Summary of 1-5:
In a great assembly of spiritual beings, God points to Job as an example of righteousness in man. Satan claims that Job is righteous only because God provides for him. God allows him to take away all of Job's blessings. Job loses his wealth, his family, and his health. His three friends, Eliphaz, Bildad, and Zophar come to sympathize with him. Job's despair is so deep that he prefers death over life. Eliphaz speaks to him first saying that God punishes foolishness but will forgive those who turn to him.
Questions:
1. What is Satan's role?
2. What is noble and what is disappointing about Job's response to his suffering in chapter 3?
3. Why does Eliphaz think Job is suffering?
4. If you were Job, what would God take away from you? In other words, what do you hold dear or what are your measures of success, security, and comfort?
Cool Things:
Job has the same haircut that most of us have had at one time or another.
Before anyone speaks, Job's friends sit with him silently for SEVEN days, and then he gets to speak first. That's a good pattern to follow when someone is grieving. Presence is all that counts.
Eliphaz sees and describes a ghost. He even describes his hair standing on end.
4 comments:
Satan's role in this story seems as if he is just roaming the earth looking for some way to attack God and his people. He is Satan. In application today, he is roaming out there for us.
Something noble about Job's response is that he did not curse God in any part of it. I find it a bit disappointing that he takes all the blame on himself for the things that have happened. Maybe its not blame but he states that he wished he had never been born. God gave him this life and he should be thankful and there isn't a doubt that he wasn't thankful, but at that moment he fell short. I think we also need to look at his environment. He was a Jew that made sacrifices for his children because they had these wild parties. He felt that he was responsible for them and maybe that is why he took it hard. Not to mention he just lost his sons and was infected with disease.
Eliphaz thinks that Job has possibly done something wrong maybe. I'm not really sure and would like to hear your thoughts.
Right now I have no measure of success. I am just trying to make money so I can live. But he would probably take my passion for art and graphic design.
Your cool things comments are really cool. I hope I find some like those in my section of the readings.
Sorry this took until Thursday to write.
Love all of you.
Ian did a fine job of opening up these questions but I'll add my two cents to get things going again here in July.
Ian is right that Satan roams the earth but I don't see him as attacking here. The word "Satan" means "accuser" in Hebrew. He is merely bringing a problem to God's attention. He seems to have that function in God's spiritual kingdom in this story and not necessarily be evil, oddly enough.
Job does seem to curse God sometimes. I don't understand that.
Eliphaz seems pretty certain that Job sinned and that's the only way he can understand Job's suffering. It really bothers Job to hear that. And I wonder if we make that assumption too often ourselves.
For me, if God pinned me down in one place with no hope of moving on and no love of that place, I would be crushed. That is the measure of success for me: to be free and unencumbered and in love with where I am.
Love all of you.
Satan's role is very strange in this story. As Christians, we always view Satan as an evil being bent on ruining God's plan, yet here, he seems to be part of God's team. He assembles before God with the angels as if he were one of them, and gets a turn to speak like all of them. Instead of cursing God or trying to start a war, he tells God what he's been up to and gives him suggestions. It weirds me out. It gives another dimension to what Satan might really be.
It seems like Eliphaz believes that God's justice is immediate. There's some technical term for this, but I can't remember what it is — that good people are immediately blessed and bad people are immediately cursed. That way, the incentive for being good is that you will be physically blessed and the incentive for not being bad is that you would be physically punished. Eliphaz sees the world this way and so the only reason that Job could have had this misfortune is that he did something wrong to deserve it.
For me, it would be causing me to fail this last college course I'm taking. Being stuck in school, taking more classes, unable to move to somewhere exciting — that would crush my spirit.
I find the conversations that Satan has with God to be very strange. He asks Satan where he's been, like he doesn't already know, or know what he is up to. I think it would be strange to have a conversation with God, especially if he was asking me questions, since he knows everything.
I also find it odd the reaction Eliphaz has to Job's outburst in chapter 3. He stayed with him for seven days and nights, and then accuses him rather than consoling or encouraging him. He's very devoted, but I would not appreciate if one of my friends accused me while I was in such deep despair.
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