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SPIRITUAL TRANSFORMATION THROUGH PERSONAL SUFFERING:

A FORMATIVE DIALOGUE WITH THE BOOK OF JOB

Marie Turcotte

I had heard of you by word of mouth,

but now my eye has seen you.

Therefore I disown what I have said,

and repent in dust and ashes.

        ~ Job 42:5-6 (NAB)

 

As a college student in a large university setting towards the end of the Vietnam War, I debated and argued and philosophized about the meaning of life and used Job to explore the concepts of justice, evil, piety, wisdom and faith vs. reason. I came up with more questions than answers, among which was, “Why do innocent people suffer?” It seemed an appropriate and relevant question at the time, given the devastation that was taking place in Southeast Asia.

     The question of suffering was to take on even greater relevance in the next few years as I continued my nursing education and found myself at the bedside caring for men and women who were suffering. I am not referring here to expected and short-term discomfort or pain that accompanies diagnostic procedures and specific therapeutic interventions, but to that deeper, unnameable pain which stems from such experiences as fighting an endless and losing battle with chronic illness or confronting the devastation of traumatic injury which forever changes the course of one’s life. This is not pain of a purely physical nature, but has psychic and spiritual dimensions as well. How often I saw the question formed in the eyes of those for whom I cared: “Why did this happen to me?” “What have I done to deserve this?” I had no answer. Many years later I was to ask these same questions of myself: at the height of a successful professional career I was afflicted with a chronic pain condition and subsequently lost my job and a way of life I had spent a lifetime building. My relationships changed as did my social life, my family life, and ultimately, my spiritual life. I suffered.

Job: First Impressions

     My image of Job was a rather traditional one; Job was a man who patiently endured his fate. He lost all that he had, yet remained faithful to God. Job persevered in the face of adversity; he was to be admired for his strength and courage and loyalty to God. That was my impression. It was an impression that I wanted to reject, refute, and abandon as I was thrown into the darkness of my own experience with pain and loss and suffering.

     I now realize that this impression of Job was naive (I knew only of the submissive Job, not the defiant one!); it captured only the obvious on the surface, and did not delve deeply into the character of Job. I had missed the point, focusing on the suffering in and of itself, willing myself to accept my circumstances as Job does in the prologue to the book. I did not see the deeper message, that of spiritual transformation which comes from having lived through the “dark night,” a transformation which changes the entire nature and character of one’s relationship with God.

Deeper Interpretation

     Although there is general agreement among scholars that the Book of Job was written in the post-exilic era, there is some controversy as to the exact date.[1] The general inclination is to date the text in the context of the Babylonian exile.[2] However, there are Sumerian versions of the legend dating from 2000 B.C.E.[3] The discrepancy in dating may be due to the impression that Job was authored by more than one person and that portions of the work are later editions, for example, the Elihu speeches and the poem on Wisdom in Chapter 28, since they seem to interrupt the natural flow of the book.[4]

     The Book of Job is the most difficult work in the Old Testament to translate.[5] Some scholars believe that the original text was lost and that the Hebrew text is a translation.[6] The text itself is “very corrupt, many passages being practically unintelligible.”[7] The book uses rare words, some of which occur only once in the Bible.[8] Also, the composition of the book is unique. The prologue and epilogue are written in narrative prose, while the middle is comprised of a poetic dialogue.[9] Other scholars postulate that early versions of the book were redacted to remove the seeming irreverence of Job as he challenges God.[10] All of these points pose quite a challenge as one endeavors to interpret the true meaning of the text.

     Both the cultural and the religious contexts of the book must be considered when interpreting the text. Job lives in a tribal culture; he is a patriarch and a Gentile. The concept of life after death did not exist at this time; therefore, the significance of family and living on through one’s descendants is to be noted. Also, the tribal culture is an oral one. The spoken word is the medium for communication and education. The rhetoric in the dialogue between Job and his friends should be analyzed from the viewpoint that how something is said is perhaps more important than that something is said.[11]

     Shame is predominant in this tribal, oral culture. “In such a context honor and shame are pivotal values, if not the pivotal values.”[12] Job’s honor and good name come into question when he seems to be in the wrong as judged by his friends. Job speaks from the context of wisdom theology, a theology which “depends on and speaks from experience.”[13] Job’s experience (suffering in the face of righteous living) seriously calls this doctrine into question. In presenting his argument to God, Job draws heavily on legal imagery.[14] Legal language is found throughout the book. Finally, the language of lamentation is found in addition to wisdom themes and legal expressions.[15] “Lamentation is the spontaneous response to the presence of the realm of death, in whatever manifestation of brokenness, in our lives.”[16]

     In summary, “Job suffers the loss of his family and possessions; he seems to be unrighteous, a conclusion his friends quickly draw. In his shame he pours out his lament to God and calls on God for a hearing that will acknowledge his innocence for all to see.[17]

From Prose to Poetry: Dialogues and Monologues

     In the prologue we are introduced to Job, a man blessed with land, wealth and posterity. He has integrity, fears God, and avoids evil. In the heavenly court, the Lord is challenged by Satan, “the adversary,” to put Job to the test.[18] The question he raises is one of the most important in the Bible: “Do humans serve God for themselves and their own profit or is disinterested piety possible?” “Can God create one who worships freely?”[19] The Lord agrees to the test.

     Destruction befalls Job; he loses his livestock, his slaves, and ultimately his children. His initial response is to bless God: “The Lord gave and the Lord has taken away; blessed be the name of the Lord!”[20] Job does not bring shame to God. The Lord is vindicated. But, the adversary presses further, saying that if Job suffers physically, he will curse God. Job is covered with boils from head to toe, scratches himself with a pottery shard, and sits down in the dust. Even his wife challenges him by saying “Are you still holding to your innocence? Curse God and die.”[21] Three of Job’s friends hear of his calamities and leave their respective countries to mourn with Job and comfort him. They remain with him in silence for seven days and nights “for they saw how great was his suffering.”[22]

     The book’s format now changes from prose to poetry. Job delivers a monologue during which he laments his condition. He curses the day he was born and longs for death. He prays for deliverance. What follows is a succession of dialogues in three cycles; the friends speak and Job responds. The friends believe that God is wise and just and would not allow a good and upright man to suffer (especially not to win a bet!). Mitchell sums up the opposing viewpoints: The friends believe that “Suffering comes from God. God is just. Therefore, Job is guilty.” Job maintains that “Suffering comes from God. I am innocent, therefore God is unjust.” A third possibility is not even considered: “Suffering comes from God. God is just. Job is innocent.”[23] Job’s friends become his accusers. They staunchly defend and uphold the doctrine of divine retribution: “Reflect now, what innocent person perishes? Since when are the upright destroyed?”[24] God does not forsake the upright.[25]  They imply that Job deserves all that he has received. They blame him and hold him guilty. Job is advised to mend his ways, say his prayers and shape up.[26]

     Throughout the dialogues Job maintains his innocence. He is adamant that right and justice are still on his side.[27] He passionately refuses to submit to the accusations, and is willing to risk his life arguing his case before God.[28]  He affirms that he has not committed deeds of social injustice and that his prayer is sincere.[29]  As the speeches intensify, Job actually says that God had dealt with him unfairly.[30]  He has been forsaken. He and God are no longer friends, but enemies.[31]

     Job remains true to himself and does not concede to his friends’ position. He will not serve God with lies and falsehood. He simply but emphatically maintains that his position is correct and that of his friends false.[32] He seeks to be vindicated! He is clearly just and demands to be recognized as such, and he challenges God to answer him![33]

     The Lord comes out of the whirlwind to address Job. He does not answer Job’s questions and his response doesn’t indicate that he has even heard Job. God tells Job that he is the one to be questioned rather than to question, and proceeds to fire a series of counter-questions which succeed in overwhelming Job “with the realization that he is a creature whose finite standards are completely ineffective for judging the Creator.”[34] God’s rebuke to Job serves “as an overwhelming reminder that the first religious obligation of the creature is to acknowledge and glorify the Creator.”[35]  How could Job presume that he could advise God on how to run the world? Job’s initial response is one of awe. He puts his hand over his mouth. He still doesn’t confess any sinfulness, but is “caught up into the mystery of God and the universe.”[36]

     Using mythological symbols, Yahweh gives a second speech. Mitchell sums up the questions asked by God of Job which address the subject of good and evil: “Do you really want this moral sense of yours projected onto the universe?...Do you want a God who is only a larger version of a righteous judge, rewarding those who don’t realize that virtue is its own reward and throwing the wicked into a physical hell? If that’s the kind of justice you’re looking for, you’ll have to create it yourself. Because that is not my justice.”[37]

     Job admits his lack of understanding of God’s power and purpose. And now, comes his final response:

I had heard of you by word of mouth,

but now my eye has seen you.

Therefore I disown what I have said,

and repent in dust and ashes.[38]

 

     My initial interpretation of verse 5 is that Job’s encounter and dialogue with the Lord leads him to a new understanding of who God is. His experience of God changes from just hearing about God to seeing him. There is a great difference between knowledge and experience, and this, it seems, is what Job speaks to here.

     In verse 6, Job’s words seem to indicate that he recants what he has previously said. Does this mean that he is admitting to having sinned after all and, therefore, is deserving of punishment? Or is he apologizing for having challenged God so vigorously, so arrogantly, and now withdraws in humility, admitting his creatureliness? It doesn’t seem plausible that he admits his guilt after having so staunchly defended himself to his friends and before God, and at such great risk. He could be apologizing, but I think there’s more significance attached to “disowning” what he has said, although I’m not sure what that is exactly. Repenting in dust and ashes seems like a self-punishment for having sinned. Does Job feel beaten into submission? Is he really abdicating his position?

     Another translation of verse 6 gives a different slant: “Therefore I will be quiet, comforted that I am dust.”[39] In this translation it seems to me that Job doesn’t renounce what he has previously said; he simply resolves to be quiet. Perhaps having been awed by seeing God has brought on this silence. Also, there is no mention of repentance. Job admits and accepts his humanity when he acknowledges that he is dust.

     I have acquired several new interpretations of these verses as a result of exploring the text in more depth. In his summation Job makes a final plea: “If only God would hear me.”[40]  He searches for the intimacy he once had with the Lord. Is this possible by means of “hearing”? He wants God to answer him. His concept of a response from God remains narrow. But, something else happens. According to Mitchell, “...far more than vindication will occur: a plea will be granted that Job wouldn’t have dared to make, a question answered that he wouldn’t have known how to ask. God will not hear Job, but Job will see God.”[41]

     Earlier in the dialogue Job and his friends agree that there are limits to human understanding. Those limits are faced here. “In order to approach God, Job has to let go of all ideas about God: he must put a cloud of unknowing between himself and God, or have the Voice do this for him.”[42] God answers Job in a way he doesn’t expect; not with words, but by revealing himself to Job. Job doesn’t hear but sees the Voice from the whirlwind. God presents Job with images that are so intense that he is “taken up into a state of vision.”[43] Job comes to understand that “paradise isn’t situated in the past or future, and doesn’t require a world tamed or edited by the moral sense.”[44]

     Job admits that God’s power and purpose are beyond his human limits of understanding. He is in awe of the wondrous works.[45] “Previously Job had learned of God from the words of tradition, but now, caught up in his experience of Yahweh, he has a more direct kind of knowledge.”[46] In the past, Job had served God based on his faith, but now Job meets God face-to-face, and this is a far different experience. “The words of Yahweh may have been very different from what Job expected, but that is unimportant. The dark night is over; God had deigned to let himself be found by Job.”[47] “When Job says, ‘I had heard of you with my ears; but now my eyes have seen you,’ he is no longer a servant, who fears God and avoids evil. He has faced evil, has looked straight into its face and through it, into a vast wonder and love.”[48]

     Job “disowns” what he has said and “repents.” It is not likely that Job is admitting to having sinned. He made a valid point earlier when he stated that God will not be served by lies and falsehood. [49] He knows that he is innocent, and perhaps more important, God knows! Job does not realize that the reason for his affliction is to test his devotion and faith; he fights to uphold the truth. Why would he recant now and lie? “Job can not be saying that he is sorry for his sins; the whole tenor of the book is against such a view.”[50] The word repent can be interpreted in ways other than to confess sinfulness or to have guilty remorse; the Hebrew word can be translated to mean “to change one’s mind” or “to be sorry.”[51]

     Doesn’t it seem probable that Job would have “changed his mind” after seeing God? His narrow view was shattered and he experienced God in a dramatic new way. It doesn’t seem likely that Job is repenting for having challenged God either. As bold and outrageous as Job was, God conceded that he had “spoken rightly.”[52] Not only did he speak the truth and maintain the integrity of his experience, but “Job has spoken right things as well. Not bought off by cheap ‘God talk’ and holding to his own integrity, Job was able to see and affirm the presence of a mystery.”[53] He pushes through the traditional view of God and gains a new and deeper insight as to who God is. “It was speaking rightly of himself that enabled Job to speak rightly of God. Both of these are profound and courageous acts of faith that lie beyond the reach of the friends and their followers through the ages.”[54]

     Another translation for “in dust and ashes” is “being but dust and ashes.”[55] This corresponds to Mitchell’s’ translation of “comforted that I am dust”[56] and can refer to Job’s “new realization of creaturely limitation.”[57] Job’s surrender is not submission. Surrender “means the wholehearted giving-up of oneself. It is both the ultimate generosity and the ultimate poverty, because in it the giver becomes the gift.”[58] Job acknowledges his mortality and he is comforted. “He feels he has woken up from a dream. That sense, of actually seeing the beloved reality he has only heard of before, is what makes his emotion at the end so convincing. He has let go of everything, and surrendered into the light.”[59]

Challenges Job Poses

     The story of Job and his struggles poses significant challenges to me personally, and for ministry. Job dares to question traditional orthodoxy. He courageously refuses to bow to the established view of religion represented by his friends, that suffering and punishment are proof of sin, as deemed appropriate by a just God. The theory of divine retribution was well established in Israelite history, having its foundation in the conditional covenant between God and the people: if you obey my laws, you will be rewarded; if you don’t, you will be punished! It is understandable that Job’s friends conclude that he is guilty of sin, and is being punished according to what he deserves as a result of his actions. As Safire puts it, “challenging religion on moral grounds was shocking to established authority because it dared assert that tradition may not be rightly expressing God’s design...”[60]

     Job’s friends cannot understand his outrage, his pain and anguish, his defiance, because they will not “risk giving up their moral certainties. Their rigid orthodoxy surrounds an interior of mush, like the exoskeleton of an insect. Unconsciously they know that they have no experience of God. Hence their acute discomfort and rage.”[61] What they don’t realize is that not to challenge is to forfeit a relationship with the Divine on deeper ground. Are Job’s friends really defending God (as if he needs defending!) or are they actually defending their own narrow and closely guarded view of God?

     Job proves that it’s not only all right to speak one’s truth, but that it’s absolutely essential in order to maintain one’s integrity, even if this means speaking from a position of pain or outrage or seeming defiance. To falsify our experience is to falsify God. To remain true to the integrity of our experience is to discover a renewed, living relationship with God.[62] I think the lesson for me as I engage in ministry is to remain open. The orthodox view may be well established, but not above testing. It is in the testing that I can move beyond “hearing” about God (tradition) to “seeing” God (experience). This attitude of openness should be afforded to others as well. Taking the risk to be challenged by others who have a different view is as important as having the strength and courage to challenge another’s position. Being closed- minded, narrow and judgmental cannot serve the deeper truth.

Meaning of Job’s Suffering Today

     The book of Job was written within the context of a tribal, oral culture which is predominantly a shame culture.[63] A person’s honor and reputation carried weight. Are there still traces of this culture even now in our western world which otherwise places such value on “being honest” and “doing your own thing”?[64]  I think there are. In my professional role as a nurse I have seen individuals try to rationalize their misfortune and suffering, to explain away why they were in a particular circumstance in order that they not be viewed in the wrong light. How often are people stripped of their integrity when they are vulnerable? This can happen not only in a clinical setting but in the context of Church culture as well. How often have I been reluctant to extend myself to another because he/she didn’t “fit” the norm in my parish? Am I guilty of judging another’s character and reputation based on incidental happenings and in the process failing to see the real person? These are tough but essential questions to ponder when I reflect on whether or not I am ministering in a manner that builds up the Kingdom of God.

     What does Job say to me as a member of the various institutions in my life, whether these be family, or government, or health care system or Church? The Book of Job is the story of a man who tries to change the world (or perhaps the world-view). He fights for justice at all costs and against incredible odds. Institutions are portrayed as being more powerful than individuals. Is it right to challenge and confront authority? What if this authority is veiled in the image of parent or boss or political or religious leader? Or is authority to be accepted, as is, without question?

     I think Job would say that the challenge can only serve to strengthen and legitimize the powers vested within the particular institution. When I challenge the “status quo” I help the institution to stay “real.” An institution is comprised of its members; if they fail to maintain their integrity in order to “go with the flow,” to be subservient in the face of a perceived greater power, isn’t the institution weakened in the long run?” At what cost is the “status quo” to be maintained?

     It seems to me that the Church needs people who are willing to risk and challenge and test. The life blood of the Church is in its people, all the people. Without them there is no Church. But perhaps more to the point, even with them the Church is in jeopardy if they are satisfied with being passive and complacent. When done in the spirit of justice and integrity, questioning institutional authority can lead to new growth, and new growth promotes and supports new life. Kierkegaard has this to say of Job: “In the whole Old Testament there is no other figure one approaches with so much human confidence and boldness and trust as Job, simply because he is so human in every way.”[65] Job is real.

     When I reflect on my personal experience with pain and suffering as a result of having lived through a significant health crisis, I have a lot in common with Job. I can say the same of people I have cared for in my role as a nurse as well as the sick and the elderly I have visited as a member of our parish Visiting Ministry Program. One of the most significant themes in the Book of Job is the mystery of suffering and relationship with God.[66]

     Suffering, to paraphrase Adrian van Kaam, is not a problem to be solved (hence there is no answer to the “why” question) but a mystery to be lived, “and lived most fully in relationship with others. For Job, the greatest pain comes from the confusion about his relationship with God.”[67] Job perceives a shift in his relationship with God from friend to enemy. He feels abandoned. He wishes for death simply because he feels estranged from a meaningful relationship with God.[68] God is hidden, and Job begs to be heard. His cries are heard, although he doesn’t realize it at the time. What is critical is not so much what God says in response (answering Job’s question) but that he responds. “The mere fact of Yahweh’s response shows that Yahweh has been present and listening all the time and reaffirms the relationship.”[69] The answering and not the answer is what finally silenced Job, and possibly satisfied him.

     God’s who-are-you-to-ask tone puts us off, and his seemingly off-the-point content causes us a worried wonderment, but it was what the badgered God did, more that what he said or how he said it, that responded to Job’s need. What God did was to show up.”[70]  Job’s hope is restored because he realizes that he is not alone, and never has been! The book speaks to the “mystery of faith, of our relationship with God, which is, indeed, its own reward.”[71] Or, to put it another way, “the basic issue is a relationship with God which is initiated by a decision of faith in response to divine grace.”[72]

     Job is profoundly changed in the course of his encounter with God, from an unreal caricature of piety and virtue in the prologue to a real human being who rages at the experience of human anguish. I can relate to Job who thinks he is alone in his suffering, and perhaps the implication in ministry is to let people “have their say”. People need to lament their loss and pain and suffering, because it is only in doing so that they can move beyond the brokenness to experience healing. I can facilitate that process simply by being present and by listening. I think people realize that there really aren’t any cogent answers to the deepest existential questions, but they must be given the opportunity to express what is in their deepest heart, to let out their feelings, even if that means venting anger and even rage. God speaks only after Job is spent from talking, from defending his point of view, and in his response we realize that “God is and has been on Job’s side all along.”[73]

     The innocent suffer; this is a fact that cannot be refuted. But they do not suffer alone. Confidence that God is present in affliction is like balm to the person who is in darkness and hurting. In the context of the relationship with the Divine, suffering takes on new meaning, and can move the person from despair to a renewed confidence that God sustains and protects and accompanies, especially through the dark night. In the end, the “false relationship based on a conception of God received from tradition” (I had heard of you by word of mouth), “is converted into a relationship of personal trust and surrender” (but now my eye has seen you).[74] It is in trust and surrender that I authenticate my relationship with God, and it is only out of that context that I can truly minister to those who struggle with the pain of being human, whether this be in the world of the spiritual or of the secular, in the parish or in the marketplace. I trust that I can respond to the call to serve as a personal witness of God’s love, compassion and mercy in my everyday encounters with others.

Marie Turcotte, R. N., M.S. (Boston University), has held various positions in the nursing profession, including clinical practice, nursing education and nursing management.  Her spiritual studies include associations with the Diocese of Portland and St. Joseph's College, Resources in Spiritual Formation in Danvers, MA, and the Loyola University of New Orleans' Institute for Ministry Extension Program.


 

[1] R.A.F. MacKenzie and Roland E. Murphy, “Job”, in The New Jerome Biblical Commentary, Raymond E. Brown, Joseph A. Fitzmyer, and Roland E. Murphy, Eds. (Englewood Cliffs, New Jersey: Prentice Hall, 1990), p. 467.

[2] Michael D. Guinan, “Job”, in The Collegeville Bible Commentary, Dianne Bergant, Ed. (Collegeville, Minnesota: The Liturgical Press, 1992), p. 675.

[3] Stephen Mitchell, The Book of Job (New York: Harper Collins Publishers, Inc., 1987), p. xxxi.

[4] R. A. F. MacKenzie and Roland E. Murphy, “Job”, p. 467.

[5] Ibid., p. 466.

[6] Stephen Mitchell, The Book of Job, xxxi.

[7] Michael D. Guinan, “Job”, p. 675.

[8] Ibid.

[9] Ibid., p. 676.

[10] William Safire, The First Dissident: The Book of Job in Today’s Politics (New York: Random House, 1992), p. xxi.

[11] Michael D. Guinan, “Job”, p. 676.

[12] Ibid.

[13] Ibid.

[14] Ibid., p. 677.

[15] Ibid.

[16] Ibid.

[17] Ibid.

[18] Ibid., p. 678.

[19] R.A.F. MacKenzie and Roland E. Murphy, “Job”, p. 467.

[20] Job 1:21b (NAB).

[21] Job 2:9, Ibid.

[22] Job 2:13, Ibid.

[23] Stephen Mitchell, The Book of Job, p. xiii.

[24] Job 4:7 (NAB).

[25] Job 8:20, Ibid.

[26] Job 11:13-14, Ibid.

[27] Job 6:29, Ibid.

[28] Job 13:14-16, Ibid.

[29] Job 16:17, Ibid.

[30] Job 19:6, Ibid.

[31] Job 13:24 and 19:11b, Ibid.

[32] Job 27:4 and 13:7-9, Ibid.

[33] Job 31:37, Ibid.

[34] Bernard W. Anderson, Understanding the Old Testament, Fourth ed. (Englewood Cliffs, New Jersey: Prentice Hall, 1986), p. 599.

[35] Ibid., p. 600.

[36] Michael D. Guinan, “Job”, p. 696.

[37] Stephen Mitchell, The Book of Job, p. xiii.

[38] Job 42:5-6 (NAB).

[39] Stephen Mitchell, The Book of Job, p. 88.

[40] Job 31:35 (NAB).

[41] Stephen Mitchell, The Book of Job, p. xxvii-xxviii.

[42] Ibid., p. xix.

[43] Ibid., p. xx.

[44] Ibid., p. xxi.

[45] Job 42:3 and 37:14 (NAB).

[46] Michael D. Guinan, “Job”, p. 697.

[47] R. A. F. MacKenzie and Roland E. Murphy, “Job”, p. 488.

[48] Stephen Mitchell, The Book of Job, p. xxvii.

[49] Job 13:7-9 and 27:4 (NAB).

[50] R. A. F. MacKenzie and Roland E. Murphy, “Job”, p. 488.

[51] Michael D. Guinan, “Job”, p. 697.

[52] Job 42:8 (NAB), and R. A. F. MacKenzie and Roland E. Murphy, “Job”, p. 488.

[53] Michael D. Guinan, “Job”, p. 699.

[54] Ibid.

[55] R. A. F. MacKenzie and Roland E. Murphy, “Job”, p. 488.

[56] Stephen Mitchell, The Book of Job, p. 88.

[57] Michael D. Guinan, “Job”, p. 697.

[58] Stephen Mitchell, The Book of Job, p. xxvii.

[59] Ibid., p. xxviii.

[60] William Safire, The First Dissident: The Book of Job in Today’s Politics, p. xiv.

[61] Stephen Mitchell, The Book of Job, p. xiii.

[62] Michael D. Guinan, “Job”, p. 700.

[63] Ibid., p. 676.

[64] Ibid.

[65] William Safire, The First Dissident: The Book of Job in Today’s Politics, p. xvi.

[66] Michael D. Guinan, “Job”, p. 698.

[67] Ibid.

[68] Bernard W. Anderson, Understanding the Old Testament, p. 595.

[69] Michael D. Guinan, “Job”, p. 698.

[70] William Safire, The First Dissident: The Book of Job in Today’s Politics, p. xvi.

[71] Michael D. Guinan, “Job”, p. 698.

[72] Bernard W. Anderson, Understanding the Old Testament, p. 601.

[73] Michael D. Guinan, “Job”, p. 700.

[74] Bernard W. Anderson, Understanding the Old Testament, p. 601.

 



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Last updated: 11/24/10.