Proverbs this was confined to
Parallelism

passages not prominent; but in Ecclesiasticus
it made up the body of the great monologue of Wisdom, while
this rose to a climax in stanzas. So in Job some of the cli-
maxes or sustained outbursts are in alternate parallelism. And
it is extensively used for transitional passages, between one
division and another of a lengthy argument, or where a speaker
at the commencement of his speech notices half contemptuously
the words of the last speaker before he enters upon his own
line of attack.

The elaborations mentioned above appear, with more fulness
and variety, but always in harmony with the elaboration of the

thought. The regular Pendulum is not found in
StJlSlTr? '^^^' ^^^ *^^ irregular form of this structure is

several times employed in the sustained outbursts.
And there is an extension of this structure in what may be called
the Triple Pendulum. Here the swaying of thought is between
three and not two ideas. Job's Oath of Clearing is of this form.
This is, as it were, a song constructed on three notes : one de-
scribes the sins to be disavowed; a second invokes penalties if
136

Notes S«-

the speaker has been guilty of them; while a third note is made
by a recoil from the very thought of entertaining such sins
against God.

If I have walked with vanity,
And my foot hath hasted to deceit ;

(^Let me be weighed in an even balance^
That God may know mine integrity ;')
If my step hath turned out of the way,
And mine heart walked after mine eyes,
And if any spot hath cleaved to 7nine hands :
Then let me sow, and let another eat ;
Yea, let the produce of my field be rooted out.

The same figure seems to underlie the first part of the Divine
Intervention: one note is made by the startling questions of
nature mysteries, another subsides into exquisite picturing of
details in these wonders of nature, while for a third there is an
occasional word of challenge to Job to answer.

Where the structure is antistrophic, Interlacing and Intro-
version are regularly used. In a single instance the two are
found to be combined (see note to section 34).

Duplication of stanzas regularly occurs. In Job's answer (5)

to Eliphaz an extension of it is found in a group of verses taking

the forms i, 6 ; 2, 12: ?, 18. The effect is in- ^

, , , , ^ , , , , , Duplication

creased by the order of the stanzas : Job having

three times used the form 2, 12, in an accession of bitterness

rises to the form 3, 18, and then subsides into despair in a verse

of the form /, 6. A new variety of duplication is to be noticed,

137

■^ The Book of Job

by which it is applied to antistrophic structure, the antistrophe
being not the equal but the double of its strophe. The use of
this figure by Elihu (40) is suggestive. He has reached the
very heart of his argument, or rather, his modification of the
argument of the Friends. Their contention was that affliction
was punishment; and Eliphaz had introduced this idea with a
description of an impressive \dsion. Elihu wishes to say that
affliction is a warning, just as much as would be a supernatural
vision. His words take the form of a strophe of three lines
describing a vision, and an antistrophe of six lines putting the
warning it conveys; then a strophe of eight lines describing the
affliction of sickness, and an antistrophe of sixteen lines to con-
vey the purpose of this sickness to warn. The symmetry of
treatment, by which each strophe is duplicated, leads us instinc-
tively to associate together the warning of affliction and the
warning of a vision, while the increased mass of the second pair
of verses serves to emphasise the form of warning on which
Elihu is to lay stress. This figure then may be termed Anti-
strophic Duplication.

Augmenting stanzas are used in those passages in which Job
has actual or imaginary objections to answer. In his first

response to Zophar he confronts the wisdom of
Augmenting

the aged, which has been urged against him,

with a higher wisdom which he sees reflected in the doings of

Omnipotence. As he warms with this theme the stanzas are

found to increase, from the form 2, 8 to 2, 20. Job's second

reply to Zophar cites four objections, or they are actually

made : the answers to these make stanzas of five lines, again of

138

Notes d^

five lines, then of eight lines, finally of eleven. And here must
be noted the Augmenting Alternation of Elihu. This speaker,
it must be remembered, occupies the position of
a young man intervening uninvited in a debate of ^i^^^i^^
old men. With the almost superstitious reverence
for old age that belongs to early civilisations, it is natural to find
that Elihu has great difficulty in nerving himself to this effort;
and it takes him fifty-two lines to complete his apology for
speaking at all in so venerable a presence. The stanzas which
express this gradual conquest over nervousness are found to take
the highly suggestive forms, /, i ; i, i 2, 2 ; 2^ 2 4, 4 ; 4, 4
6, 6 ; 6, 6. Later on he has been threatening Job with judg-
ment, when a rumble of distant thunder darts into his mind the
idea that the judgment is that moment impending. His thoughts
now become engrossed with the advancing signs of the storm;
and the growing excitement expresses itself in stanzas of the
forms, z, 3 ; I, 3 2,6 ; 2, 6 4, 12 ; 4, 12. This second ex-
ample is duplication combined with augmenting. It would be
impossible to imagine any closer harmony between the outer
form of a scene and its inner spirit (sections 38, 44).

Of Variation it is enough to say that it is used as in other
Wisdom literature, but to a much less extent than we should
have expected. Interruption plays an important variation
part in the dramatic poetry of yob. Its first and Interrup-
appearance is at the opening of the Curse. The *^*^^
essence of this whole section is contained in two couplets.

Let the day perish tvherein I was born ;
And the night which said, There is a man child conceived :
139

-^ The Book of Job

Because it shut not tip the doors of my mother'' s womb.
Nor hid trouble from mitie eyes !

But between these two couplets are interposed two tours-de-
force of execration, invoking upon that day and that night all
conceivable forms of darkening. Again, Bildad's first speech
has the form of sextett stanzas. Two of these suffer interruption :
in the one a conditional sentence is delayed by additional con-
ditions; and in the other case a stanza of illustration is loaded
with an additional illustration. A marked case of interruption
is found in Job's speech before the Oath of Clearing (35) . The
whole passage describes how the patriarch is despised by the
youths and the rabble, and consists of two octetts. The first
octett is interrupted by an outburst of fifteen lines, presenting
the fathers of these youths as the very canaille of the last gener-
ation. The second stanza has an interruption of only a single
line, which comes as an echo of the previous outburst. Inter-
ruption is used for a different dramatic purpose in the great
passage where Job rises to a sudden confidence in a vindication
beyond the grave. With the magnitude of this sudden inspira-
tion Job (as his words clearly convey) nearly faints : and at this
point (see section 20) one of the quatrains lacks a single line.
When he has resumed in a calmer mood, there is again a lack
of a line where Zophar breaks in upon the unfinished sentence,
as he himself confesses, because he cannot any longer restrain
his indignation.

It may just be observed that there is one metrical elaboration
in this poem which I have not noticed elsewhere in Wisdom liter-
140

Notes 8«-

ature. It may be called Suspension. Elihu, when he passes from
apology to argument (39), recites in a sextett what he conceives
to be Job's plea, and in the same measure answers
it. These two sextetts do not follow one another,
but the plea is interposed in the middle of the answer; the first
sextett being thus suspended, and concluded when the point to
be answered has been stated. That this is the right way of
analysing the metre seems confirmed by the fact that a similar
effect immediately succeeds in the next section; the antistrophic
duplication described above being interposed between the two
parts of a sextett which evidently make one whole (see note
to section 40).

When minutiae of form such as have been here reviewed are
under discussion, an objection often forms itself in the mind of
readers unaccustomed to such studies: Can a writer of an
impassioned poem be supposed to have burdened himself with
such mechanical arrangements as are thus suggested? The an-
swer is that nothing of the kind is to be supposed. Conscious
planning of metres or other formal devices are for learners in the
art of poetry; the author of Job is credited only with an exqui-
site sense of symmetry as part of his poetic equipment. The
more exalted his strain, the more will it fall of its own accord
into symmetries which the cold analysis of criticism can measure
and classify. In any case, whatever may be the mental process
of poetic composition, this can make no difference to that which
is a matter of fact, — the forms which can actually be traced in
what is produced.

141

^ The Book of Job

Brief Cojispectiis of the ArgU7fieftt

A dramatic debate may have all the force, but will certainly
not have the logical order, of a philosophic discussion ; irrup-
tions of personal feeling, and glancings at details of attack and
defence, will sway the main argument out of its regular course.
It will be well then for the reader, before he enters upon the
detailed analysis of the poem, to fix in his mind the leading
lines of thought, which, with whatever interruptions, are followed
from the beginning to the end.

The starting-point is the position taken up by Job in his Curse :
his misery, and claim for a speedy end. To this position Job is
continually subsiding after outbursts of passionate argument.
The Friends treat this as ignoring a visitation of God.

First Round of Speeches

The Friends Job

The Doctrine : All calamity is Opposition of facts to the Doc-
judgment upon sin. trine: impunity of the wicked

exists.
Basis of the Doctrine : The in- Helplessness of short - lived
finite distance between God man to bring his cause be-

and man. fore Omnipotence — mo-

mentary thought : a Vindi-
cation beyond death (dis-
missed).
142

Notes ^

Personal bearing of the Doc- Wavering courage for Appeal

trine : Job a sinner, with a to the inflicting God against

sinner's hope of restoration the Friends' misinterpreta-

upon submission. tion of the infliction.

Second Round

All three lines of argument Job's opposition of facts against
maintained. the Doctrine enhanced to a

doubt whether impunity of
the wicked is not a general
thing.

His helpless position enhanced,
his cause is actually sub-
verted— thought of a Vin-
dication beyond death en-
hanced to a glorious cer-
tainty.

Appeal to God from the
Friends now passionately
made, and the Friends
treated with contempt.

Third Round

All three lines of argument Job rises to corresponding

advanced to a climax. climaxes.

The Doctrine [Zophar] made The visible impunity of the
identical with all wisdom. wicked formulated as one

of the laws of providence.
143

■^ The Book of Job

Basis of the Doctrine [Bildad]: The heavenly Vindicator not

distance between God and to be found : but the vindi-

man in a climax of eloquence. cation will come.

Personal bearing [Eliphaz] : The Oath of Clearing,
suggestions of actual sins
are made.

[The subsidence into misery which appears
in Job at intervals throughout rises to a formal
climax just before the Oath of Clearing in the
contrast of what he was and what he is.]

Elihu

Elihu modifies the Doctrine of the Friends : Affliction is not
so much a judgment, as a warning against judgment to come.
Provoked by the silence, first of Job and then of the Friends,
he advances to threats of coming judgment — the first appear-
ance of the storm leads to the idea that the threatened judg-
ment is now impending.

Divine Intervention

An outburst emphasising the infinite mystery of all nature,
of good as well as of bad — when Job attempts a word of sub-
mission, a further outburst proclaims him unequal even to the
mysteries of human government, how much more to the climax
mysteries of nature — Job makes complete submission ; and

Epilogue

justifies him as against the Friends.
144

Notes e«-

THE STORY PROLOGUE

The dramatic poem of Job rests upon a basis or frame of nar-
rated story, which appears at the beginning, the end, and briefly
at the passage from the Debate to the Interposition of EHhu.
Dramas regularly contain (or imply) a trace of story element in
the 'stage directions,' which in modern literature there is a
growing tendency to expand (compare Wagner, Ibsen). This
story frame to Job is partly an enlargement of such stage direc-
tions.

[The Story Prologue is in prose. The only exceptions
are : (i) The Messengers' Speeches exhibit a form inter-
mediate between verse and prose, external without inter-
nal parallelism; the lines correspond not with others in
the same speech, but with similar lines in other speeches.
(2) Job's first words of submission make two recitative
couplets; a form which suggests a pause between the two.
The same form is taken by his first submission at the end of
the poem (section 47) ; his later submission (50) enlarges
from this by augmentation, with interruptions. The same
form (interrupted) underlies the Curse (i).]

The greatest of all the children of the east. The name children
of the east seems to be given in Scripture to the Arabian nomad
peoples to the east of Palestine. Their present successors claim
descent from Abraham. {Genesis, chapter xxix. i; Jeremiah,
chapter xlix. 28.) — // may be that ?ny sons have . . . renounced
L 145

^ The Book of Job

God in their hearts. The word renounce is founded on the
gesture of salutation, and (like the double meaning of the Greek
chairete) may be used for welcoming or departure. The feeling
underlying this expression may be illustrated by a later passage
in the Oath of Clearing :

If I beheld the sun when it shined^

Or the ??toon walking in brightness ;

And my heart hath been secretly enticed^

And my mouth hath kissed my hand:

This also were an iniquity to be punished by the judges :
For I should have lied to God that is above.

This (and a somewhat similar passage in Deuteronomy, chapter
iv. 19) brings before us the conception of the worship of Jehovah
as a sense of sanctity and restraint, in contradistinction to com-
peting religions of revel and excitement; the gesture of an ex-
cited moment might violate plighted troth to Jehovah.

Now there was a day when the sons of God came to present
themselves before the LORD. With this incident should be read
Psalm Iviii (margins of R. V.), and especially Psalm Ixxxii
(Cheyne's comment valuable). Other single passages may be
compared, such as Psalms xxix. i; Ixxxix. 6, 7; xcvii. 7; Job,
chapter v. i, and Exodus, chapter xv. 11. Without going into
difficult questions as to the phrase sons of God or of the gods, or
the identification of these with seraphim of Isaiah, three main
ideas may be kept distinct, (i) The sons of God are super-
natural powers conceived to attend upon God as a council of
officers upon a king. (2) They are conceived to be function-
146

Notes ^

aries through whom God's government is carried on. (3) In
Psalms Ixxxii and Iviii the sphere of government of these sons
of God would seem to be the different peoples of the earth.
They are in these poems regarded as neglecting their duties,
and (in Psalm Ixxxii) threatened with degradation from their
rank of immortals. But in J^od the suggestion is rather that the
various parts of the universe, of which our earth is only one, are
under their charge; and that 'Satan,' or *the Adversary,' has
the oversight of * the earth,' In support of this view, compare
the regular association of angels with stars (implied in such a
phrase as * the host of heaven,' and in such passages as Deiiter-
onof?iy, chapter iv. 19; Isaiah, chapter xxxiv. 4; Psalm cxlviii. 3)
with the picture later in this poem of the rejoicings over creation :

When the f?iorning stars sang together.
And all the sons of God shouted for joy.

And the Adversary came also among them. The Adversary is
the marginal alternative of R. V. for * Satan ' in the text. Either
* the Adversary ' or ' the Satan ' will convey the right impression.
The essential points are: (i) The word is not a proper name,
but a common noun, the name of an office. (2) This officer is
represented as coming amongst the other sons of God, and there
is nothing in his reception to suggest any difference between
him and the rest. (3) His office is that of Inspector or Guard-
ian of the earth : the words From going to and fro in the earthy
and from walking up and down in it, besides being in them-
selves just descriptive of such an officer, are close to the words
(" walk to and fro through the earth," five times repeated) in
147

-^ The Book of Job

the vision of Zechariah (chapters i. 7 to vi. 8), which undoubt-
edly are a formula expressing spirits of ministration of God on
the earth. (4) When associations with the other use of the
word * Satan ' are dismissed, it is easy to see that there is no
malignity or sin in the Adversary's action in the present inci-
dent. To be suspicious is the function of an inspector; and he
only does his duty in suggesting a possible flaw in the apparent
integrity of Job. The Lord is not represented as showing any
displeasure. The position of the Adversary is exactly that of the
AdvocatMS Diaboli in the usages of the Roman Church, who has
the function of making opposition to the canonisation of a
saint, lest any flaw should be passed over. He is an ' adversary '
only in the sense in which any inspector or examiner is opposed
to those on whom he exercises his office. The same title of an
officer of heaven, and the same functions, appear in other pas-
sages of Scripture: compare Zechariah, iii. i; / Chron. xxi. i,
and / Kings, xxii. 19. Finally (5) it is intelligible how the name
of an office should in time come to be applied as the name of
an individual : the Adversary of God, and so champion of evil.
With regard to the whole incident, it may be remarked that
the views presented above are assisted by the ritualistic charac-
ter of the narrative. The exact repetition of questions and for-
mularies in the description of the two days suggests that these
are to be regarded as periodical gatherings, with formularies of
ritual, as each son of God presents himself. It may be added,
that the popular notions of 'Satan,' and his connection with
the early stages of the world history presented in the Bible, are
derived from Milton's working up of Scripture into Paradise
148

Notes 8«^

Lost, rather than from the Bible itself. Bishop Bickersteth, in
his Yesterday, To-day, and Forever^ has reconstructed the bib-
lical story of Milton, and harmonised the conception of Satan
in Job Avith the conception in the N. T. It is unnecessary to
point out that the prologue to Goethe's Faust is wholly founded
on the ideas of this incident of Job.

Skin for skin, yea, all that a man hath -will he give for his
life. The general sense is clear enough ; but the exact force of
the proverb is difficult to catch. Cox quotes a Jewish proverb
which is helpful : " One gives one's skin to save one's skin, and
all to save one's life." — And he sat among the ashes. David-
son quotes from Wetzstein a passage which brings this clearly
before our imagination.

The dung which is heaped upon the Mezbele of the Hati-
ran villages is not mixed with straw, which in that warm
and dry land is not needed for litter .^ and it comes mostly
from solid-hoofed animals, as the flocks and oxen are left
over-night in the grazing places. It is carried in baskets in
a dry state to this place before the village, and usually burnt
once a month. . . . The ashes remain. . . . If the village
has been inhabited for centuries the Mezbele reaches a height
far overtopping it. The xvinter rains reduce it into a com-
pact mass, and it beco7?ies by and by a solid hill of earth.
. . . The Mezbele serves the inhabitants for a watchtower,
and in the sultry evenings for a place of concourse, because
there is a current of air on the height. There all day long
the children play about it ; and there the outcast, who has
149

^ The Book of Job

been stricken with some loathsome malady, and is not
allozued to enter the dzvellings of men, lays himself down,
begging an alms of the passers-by by day, and by night
sheltering himself among the ashes which the heat of the sun
has warmed. There, too, lie the village dogs, perhaps gnaw-
ing a fallen carcase, which is often flung there.

After this Job . . . cursed his day. The word curse is quite
distinct from the renounce (God) of previous passages. It
simply implies execration. There is not here any approach
to the renunciation of God, which the Adversary suggested
as probable, and which Job feared for his children, while his
wife in a moment of distraction bade him do it. On the con-
trary, Job accepts his loss of all without resistance; only he
insists now upon recognising that all is lost, and he claims per-
mission to die. There is no suggestion of rebellion against
God, until the Friends contend that his doom is deserved.

THE CURSE

I Job, in an outburst of sustained passion, execrates the time
that brought him into existence.

[The form of i is antistrophic couplets interrupted : an
exact counterpart to Proverbs I. xv ; see note on page 169
of that volume. The interruption is a tour-de-force of terms
ISO

Notes S«-

for darkening, applied, six of them to the day of his birth,
nine to the night of his conception.]

Who are ready to rouse up leviatha7i. Davidson's explana-
tion of this passage is lucid and interesting. It must be read
with two other passages. One is below (30) :

By his spirit the heavens are garnished ;
His hand hath pierced the swift serpent.

The other is from Isaiah^ chapter xxvii. i :

In that day the' LORD with his sore and great and strong
sword shall punish leviathan the sivift serpent, and levia-
than the windi7tg serpent ; and he shall slay the dragon
that is in the sea.

The latter passage identifies the sxvift serpent with leviathan^ or
the dragon of the sea; the former passage identifies the pierc-
ing of this sivift serpent with the act of clearing or garnishing
the heavens. The idea is of the dragon or monster supposed
to produce eclipses of the sun : those referred to in the Curse
are magicians professing to rouse this dragon and so darken the
sun. — It may be convenient to anticipate an expression used
by Job below (page 27) :

Am I a sea or a sea-morister,
That thou settest a watch over me ?

As the sea-monster in the one passage is a danger to the

heavenly bodies, so is it here to the land. And the wording

seems to identify the conception of sea-monster (poinding, or

151

^ The Book of Job

swift, in the quotation from Isaiah) with the sea itself, twisting
round the land, and at times invading and destroying.

2 The feeling expressed in the first section is carried for-
ward: If he was doomed to be born, why was the luxury of
immediate death denied him? Why now is life forced upon
the miserable?

[After a transitional quatrain the metre is antistrophic :
each of the thoughts, death denied, life forced on him, has
a strophe of the form 2, 4, 2^ 6.]

THE DEBATE

3 Eliphaz

Eliphaz opens the Doctrine of the Friends : that all calamity
is a judgment on sin — but this is made a source of hope for
Job through submission. — A climax passage makes a Basis
for the Doctrine by a supernatural vision setting forth the infinite
distance between God and man : there can be no human plea
against a visitation of God. — The strain of hope yields another
climax passage in the picture of Job's restoration.

[Stanza system, with duplication and climax passages.
(It is unnecessary to mention recitative couplets, which
may occur anywhere.) The doctrine (with its hope) ap-
pears in quatrains ; the enlargement in stanzas of 2, 6
duplicating into 4, 12. The climax vision is antistrophic
(-?, 9) ; the other climax passage is a number sonnet (see
152

Notes S«-

Proverbs volume, page xxiii) on the base 7, worked out in
couplets.]

Is not thy fear of God thy confidence, etc. The tenderness
and grace of Eliphaz must be noted. He has the delicate task
of suggesting to this pattern of the world that he has been
secretly a sinner. His first hint of this is conveyed under the
form of a hope for Job: if this overwhelming disaster were a
capricious accident, the sufferer would indeed be hopeless. But
now his confidence in God's justice shows him penitence as a
way of escape. — To which of the holy ones wilt thou turn : see
above, page 146. — Man is born unto trouble as the sparks fly
upward : that is, the visitation of calamity is no accident, but
is as much a law of nature (viz. its connection with sin) as that
of the upward tendency of fire.

4. 5 Job

4 Job [in antistrophic interlacing: 7, 6 ; 7, 6], as if speak-
ing to himself, justifies the position taken up in the Curse : his
sufferings give him a right to complain and ask for a speedy end.

5 Speaking aloud. Job now expresses disappointment at the
Friends who have given him rebuke instead of comfort — then,
after a transitional passage challenging them to look him in the
face and accuse him, Job turns to God, and justifies the position
taken in the Curse : man's life is that of one hired for a period
of service — after another transitional passage of misery, Job
rises to a climax of bitter appeal against what he presents as
God's persecution of the helpless — finally he subsides into a

153

-^ The Book of Job

cry for pardon of whatever transgression he may have com-
mitted, in view of the near end.

[The transitional passages, as always, are of alternate
parallelism. The rest is in stanzas with extreme duplication
(/, 6 ; 2, 12 ; 3, i8') . The protests against the Friends and
the first appeal to God make three stanzas of 2, 12 ; then
the climax intensifies to j, 18, and the final subsidence is
in 7, 6.]

Am la sea or a sea-?nonster : see above, page 15 1.

6 Bildad

The doctrine of the Friends reasserted, with appeals to
nature and tradition. Hope of restoration not omitted.

[Stanzas of 2, 4; with very curious examples of inter-
ruption. The first stanza, which is a conditional sentence
(If tkou wert pure and holy, etc.), has the interruption of
conditional sentences more remote (^If thy children, etc.).
Similarly, the fourth stanza, which is to work out the pre-
viously suggested illustration of the rush, is interrupted (at
the beginning) with a further illustration of the spider's
web.]

7-10 Job

7 Job [in antistrophic introversion: 4, 6; 6^ 4 and 4, 3;
J, 4 bis\ dwells on the hopelessness of submitting his cause to
Overpowering Strength.

IS4

Notes 8«^

8 The strain is continued [changing to antistrophic inter-
lacing] : the further ground of hopelessness in his short life.

9 Job appeals to God against a persecution which is a per-
secution of God's own workmanship, and of unrelenting severity
against helplessness.

[This is an introduction and irregular pendulum figure.
The pendulum figure is repeated : the first has lines sway-
ing between the idea of God's workmanship (left) and
harsh judgment (right); the second, between Job's con-
duct (left) and watchful judgment (right).]

10 Finally Job subsides [in quatrain stanzas] to the position
taken in the Curse : his right to beg a speedy end.

II Zophar

Zophar enlarges upon the basis of the Friends' doctrine : the
distance between God and man : the only hope is submission.

[Stanza system. Three stanzas (of 4, 2) describe Job re-
sisting and Job repenting — then two (of 2, J2^ dwell on
the immeasurable greatness of God, and the hope of
restoration.]

12-15 Job

12 Job commences with blunt opposition of facts to the
Friends' doctrine : impunity of the wicked is to be seen, as
well as their punishment.

-^ The Book of Job

[The figure is antistrophic inversion: 2, ^ ; j, 2 3,2;
2, J. This is a curious example, almost amounting to in-
troverted introversion,]

PF/io knoweth not in all these that " the hand of the LORD hath
zvrought this ? " Delitzsch makes the excellent suggestion that
there is a proverb quoted here (comparing Isaiah, chapter
xli. 20) ; this turns what seems a vague weakness (in the this^)
into a fine stroke of argument. This line must be connected
with the previous line, Who knoweth not such things as these?
They have offered Job commonplaces of Divine judgment; he
retorts with commonplaces of impunity, bringing out their com-
monplaceness by the phrase of a current proverb.

13 Continuing, Job confronts the 'wisdom of the aged,'
which has been cited to him, with another wisdom seen in the
actions of Irresistible Strength (as it were, the logic of events).

[The form may be called Augmenting Interruption. An
objection (as if in the objector's words) interrupts the
speaker : his reply makes two rhetoric masses, augmenting
from 2, 8 to 2, 20. Compare sections 23 and 50.]

14 The idea is gathering strength of an appeal to God
against God's own visitation as interpreted by the Friends — Job
sways between longing to make the appeal, and awe of the Power
to be appealed to.

[Two pendulum figures. In the first the swaying is be-
tween the idea of appealing to God against God himself
(left) and the Friends making false pleas out of subservi-
156

Notes Q^

ence to God (right) — in the second the swaying is between
the appeal to God (left) and awe of God (right).]

15 The feeling of awe has prevailed, and Job sinks back to
despair of short-lived man — this leads to a momentary glimpse
of the idea of a vindication beyond the grave — which is instantly
rejected, and the most miserable despair follows.

[Antistrophic interlacing and then inversion : 4, 2 ; 4^ 2
3,4; 4,3 7,4; 4-, 7-1
Only for himself his flesh hath pain, and for himself his soul
moiirneth. This is one of the strongest passages depicting the
semi-existence of the soul after death has transported it to Sheol
or the Grave. Other passages may be read with this {yob,
chapter iii. 13-19; x. 21, 22; xvii. 13-15) to support the idea of
Sheol as a habitation of more or less conscious existence, with
worms and corruption for companions. The flesh wastes away
and the persons become 'Rephaim' or Shades {Job, chapter
xxvi. 5, 6). Only an occasional burst of faith pictures a deliver-
ance from Sheol {Job, chapter xix. 25-27).

16, 17 Eliphaz

16 Eliphaz exclaims against Job, as resisting alike the united
wisdom of his friends, and the visitation of God.

[Stanza system : quatrains contain the resistance to the
Friends, stanzas of 2, 4 the resistance to God.]

With us are both the grayheaded and the very aged men, much
elder than thy father. It is tempting to understand these words
157

-^ The Book of Job

as relating to some one present, though, of course, they need
not have this meaning. Zophar seems to speak with the tone of
extreme age; and it would be in accordance with this idea that
to him is given the peroration (so to speak) of the Friends'
case, as Eliphaz has its formal opening. But of course this
whole idea rests on very slender foundation.

17 Doctrine of the Friends emphasised : Judgment is descend-
ing on the impious, while all appearances are to the contrary.

[Pendulum figure, with quintett opening and conclusion.
The pendulum sways between the secret or open misery of
the wicked (left) and his proud sin (right).]

He hath covered his face with his fatness, and made collops of
fat on his flanks. The same association of fat and sin is promi-
nent in Psalm Ixxiii.

18 Job

After a transitional passage [alternate parallelism] of con-
tempt for the Friends, Job gives himself to a sustained appeal to
God : swaying [in pendulum figure] between the misery of his
visitation [left] and his appeal to the visiting God rather than
the misinterpreting Friends [right].

1 9 Bildad

After a passing rebuke to Job's contempt [alternate parallel-
ism] Bildad supports the doctrine in a sustained outburst [triplet
recitative and alternate parallelism] : Shall Job be an exception
to universal law ?

158

Notes B^

20 Job

After a transitional passage of personal irritation, Job pro-
ceeds to an address in which two opposite sides of his general
position are intensified. His cause he now declares to be
subverted by God (hitherto he had spoken of the difficulty of
submitting it). In the reaction from the misery so described he
suddenly rises to a certainty of the vindication hereafter (hitherto
brought forward only to be rejected). With the power of this
conception he almost faints; then resumes the misery, which is
interrupted by the speech of Zophar.

[The sustained picture of misery is in alternate parallel-
ism. By interruption, the confidence of vindication beyond
the grave appears in quatrain stanzas, the last lacking one
line, as Job breaks off in a half-fainting condition. He re-
sumes the alternate parallelism; and one of these couplets
is imperfect as Zophar breaks in.]

21 Zophar

The doctrine of the Friends intensified : the short triumph of
the wicked is only to emphasise his fall. This is a providential
law.

[Stanzas introducing a pendulum figure : the criminal
(right) and his retribution (left). A very close parallel is
Proverbs I. iii.]

22, 23 Job

22 Job, after a transitional passage, which expresses the dis-
turbing emotions attending a sudden thought, proceeds to open
159

^ The Book of Job

[in alternate parallelism] his doubt whether the impunity of the
wicked is not a general principle.

23 The thought is continued, in the way of dealing with stock
objections against such alleged impunity. According to the
note above (page 128) I understand these objections to be
actually spoken by the three Friends.

[The form, as in the similar section 13, is augmenting in-
terruption : the objections (four) appear irregularly as in-
terruptions; the answers augment in the proportions 5, 5,
8, II.-]

24, 25 Eliphaz

24 Falling back on the basis of the doctrine, the awful dis-
tance of God from man, Eliphaz then brings the personal bear-
ing of the Friends' doctrine to a climax in direct accusations of
offences on Job's part.

[Stanza system: stanzas of 2, 4 contain the basis ideas;
stanzas of 8, 4 the direct accusations.]

25 Then Eliphaz puts for the last time the hope that lies for
Job in submission. [Transitional quatrain and pendulum figure,
swaying between Job's submissive attitude (right) and his restora-
tion (left).]

26-29 Job

26 This attack has brought back Job to his own case; he falls
back [in antis trophic inversion: .?, 8; 8^ 2~\ upon the thought
of the heavenly Vindicator, who is not to be found in this
world, but will certainly clear him.

160

Notes B^

27 The meditative strain is continued [in quatrain stanzas] :
Job feels his innocence and yet his helplessness against the
Almighty.

28 Then he passes from his personal case to the general
impunity of the wicked; and what before was a doubt, is now
calmly formulated as apparently one of the laws of mysterious
providence.

[After the question has been opened in a recitative coup-
let, the section falls into triplet stanzas with duplication.
But the duplication is irregular in the first of the two sex-
tetts : instead of the parallelism running aabbbb, it runs
abbbaa. I suppose this may be classed as a form of varia-
tion; but there is no similar case in Job7\

Why are times not laid up by the Almighty ? On the word
times ^ see a note in Volume III of this series, pages 143-8. The
use here is close to that in Essay II of Ecclesiastes (page 19) :
" God shall judge the righteous and the wicked : for there is a
time there for every purpose and for every work." In the whole
passage the steps of social evolution are scientifically discrimi-
nated : {a) encroachment, by removing boundaries, on the com-
mon land; (3) the consequent formation of a class sinking into
hardship and poverty; {c) the intensification of this hardship
by close contact with wealth :

And being an-hungered they carry the sheaves ;
They make oil within the walls of these men ;
They tread their wine-presses and suffer thirst.
M 161

^ The Book of Job

(d) Next we have the crowding of population in cities, and
the violence of city crime; (<?) finally, the rise of a distinctly
criminal class, whose whole existence is a warfare against the
light : in this way the morning is to all of them as the shadozo of
death.

29 The stock objections against this view of the impunity of
the wicked as part of God's providence are cited and answered.

[Unlike the previous sections dealing with objections
(j-Zf 23) the form of this passage is antistrophic inversion :
8,2; 2,5.]

30 Bildad

Bildad brings to a climax the basis of the Friends' doctrine :
the infinite distance between God and man [in a single pendu-
lum figure : God's infinite greatness (right), inabiUty of man to
maintain his cause against such power (left)].

The Shades tremble: see note above, page 157 — beneath
the waters and the inhabitants thereof: this is the location of
Sheol as the lowest conceivable region. Compare Amos, chap-
ter ix. 3; Psalm cxxxix. 8. — Destruction hath no covering : below
(section 33) this term is used as a synonym of Sheol. — He
closeth in the face of his throne, and spreadeth his cloud upon it :
the idea is, that the storm is the moving Presence of God, but
the clouds conceal him from our eyes ; compare Psalm xviii. 9.

He bowed the heavens also, and came down ;
And thick darkness was under his feet.
And he rode upon a cherub^ and did fly :
162

Notes ^

Yea, he fleiv siviftly upon the wings of the wind.
He made darkness his hiding place, his pavilion round about

him ;
Darkness of waters, thick clouds of the skies.

He hath described a boundary upon the face of the waters, unto
the confines of light and darkness. This is the mj'stery of the
horizon : which is associated with ocean, because there only is
it visible without interruption. Compare below (46) :

As for darkness, where is the place thereof?

That thou shouldest take it to the bound thereof.

And that thou shotddest discern the paths to the house thereof?

The idea of this last is, being able to carry darkness forward to
the horizon, and back again to the place from which it came.
So Milton's Satan, wandering on the outer surface of the ' World,'
sees the light of the Empyrean streaming through the opening
passage from heaven to earth ;

So wide the op^7ting seemed, where bounds were set
To darkness, such as bound the ocean wave.

His hand hath pierced the swift serpent: see note above,
page 151.

31 Job

As the Friends persist in ignoring his doubts. Job, after a
transitional passage of contempt [alternate parallelism], briefly
returns to the assertion of his own personal case : he will never
be moved from the position that God has subverted his cause
[antistrophic].

163

-^ The Book of Job
32, 33 Zophar

Zophar, on behalf of the three Friends, prepares to bring the
discussion to a conclusion. He first (32) calmly states over
again the doctrine of Judgment on the wicked; and then (33)
makes the fear of God and his judgments the basis of universal
wisdom. This makes the climax or peroration of the Friends'
case.

[Alternate parallelism as Zophar begins to speak (32),
followed by quatrain stanzas for the simple statement of the
Doctrine. The climax (33) is a complete sonnet, consisting
of elaborate strophe, antistrophe, and conclusion. Here is
one of the few examples of variation in this poem (above,
page 139 and Proverds volnme, ipzge 168). The couplets
of the strophe are broken by two successive triplets, and
the same thing occurs in the antistrophe, but not at the
same place.]

Behold, all ye yourselves have seen it ; why then are ye become
altogether vain ? These words are in accordance with the idea
that Zophar is summing up the case for the Friends, as the ma-
terials of the debate are evidently exhausted, and Job is more
immovable than ever. He has said, I will teach you, and then
turns to include his colleagues in his views : Ye yourselves have
seen it; why then, he asks, are ye become altogether vain? that
is, why are your united attestations to go for nothing with Job?
— The difficulty of these words in the Bible arrangement of the
speeches, by which all this falls to Job, is felt by all commenta-
164

Notes en-

ters- The words are further of interest as possibly explaining
how the misplacing of the speeches came about (see above,
pages 126-7).

34-36 Job

The formal conclusion to Job's side of the discussion will be
the Oath of Clearing. In these sections, as if to emphasise the
coming oath by a pause of delay, Job soliloquises in a climax
picture of the misery which was the starting-point of the Curse.
34 is a picture of what Job was; 35 the contrast, what he has
become; while in 36 he sinks into a wail of utter misery.

[34 is a combination of antistrophic interlacing and in-
version: the stanzas succeed one another in the order:
strophe i, strophe 2, strophe 3; antistrophe 2, antistrophe 3,
antistrophe i . The first strophe is of the figure abbbaabbbb ;
strophe 2 has the form 2, 6, and strophe 3 the form 2, 4.^

[35 is antistrophic interruption (described above, page
140). — 36 has a stanza system: quatrains and stanzas of
2,8.-]

THE OATH OF CLEARING

37

Job rises, and in the most formal manner, falling into a tradi-
tional form of oath, disclaims all such sins as he could be sus-
pected of: the form of speech being elastic enough to admit
emotional outbursts of horror at the suggested sin, or longing
for appeal to God.

165

-^ The Book of Job

[The form is a triple pendulum : a swaying between three
tones. One is the enumeration of the supposed sins : If
. . . Another is the denunciation of evil on himself, if he
have committed them : Then . . . The third is a sort of
permitted interruption of the formal oath to express the
swearer's horror of the sin, or appeal to God against the
idea of being guilty. The idea that this is a recognised
formula appears not only from the repetition here in some
ten stanzas, but also from the exact parallelism of form with
a similar oath of disclaiming in Psalm vii.

O LORD my God, if I have done this ;
If there be iniquity in my hands ;

If I have rewarded evil unto him that was at peace
with me;
( Yea, I have delivered him that without cause was
mine adversary /)
Let the enemy pursue my sotil, and overtake it ;
Yea, let him tread my life down to the earth,
And lay my glory in the dust /]

If like Adam I covered vty transgressions . . . so that I kept
silence, and went not out of the door. The general drift is, Job
had never done anything to be ashamed of. To paraphrase :
If like Adam (when he heard the voice of God in the garden
and hid himself) Job had secret transgressions that forced him
to keep in hiding from public contempt — . The sentence is
never finished : there comes the natural interruption of a long-
i66

Notes B^

ing for a distinct indictment: how can he answer charges of
sin not even made?

TAe words of Job are ended! I understand these words to
belong to the poem (not simply to the written MS.). Job
waves a dismissal of the debate, and sinks down on the ash-
mound in dignified silence.

THE INTERPOSITION OF ELIHU

Elihu the son of Barachel the Buzite, of the family of Ram.
The only literary significance of this description is the sugges-
tion of this speaker as representing a kindred people to the
other speakers but not the same : as if in a dialogue of Eng-
lish personages an American were to interpose. It seems natu-
ral— though in a work that is parabolic rather than historic
there can be no certainty — to associate ' the land of Uz ' with
Uz the first-born son of Nahor, Abraham's brother; Buz was
the second son. Their descendants would be kindred tribes of
monotheists, with their ethnological variations; the large in-
fusion of Aramaic elements into the original of Elihu's speeches
bears this out. The names * Elihu,' * Barachel,' keep up the
suggestion of monotheist race (the words mean ' my God is he,'
* may God bless '). — Of the family of Ram : the experts have
not been able to make anything substantial of this; it is enough
to suggest that he is * a man of family.'
167

^ The Book of Job

38-45

The Interposition of Elihu takes the form of a succession of
speeches : there is no speaker beside Elihu, but the multiplication
of his addresses is due to circumstances connected with the
scene and the demeanour of the auditors.

After he has gradually introduced and then expounded his
argument, he then (at the close of 40) appeals to Job, and
pauses for his reply:

If thou hast anything to say, answer me :
Speak, for I desire to justify thee.
If not, hearken thou tmto me.

Job's silence evidently nettles Elihu, and he turns to the Friends :
Hear my words, ye wise men . . . what man is like Job, who
drinketh up scorning like water? The speech so provoked
deals vi^ith presumption; and at the end Elihu again tries to
take the Friends with him in his condemnation of Job :

Men of tinder standing will say -unto me,
Yea, every wise man that heareth me :
Job speaketh without knowledge . . .
For he addeth rebellion unto his sin
He clappeth his hands a?nong us.

But the Friends evidently ignore this appeal. Accordingly the
next speech (42) is directed against them as well as Job :

/ will answer thee.
And thy companions with thee.
168

Notes Q^

At the close of 42 a similar pause may be understood; but as
both parties continue to ignore the youthful speaker, he has in
the next speech (43) to take refuge in increased self-assertion :
/ zai/I fetch my knowledge from afar . . . one that is perfect in
knozvledge is with thee.

But meanwhile another external stimulus has appeared to the
eloquence of Elihu. At the opening of 42, where he had just
suffered the double slight of the Friends' silence following that
of Job, he seems to look up to the sky, and finds there a start-
ing-point :

Look rmto the heavens, and see.

Now from the end of 43 this sky of the land of Uz seems to
show signs of change; and from this point to the close of his
speeches, Elihu's words are inspired wholly by the changing
heavens. These changes are traced below (sections 44, 45).

38 Elihu, with mingled excitement and nervousness, apolo-
gises as a young man for interposing in a debate of his elders;
but his feelings are roused by the sight of Job justifying himself
against God, and the Friends unable to answer him.

[This nervousness gradually stiffening to self-assertion is
admirably expressed by the form of augmenting alternation :
/, // z, I ; 2, 2 ; 2, 2; 4, 4; 4, 4; 6, 6; 6, 6. See
above, page 139.]

169

■^ The Book of Job

39 In this short section Elihu briefly states Job's position,
and briefly opposes to it what is the basis of the Friends' doc-
trine : the distance between God and man.

[A case of antistrophic suspension : see above, page 141.]

40 Here Elihu reaches his real answer to Job, and con-
tribution to the argument. It is that calamity is a warning, just
as truly so as Eliphaz's vision, which was the foundation for the
doctrine of the Friends. He urges this view on Job, and
pauses for his reply.

[The form is antistrophic duplication, set in a suspended
introductory sextett. As to the latter, the couplet —

For God speaketh once,

Yea twice, though man regardeth it not —

is clearly continued in the four lines :

Lo, all these things doth God work,

Twice, yea thrice, with a man ;

To bring back his soul froju the pit.

That he may be enlightened with the light of the living.

Between comes the whole doctrine of Elihu. Similarly, in
section 39, his negation of Job's doctrine was contained in
a sextett, which was suspended to interpose in the middle
of it the statement of Job's position. — The antistrophic
duplication which is the form of Elihu's main argument is
fully explained above ; see page 138. Note also the reitera-
170

Notes B^

tion: J/e keepeth back his soul from the pit, Deliver him
from going down to the pit, in the corresponding parts of
the vision warning and the warning of affliction. The sec-
tion ends in a transitional passage of alternate parallelism,
in which Job is called upon for an answer.]

41 Receiving no reply from Job, Elihu appeals to the Friends
against Job's presumption, and enlarges on the sin of presump-
tion generally. At the close he connects this with his main
argument, the rejection of the warning contained in affliction ;
and gives a first hint of further judgment in store for Job {wotild
that Job were tried unto the end') .

[Stanza system : quatrain stanzas express the greatness
of God ; septetts the special sin of presumption.]

For hath any said unto God^ " / have borne" etc. This is
recognised as an obscure passage, but its sense is assisted by our
remembering that Elihu's main point is the rejection of the
warning implied in affliction. He now says in effect : Has any
man ever submitted to the warning conveyed in calamity, and
shall his recompense be other than restoration? Elihu does not
say "other than restoration," but, "as thou wilt": because he
is trying to put Job's thought. Job must suppose that the recom-
pense will be something else than restoration, or else he would
not refuse to take this course ; but what Job can suppose it to
be Elihu cannot conceive : Thou must choose, not I.

42 Disappointed at the silence of the Friends, Ehhu looks
up to heaven, and there finds a fresh inspiration : the God of

171

-^ The Book of Job

that heaven can have no motive for injustice. He returns to
the theme of men's rejection of the warning of affliction, and
gives a second hint of further judgment in store for Job {because
he hath not visited in his anger).

[Introduction and stanza system : quatrains express the
distance between God and man, stanzas of 2^ 4 the neglect
of the warning conveyed by affliction.]

43 Falling back upon his own thoughts, in the absence of
encouragement from without, Elihu brings to a climax his doc-
trine of warning calamity, and utters a similarly intensified threat
of judgment on Job's impenitence : Thou art full of the judgetiient
of the wicked : as if to say, " Thou art even now ripe for
judgement."

[Introduction and triplet stanzas, with regular duplication.]

44, 45 At this moment the first signs of the approaching
storm attract attention, and Elihu catches the thought that the
judgment with which he has threatened Job is that moment im-
pending. From this point Elihu's speech is entirely occupied
with the increasing storm.

[The crescendo in the storm without is reflected (44) in
augmenting alternation : /, j / 7, j / 2, 6 ; 2, 6 ; 4, 12 ;
4y 12. — The actual climax (45) is in sustained alternation.]

The leading effect in all this part of the poem is the absorp-
tion of the thought with the signs of approaching tempest. It
is not essential that every detail should be connected with some
172

Notes B^

present disturbance : to a certain extent Elihu may generalise
upon what the visible scene presents (e.g. Jle sealeth up the
hand of every man is most naturally understood of winter in
general). Of course, in regard to a large proportion of lines,
the language would be the same whether Elihu were speaking
of the general works of God in nature or of a tempest then
rising. But some of the lines cannot be interpreted in this
general sense ; for example :

At this also my heart trembleth,

And is moved out of its place.

Hearken ye unto the noise of his voice, etc.

And again :

Hearken unto this, O yob :

Stand still, and consider the wondrous works of God.

Again :

We cannot order our speech by reason of darkness.

These being necessarily called forth by present phenomena, the
rest of the description goes with them.

The most important point is to note the order of the natural
phenomena pictured by Elihu, and how this agrees with the
approach of the whirlwind. The transition to this section is
made by the words :

Behold, God doeth loftily in his poiver :
Who is a teacher like unto him ?
^73

-^ The Book of Job

Then we get, in regular succession, drawing up of drops of
water which distil in rain from his vapour, which the skies pour
down — spreadings of clouds — thunderiitgs and lightning —
cattle showing recognition of the stor??i that cometh up. Then
some thunder clap at which EHhu's heart trembleth and is moved
out of its place — thunder under the tuhole heaven, lightning unto
the ends of the earth. — Next snozv and cold otit of the north
mingles with the wind storm out of the chamber of the south,
while beasts go into coverts ; the thick cloud laden with moisture
is thus turned about in terrible whirlwind violence. After the
next hearken we hear of the balancings of the clouds (the black
mass is descending on to the speakers) : they who, a few mo-
ments ago, were chilled with the icy snow and wind now find
their garments too warm, when the earth is struck quiet with
the suffocating south wind. The storm cloud has now plunged
them in its thickest darkness :

Teach us what we shall say unto him ;

For we cannot order our speech by reason of darkness.

Shall it be told him that I would speak ?

If a man speak .^ surely he shall be swallozved up.

From this point we have no longer a whirlwind, but a supernatural
visitation, appropriate to the ushering in of Deity. Every clause
must be studied. And now men cannot look on the light when it
is bright in the skies, tvhen the zuind hath passed, and cleansed
them. The whirlwind has blown the encompassing cloud to
form a dark background in the distance : against which appears
a supernatural brightness too vivid to gaze upon.
174

Notes 6^

Out of the north cometh golden splendour :
God hath upon him terrible majesty.

They recognise this blaze of glory, golden yet too bright to
gaze upon, as the visible glory of God. The north must not be
taken of the north wind cleansing the skies, but of the north
as in prophetic imagination the quarter specially associated
with the Divine abode, or the direction from which the God of
Judgment makes his appearance. This is perfectly clear from
Isaiah, chapter xiv. 13 :

And thou saidst in thine heart, I will ascend into heaven,
I will exalt my throne above the stars of God ; and I will
sit upon the mount of congregation, in the uttermost parts
of the north: I will ascend above the heights of the clouds;
I will be like the Most High.

(Compare Ezekiel, chapter i. 4; Jeremiah vi, i; i. 13-14, etc).
It is a regular feature of the theophanies of Scripture to have
a supernatural brightness as a stage beyond the natural tempest.
Thus in Ezekiel's vision (i. 4) :

Behold, a stormy wind came out of the north, a great cloud,
with a fire flashing continually, and a brightness round
about it, etc.

Again, in the appearance to Elijah the order is, wind rending
the mountains, then earthquake, then fire, and then the Voice.
(Compare verses 11 and 12 of Psalm xviii. In the Ode of
Habakkuk there is the combination of supernatural brightness
and nature convulsion, but the wind and darkness are Avanting.)
175

-^ The Book of Job

THE DIVINE INTERVENTION
46-50

For the general significance of the Divine Intervention see
Introduction, page xxxiii.

46 The first part of the Divine Intervention is made up of
startling interrogatories as to the mysteries of the universe
(broken occasionally by quieter description) : the suggestion
being that the mystery of suffering is not greater than these. —
The idea of thunder crashes must be kept in mind throughout.

[The form is a triple pendulum : see above, page 137.]

47 A brief transitional section in which Job interjects words
of submission [in two couplets : see note on the form of the
Prologue, above, page 145].

48 In a tone less terrible, even human government is pre-
sented as a task too hard for Job. [Recitative and quatrain
stanzas.]

49 As if without break in the violence of the storm, the chief
wonders of land and sea are instanced in elaborate detail,
behemoth and leviathan : the argument of course a continua-
tion of 46.

[The form is sustained alternation, with a passage of trip-
let interruption : the alternate parallelism contains the tour-
de-force of description; the interrupting passages, the feeble-
ness of man before these monsters.]
176

Notes B^

50 Job makes his full submission. Job had been awed by
the thought of God's presence when it was but a thing spoken
of: now he has attained it he feels himself but dust and ashes.
(Compare Introduction, page xxxix.) All this while the Voice
out of the Storm is dying away.

[The form must be described as augmenting interruption :
compare above, notes to section 13 and on the form of the
Prologue (page 145).]

JVAo is this that hideth counsel without knowledge ? ... /
will demand of thee, and declare thou unto me. On the diffi-
culties connected with these sentences see a special note above,
page 130.

STORY EPILOGUE

The significance of the Epilogue has been discussed in the
Introduction, pages xxxiii, xxxix. [The form is plain prose.]
N 177

Index

OR

Reference Table

REFERENCE TABLE

To connect the Numbering in the Present Edition with the Chapters
and Verses of the Bible

Chap.
Story Prologue I

The Curse

I Ill

2

II
The Debate

3 IV

4 VI

5

6 VIII

7 IX

8

9 X

10

II XI

12 XII

13

14 XIII

15 XIV

16 XV

'^erse

Page

I

9

3

IS

11

16

2

19

2

23

14

24

2

28

2

30

25

33

I

34

18

36

2

37

2

39

II

40

I

41

I

44

2

46

Chap.

17 XV

18 XVI

19 XVIII

20 XIX

21 XX

22 XXI

23

24 XXII

25

26 XXIII

27

28 XXIV

29

\ XXV
3° ixXVI

3X I XXVI

^ I XXVII

32 XXVII

33 XXVIII

34 XXIX

35 XXX

36

Verse

/'tf^^

17

48

2

SO

2

S3

2

S5

2

S8

2

60

16

62

2

64

21

66

2

67

II

68

I

69

18

71

2-6

72

S-I4

72

2-4

73

2-6

74

7

74

I

76

2

78

1

81

16

82

181

-^ Reference Table

III

TAe Oath of Clearing

Chap. Verse Page

37 XXXI I 85

IV
Interposition of Elihu

XXXII I 89

38 6 89

39 XXXIII 8 92

40 14 92

41 XXXIV 2 94

42 XXXV 2 98

Chap. Verse Page

43 XXXVI 2 100

44 22 102

45 XXXVII 14 105

Divine Intervention

46 XXXVIII 2 107

47 XL 4 113

48 7 113

49 IS "4

50 XLII 2 118

Story Epilogue XLII 7 121

182

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