Throughout the book that bears his name, Job pleads with God to show himself. He groans and pleads with God to appear, that he would contend with Job and explain the deeper reasons for his awful affliction and suffering. At one point, in chapter 23, Job cries out in his pain and anguish:
“Today also my complaint is bitter;
my hand is heavy on account of my groaning.
Oh, that I knew where I might find him,
that I might come even to his seat!
I would lay my case before him
and fill my mouth with arguments.
I would know what he would answer me…” (23.2-5)
Job gradually looks from his own suffering and begins to cast his gaze over the suffering and difficulty of his neighbours. Injustice is everywhere; the poor are abused and exploited while the criminal and the wicked prosper. Job sees the unjust and the evil people who
”…drive away the donkey of the fatherless;
they take the widow’s ox for a pledge.
They thrust the poor off the road;
the poor of the earth all hide themselves.
Behold, like wild donkeys in the desert
the poor go out to their toil, seeking game;
the wasteland yields food for their children.
They gather their fodder in the field,
and they glean the vineyard of the wicked man.
They lie all night naked, without clothing,
and have no covering in the cold.
They are wet with the rain of the mountains
and cling to the rock for lack of shelter.
(There are those who snatch the fatherless child from the breast,
and they take a pledge against the poor.)
They go about naked, without clothing;
hungry, they carry the sheaves;
among the olive rows of the wicked they make oil;
they tread the winepresses, but suffer thirst.
From out of the city the dying groan,
and the soul of the wounded cries for help;
yet God charges no one with wrong. (24.3-12)
“…yet God charges no one with wrong.” The poor are afflicted and the righteous suffer whilst the wicked and the unjust prosper. Poverty, misery, despair, death and injustice are everywhere. But where is God? Why does he not intervene? Why will he not act? Job’s anguish and misery deepens until it becomes focussed in a lengthy discourse that culminates in a direct provocation of God:
“God has cast me into the mire,
and I have become like dust and ashes.
I cry to you for help and you do not answer me;
I stand, and you only look at me.
You have turned cruel to me;
with the might of your hand your persecute me.
You lift me up on the wind; you make me ride on it,
and you toss me about in the roar of the storm.
For I know that you will bring me to death
and to the house appointed for all
living.” (30.19-23)
Job’s former resolve to honour God with his lips despite his grave suffering has collapsed. Misery has engulfed him. For the first time, he doubts the gracious character of God and shouts in his face. God is no longer his advocate. Instead, he has become his persecutor, the one who tosses him in the storm; the one who will bring him to death with no word of comfort. God will not help him. God stands and merely looks on as Job writhes in agony and goes to the grave in despair.
And so it seems that God will bring Job no resolution. The knot of anger and outrage in the pit of Job’s stomach will not be assuaged by a clear answer from God. The litany of anguished questions that perplex Job are ours too. Will God show up and speak for himself? Will he give an account of himself? Will he meet Job’s piercing questions head-on or will he remain hidden, inscrutable, distant?
God does show up. And he speaks. Indeed, he answers Job - but not in the way we expect. We are completely unprepared for the denoument that unfurls as God finally speaks out of the whirlwind:
Then the LORD answered Job out of the whirlwind and said:
"Who is this that darkens counsel by
words without knowledge?
Dress for action like a man;
I will question you,
and you make it known to me.
"Where were you when I laid the foundation of the earth?
Tell me, if you have understanding.
Who determined its measurements—surely you know!
Or who stretched the line upon it?
On what were its bases sunk,
or who laid its cornerstone,
when the morning stars sang together
and all the sons of God shouted for joy…?” (38.1-7)
Out of the whirlwind God speaks. He hurls a catalogue of questions that scupper the human intellect and bow the human spirit low in bafflement and awe:
"Can you bind the chains of the Pleiades
or loose the cords of Orion?
Can you lead forth the Mazzaroth in their season,
or can you guide the Bear with its children?
Do you know the ordinances of the heavens?
Can you establish their rule on the earth…?” (38.31-33)
The book of Job climaxes in this shocking and exhilarating revelation of God; unbounded in his freedom and supreme in his wisdom he questions Job. No longer is God in the dock; suddenly Job is challenged to come forward and answer the searching questions God puts before him. Job’s questions, formerly so pointed and urgent, now evaporate into thin air as the presence of God engulfes him. God reveals the unsearchable depths of his glory; he speaks and Job listens.
“Then Job answered the LORD and said:
"I know that you can do all things,
and that no purpose of yours can be thwarted.
'Who is this that hides counsel without knowledge?'
Therefore I have uttered what I did not understand,
things too wonderful for me, which I did not know.'
'Hear, and I will speak;
I will question you, and you make it known to me.'
I had heard of you by the hearing of the ear,
but now my eye sees you;
therefore I despise myself,
and repent in dust and ashes." (42.1-6)
“I had heard of you by the hearing of the ear, but now my eye sees you.” The philosopher Paul Ricoeur mused on these passages in an article entitled The Religious Significance of Atheism. To his mind, when God finally speaks he reveals the very fullness of his Being; something so incommensurable and immense that no words are adequate to capture it or render it comprehensible. In other words, the manifest presence of God is signified in words and questions designed to short-circuit human understanding. The Being of God is disclosed in words that can summon only one response; a posture of listening and awe.
Job cannot answer the questions God puts to him. And neither can we. The barrage of words are intended to signify the mystery and the majesty of the Being of God; his words convey his overwhelming presence. Job is engulfed in an explosion of pure Being; he is surrounded by the presence of God who fills and contains all things. (According to Ricoeur, it is this Being whom the Pre-Socratics discerned as the “logos” that sustained the known universe and all reality. They had a dim intuition of the One Job encounters directly in the pages of the Old Testament.) Job does not recieve from God that for which he pleaded; instead of offering a clear answer to his questions, God comes close and reveals himself in an immediate encounter.
Like Job, in the midst of suffering, although we cry out to God for the reasons why we suffer, we will never receive them clearly stated in so many neat words we easily comprehend. “The problem we have is Job’s problem writ large: and Job’s protests are our protests. We need the solution he was offered: a sense of the presence of God.” (Frances Young, Can These Bones Live, pp. 80) Ultimately, of course, it is not a ready question that our heart seeks but the comfort of the close presence of the God who is there.
The plaintive cry of Job in the Old Testament anticipates another, far deeper and more disturbing cry. Job’s muttered, tearful questions are mere echoes of a far deeper and far more disturbing question. At the heart of the New Testament, as Jesus hangs on the cross in the darkness, he utters the terrifying words: "My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?" (Mark 15.34, Matthew 27.46)
Jesus is utterly God-forsaken as he hangs from the crucifix on Golgotha. Is it possible to make some sense of this awful cry of Jesus, the anguished questions of Job and the God who is there? How does it all hang together?
With the help of Leon Morris, we’ll investigate these questions in the next post.
Until then –
The Scribbling Apprentice.
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