There lived in the land of Uz a man of blameless and upright life named Job who feared God and set his face against wrongdoing. He had seven sons and three daughters and he owned a multitude of cattle as well as many slaves. So he was the greatest man in all the East. His sons used to meet together and gave each in turn a banquet in his own house and they would send and invite their three sisters to eat and drink with them. Then when the round of banquets was over, Job would send for his children and sanctify them, rising early in the morning and sacrificing a whole offering for each of them, for he thought that they might somehow have sinned against God and committed blasphemy in their hearts. This Job did regularly.
The first chapter of this immortal story moves on to the Court of Heaven, where the various members took their place in the presence of the Lord and the adversary, Satan, was there among them. And the Lord asked him where he had been. "Ranging over the earth from end to end" was the reply. And the Lord then asked him if he had considered his servant Job, for he would find no one like him on earth, a man of blameless and upright life who preferred God and set his face against wrongdoing. At this point the adversary becomes much more malicious.
Has not Job good reason to be God-fearing, have you not hedged him round on every side with your protection, him and his family and all his possessions? Whatever he does, you have blessed and everywhere his herds have increased beyond measure. But just stretch out your hand and touch all that he has, and see if he will not curse you to your face.
The Lord at once delivered all that Job possessed into the hands of the adversary with the proviso that Job himself should not be touched. And so on the day when Job's sons and daughters were eating and drinking at their eldest brother's house a messenger came to Job to tell him that a host of Sabaeans had swooped down and carried off the flocks and donkeys after killing the herdsman. Almost simultaneously another messenger arrived and said that God's fire had lashed down from heaven striking the sheep and shepherds and burning them up; he alone was preserved to bring the news. While he was still speaking, another arrived and said "The Chaldeans, three bands of them, have made a raid on the camels and carried them off, after putting those who tended them to the sword. Only I have escaped to bring you the news." As he spoke yet another messenger arrived and said "Your sons and daughters were eating and drinking in their eldest brother's house when suddenly a whirlwind swept across the desert and struck the four corners of the house which fell on the young people and they are dead. Only I have escaped to bring you the news." At this Job stood up, tore his cloak, shaved his head and threw himself prostrate on the ground, saying: "Naked I came from the womb, naked I shall return whence I came. The Lord gives and the Lord takes away; blessed be the name of the Lord." Throughout all this Job did not sin nor did he ascribe any fault to God (Job 1-3).
Once again God points out Job's sanctity to Satan in the second chapter only to be met with the challenge that when Job's health is also destroyed, then he will most certainly curse God to his face. And so God puts Job into Satan's fell clutches with the sole proviso that his life is spared. Job becomes afflicted with a most terrible skin disease so that his wife challenges him not to hold fast to his integrity but rather to curse God and die (Job 2.9). Job compares her advice to that of any impious woman, making the important observation that if we accept good from God shall we not accept evil also? Throughout all this Job does not utter one sinful word. Then Job's three friends, Eliphaz from Teman, Bildad from Shuha and Zophar from Naama, having heard of all the calamities that had overtaken Job, come to comfort and condole with him. But Job in chapter 3 first curses the day that he was born. He asks why a man should be born to wander blindly hedged about by God on every side; sighing for him is his only food, and every terror that haunted him has caught up with him. What he dreaded has overtaken him and there is no peace of mind, no quiet for him. Trouble comes, but he has no rest.
In the first cycle of his speeches Eliphaz takes over chapters 4 and 5. He first gently chides Job for his impatience, for his piety ought to give him absolute faith in help. Have the innocent ever perished? But he has seen those who plough mischief and sow trouble reap no other harvest, perishing at the blast of God and being shrivelled by the breath of his nostrils. Eliphaz tells of a word that came to him stealthily in the anxious visions of the night. A formless presence that filled him with fear. He heard a voice murmur "Can a human being be righteous before God if he mistrusts his own servants and finds his messengers (the angels) at fault, how much more those who live in houses on earth whose foundations are in dust; how much more shall they perish unheeded together, only to die without finding wisdom". Eliphaz counsels Job to make a direct appeal to God who does great and unsearchable things, who may rebuke one only to show his greater capacity to heal afterwards.
All this contains some truth, but why the pain in the first place in the case of a blameless, virtuous man? Eliphaz does mention the disciplinary value of painful experience but does this really apply in Job's case? Certainly, it washes over poor Job like water off a duck's back, for in chapters 6 and 7 he roundly declares his innocence. He is convinced that death is close at hand. He asks "Does not every mortal have hard service on earth and are not his days like those of a hired labourer, like those of a slave kept waiting for his wages?" One might remember the days of radiant prosperity that had preceded Job's catastrophe, but our memories are short-lived. Job's final lament is especially moving. "What is man that you make much of him and turn your thoughts towards him, only to punish him morning after morning, or to test him every hour of the day?" Job asks God if he will not look back away from him for a single instant so that he can at least swallow his saliva, or if he has indeed sinned, what harm has he done God? Surely he will lie in the dust of the grave. You may seek him, but he shall be no more.
Bildad and Zophar repeat the basic assertions of God or God's state of love and justice, and that it is right for Job to bear his present distress for further instruction and future understanding. But Job is unmoved by all this comfortable rhetoric pouring forth from those who are full of knowledge but illuminated by a minimum of experience that alone makes this knowledge credible. This is indeed the crucial difference between knowledge and wisdom. The first is learned from reading books and listening to various authorities, whereas the second proceeds directly from the experience of life itself. Wisdom alone can teach and test the veracity of the human heart and the truth of another person's experience of life. Wisdom is the supreme working of the Holy Spirit in the human soul, and it is easily overlaid by the glib assurance of various plausible "experts".
The three friends praise God's magnificence and glory, and all affirm that Job's suffering must be due to great sinfulness, a charge that Job absolutely repudiates. In chapter 28 there is a marvellous Wisdom Poem that is not directly connected with the main theme of Job's suffering. But has Job in fact been guilty of any wrongdoing? On the surface, the answer must be in the negative. However, chapters 29 to 31 reveal a weakness to the astute reader.
If only I could go back to the old days, to the times when God was watching over me, when his lamp shone over my head and by its light I walked through the darkness. If I could be as in the days of my prime when God protected my home, when the Almighty was still there at my side, when my servants stood around me while my paths flowed with milk and the rocks poured forth streams of oil for me.
Then follows a most revealing passage.
When I went out of my gate, up to the town to take my seat in the public square, young men saw me and kept back out of sight. Old men rose to their feet. Men in authority broke off their talk and put their hands over their lips, the voices of the nobles died away and every man held his tongue. They listened expectantly, and waited in silence to my counsels; after I had spoken nobody spoke again. My words fell gently upon them. They waited for me as for rain, open-mouthed as for spring showers. When I smiled on them, they took heart; when my face lit up, they lost their gloomy looks. I presided over them, planning their course like a king encamped with his troops; like one who comforts mourners.
Job continues in this self-congratulatory style in chapters 29 to 31. "Whoever heard me, spoke favourably of me, and those who saw me bore witness to my merit, how I saved the poor who appealed for help, and the fatherless and him who had no protector." The person threatened with ruin blessed Job and he made the widow's heart sing for joy. He put on righteousness as a garment; justice, like a cloak and turban, adorned him. He was eyes to the blind and feet to the lame. He was a father to the needy and took up the stranger's cause. He broke the fangs of the miscreant and wrested the prey from his teeth. He thought he would die with unimpaired powers and days uncounted as the grains of sand, with his roots spreading out to the water and the dew lying on his branches.
If one considers Job's self-congratulation seriously and sympathetically, it is evident how hard it is not to look for a reward for some admirable past action. We are brought up with the expectation but with varying degrees of disapproval if we fail to meet the mark. This approach has a degree of justice, and if there were a greater degree of training for the young in basic issues of morality, much suffering would certainly be averted; surely the consequence of bad behaviour is alienation from society until amends have been sincerely made, and the humiliation causes the individual to respect other people's welfare as well as their own, giving the possibility of goodness and happiness. But if the reward for anti-social behaviour is suffering ranging from ostracism to imprisonment, is the reward for the good person spontaneously glorious? Does such a person attain national eminence, social importance, great wealth, or the esteem of those who are considered authorities on spiritual themes?
The honest answer is "generally, in due course, if ever at all". When the great wrath of God in Israel was confronted in a state of general confusion, whether personal, religious, or national, the advice of the great prophets was assiduously sought during the period of natural emergency, but their advice was nearly always forgotten when a state of equilibrium had been attained once more.
In other words, the reward for decent spiritual living is little more than material stability during a period of national tranquillity, remembering, after the manner of Job, the evanescent value of money in a world of turmoil. There is absolutely no evidence that good fortune on the money markets is in any way related to the morality of the individual investor, nor is their state of health automatically less sound than that of those whose way of life is dedicated to the welfare of the sick and the bereaved. There is, in other words, apparently nothing to be gained, at least on a purely worldly level, by a virtuous, compassionate way of life, despite the frequent exhortations in the Old Testament and the Apocrypha.
Consider the counsel in the book of Tobit.
Distribute alms from what you possess and never with a grudging eye. Do not turn your face away from any poor man, and God will not turn away his face from you. Let your almsgiving match your means. If you have little, do not be ashamed to give the little you can afford; you will be laying up sound insurance against the day of adversity. Almsgiving preserves the giver from death and keeps him from going down into darkness. All who give alms are making an offering acceptable to the Most High. (Tobit 4.7-11)
In the Acts of the Apostles the generosity of Barnabas is especially praised. The whole company of believers was united in heart and soul. Not one of them would claim any of his possessions as his own. Everything was held in common. With great power the apostles bore witness to the resurrection of the Lord Jesus and all were held in great esteem. There was never a needy person among them, for all who had property in land or houses would sell it, bring the proceeds of the sale and lay it at the feet of the apostles to be distributed to any who were in need.
For instance Joseph, surnamed by the apostles Barnabas, which means "son of encouragement" (and a Levite Cypriot), sold an estate which he owned and he brought the money and laid it at the apostles' feet. The same Barnabas was, as we know subsequently, to befriend Paul and to make him acceptable to the apostles because his notoriety as a persecutor of the earliest Christians, especially Stephen, made them shrink from him in fear. That such a person should now come to be on their side, heart and soul, seemed truly incredible.
The presence of the living Christ among them brought the apostles true contentment and peace which had been hard to attain in the midst of severe persecution - and this is what the Job experience is especially here to teach us - that truly nothing belongs to us, not even our own children, and that everything and every occurrence in our lives are here to open our eyes to the reality of the self, and from the self to all other selves also. This is primarily human but stretches through the animal and vegetable kingdoms also. We see how small our place is in the Divine scheme, and the more we can let go of thoughts of ownership, the more we can concern ourselves with life in its wholeness.
In the various discourses that shed light on the characters of the participants as the book of Job proceeds, there is an unheralded intrusion of a fourth person, Elihu. He is an impetuous young man who is infuriated on behalf of God's honour, for Job had made himself out to be more righteous than God. His three friends had found no answer to Job, since only God appeared to be acting wrongly. In a long-winded discourse in chapters 32 to 37 Elihu praises the absolute strength and justice of God and, by contrast, the weakness of the leading characters. It is not in the nature of God to bring about suffering like Job's terrible ordeal so close to death unless that person was guilty of great sin and showed no sign of repentance. Therefore, sin is, after all, the cause of Job's travail, and the sooner he ceases to adopt the self-righteous pose and face the facts of his previous life squarely, the more speedily will his relief come. Little is added by this discourse to the observations already made by the three friends and also by Job himself.
The one evident observation is that the human being does not understand the inner workings of providence or the outer desires of their own heart. They want everything to be as pleasant as possible but they are not prepared to put themselves out to attain this goal, except perhaps by the exploitation of their fellow creatures with little concern for their individual welfare. In chapter 38 God himself makes his appearance in the traditional form of a supernatural power, issuing forth from the tempest. He puts Job to the test in the next four chapters, stressing his creative power in what he has achieved from the whole natural order. Has Job any understanding of how the earth's foundations were laid, or who fixed its dimensions? So the questioning continues until the various animal species are also described: this lesson in natural history is absolutely fascinating but has little to do with Job's suffering except peripherally in respect of God's power and magnificence towards his creatures. But what about Job, the most intelligent and sensitive of all of them?
At any rate, Job's questions are satisfied by his encountering God directly. He says "I know that you can do all things, and that no purpose is beyond you. You ask: "Who is this obscuring counsel, yet lacking knowledge?" But I have spoken of things which I have not understood, things too wonderful for me to know." In this confession of Job (42.1-6), he at least acknowledges that while he previously had known of God only by report, now he can see him with his own eyes and he repents in dust and ashes (for his doubt). The end of the chapter has a fairy-tale atmosphere with Job interceding for his friends because they did not give the right doctrine about God. At the same time Job's possessions are restored to him, his relatives come and feast at his home, comforting and consoling him for all his past afflictions, and each giving him a sheep and a gold ring. He also has seven sons and three daughters more beautiful than any other women in the world, and Job gave them an inheritance with their brothers. Job lived another 140 years after all this.
When one considers the whole narrative, one is aware of an aspect of anti-climax, inasmuch as the harrowing part of the ordeal is magically reversed, Job is instructed in the creative ways of God, and then has a fortune bestowed on him. No explanation of this dramatic change in his fortunes is supplied. Since Job is fundamentally a decent God-fearing man, even if some of that fear has a self-centred basis, the one message that comes through loud and clear is the unpredictable nature of our life on earth, and that we dare not bargain with the powers that be for our survival, let alone our certain good fortune. Job's fortitude is tested to prove his sincerity of heart, and he is extremely fortunate to be left alive at the end of his ordeal.
But how many victims of the most terrible persecutions that have disgraced human society throughout the centuries have gone unsung to their graves? If we are wise, we do tend to learn something from the story of Job - not that piety will deliver us from evil, so much as that a keen regard for common decency will provide us with the strength of character to overcome evil. In other words, that strength comes from within although of course it has its primary origin from God. We are, however, ill advised to depend on divine assistance if we are not prepared to play our part also. This is the full nature of human responsibility, and if we were to abrogate it, our lives would be immeasurably impoverished. With these thoughts in mind we need not be over-solicitous about the fate of Job, terrible as some of his pains seem to have been.
Living contains within it the seeds of suffering, as no doubt Job knew long before his dramatic fall into penury and ill-health, to say nothing of his terrible bereavement of all his family apart from his cantankerous wife. It is probable, if we take the final chapter of the book literally, that his fine, fresh, young family was born of a younger, much more pleasant wife.
The full thrust of the Job experience is liable to afflict any of us when all our customary ways of life are suddenly and summarily shattered by some intervening event, and stark reality faces us. The precipitating factor may be an incurable disease, the death of a close friend, the failure of a venture on which we had pinned all our hopes and prayers, or the simple betrayal of trust by someone we sincerely believed to be honest in their dealings. In all these instances and many others too we have been seriously let down and our hopes, at least temporarily, are dashed. The pain of much of life is related to its apparent meaninglessness. Young people with much promise ahead of them are suddenly stricken by incapacitating illnesses that thwart their creativity and make chronic invalids of them. There is also the tragedy of progressive mental disease, notably schizophrenia, cutting short the full blossoming of a young person's life, so that they may need institutional care whereas they would once have enjoyed an enviable life with their friends.
Life on earth certainly reminds us of the frailty of the physical body, and also the instability of the emotional life that focuses both on the brain and on past experiences we have had to endure in the midst of a society that is seldom favourably disposed to the needs of its especially sensitive members.
It is not surprising that the doubt at the time poor unfortunate Job had to bear is a natural part of human experience. What is the meaning of it all? Why do our personal experiences run so obviously counter to the teaching of the Church? Why was the counsel of Job's three friends not only futile but also infuriatingly smug, a criticism, incidentally, of much teaching from "religious" people? Why is there so seldom anyone to listen to our questions on a higher level of understanding or compassion? Even Job did not receive this courtesy. He was simply given a view of God's magnificence and restored to health and good fortune, but he received no explanation of his suffering. We have at least been given the answer to his problem - the contest between the forces of darkness and light with the person of Job acting as the object of a celestial tug-of-war between them. But he personally knew nothing of all this in his own battle for survival. Is this in fact the purpose of individual suffering? Is this the purpose of doubt in the growth to maturity of any individual?
It seems clear to me that agnosticism, the capacity to accommodate doubt where there is no cut-or-dried answer to any final question, is absolutely necessary if we are to come within any hailing distance of the truth. In fact, it is doubtful if we can ever know absolute truth in our present state of moral and spiritual development. But it is in the nature of truth always to recede from us, the more intimately we venture into its recesses. Doubt with experience can be seen as a denial of an absolute answer to any personal, communal, or universal problem.
On the other hand, it is sensible to trust the advice of an acknowledged specialist in a worldly discipline, like medical practice, accountancy, or the law. Then one would be closer to the truth than if one were to trust in one's own intuition or that of an unskilled practitioner. In worldly transactions of this type, doubt should be largely assuaged by confidence in the ability of the practitioner who is being consulted. Their reputation should afford as much trust as any of us could reasonably demand.
In the world of the spirit we are right to assess people by the impact they make upon our intuition, but in the end it is their work that counts. "Truly I tell you: anything you did for one of my brothers here, however insignificant, you did for me" (Matthew 25.40). This must be placed in opposition to 1 Corinthians 13.3: "I may give all I possess to the needy, I may give my body to be burnt, but if I have no love, I gain nothing by it." Therefore, love is shown by works as well as by our inner attitude to people.