Justifying Job

Job, is one of many Biblical books that I struggle to understand. But here is one take on it you don't often hear... it's a book about justification!

• The opening scene: the great accuser (trans. Satan) appears before God. God justifies his servant Job, declaring him righteous before Satan, but Satan declares God's verdict to be false (not for the first, or last time). Satan de-justifies God.
• The dialogue between the 3 friends and Job: The friends take on Satan's accusing role and reason like this:
  • God is just + Job is suffering => Job is unjust
  Job works with similar logic, but to his credit only toys with the conclusion and doesn't commit to it:
  • I am just + I am suffering => God is unjust
• Elihu: Elihu is a bit difficult to pin down. He recognises that Job is trying to justify himself by de-justifying God. He justifies God himself, but he doesn't justify Job. He anticipates God's speeches, but he only has some light to shed on Job's confusing darkness.
• God's speeches: God has two points in his two speeches:
  1. Give up on your logic-games. Job is just and I am just. How those are both true you will never be able to fathom by reason... so give up the quest.
  2. I control the accuser who brings suffering, so there is hope in me as the only one who can tame the leviathan of Satan.
• The epilogue: Job repents, God justifies Job before his friends and the whole world. He declares him righteous and justly gives the blessings of wealth and health which belong to the righteous.

I've blogged about this a little before, so I'll be bold and quote myself saying it quite well!

Elihu was angry with Job because he was 'justifying himself rather than God' (32:2) and YHWH isn't too happy about that either (40:8). But actually Elihu admits that he wants to justify Job (33:32) and YHWH does so in the end too (42:7). Job is justified through YHWH's own justification. Only when YHWH is allowed to be just in a way above human comprehension, can we too be justified.