Northern Baptist Seminary

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God and Job
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A Research Paper
Printed in Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for the Course
OT 458 Old Testament Theology

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by
James L. Brooks
May 27, 2013

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Introduction
The book of Job is a classic. Many have read this book, especially when seeking answers to suffering. Whenever Christians talk about suffering, more than likely the story of Job will be mentioned and Job’s sayings will be quoted. Although the “Job story” is frequently discussed, there are still many unanswered questions. Where was God? Why did God allow Job to go through all the trials and tribulations? What kind of God is this? Why does God make a deal with Satan? What about Job’s friends and their response to his suffering? These are all questions that will continue to haunt readers after reading the story of Job.
This paper will examine the character of God and his parental attributes. No matter what the reader may think, God is ultimately in control. Although God gives Satan the latitude to do what he will with Job, short of killing him, still it is all within the scope of God’s permissive will. The story of Job, although it may be rather simple to read, is complex in theological understanding.
The God of Job is inscrutable, but yet he is in control. “The book of Job challenges the principle of retribution: that trouble in life must be a person’s own fault.”1
The prologue is in prose. The epilogue is in poetry. The conclusion is in prose. “The book of
Job takes the form of a prose story interrupted in the middle by a poetic dialogue.”2 Although the book is complex, the characteristics of God are clear. Although it seems as though God is harsh and unfair, God is presented as a good parent who is concerned for his child, whether that child is going through difficult times or is doing well. However, there are things that are difficult to

!3 understand in Job. Robin Routledge writes, “With all of this there remain unanswered questions and we must recognize that in some cases we cannot, or may not, know the mind of God.”3

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God of Israel
In the Pentateuch God introduces himself as the liberator of those who are in bondage. God liberates the children of Israel who are captive under Egyptian authority. Not only does the allpowerful God free the oppressed, but he destroys their enemies.4 The basic theological understanding of God, then, is that he will bless the righteous and punish the wicked. The formula is: when one is good, good things will come. “From this basic conviction, the
Pentateuchal doctrine of retribution follows naturally: righteousness will be rewarded and wickedness punished.”5
God is the one who comes and sets his people free from their bondage and oppression. God commands Moses to go and tell Pharaoh to release the children of Israel from bondage (Exod
5:1). Therefore, this God in the Pentateuch is a God of liberation and justice. He is the God who creates his people and wants the best for his children. The children of Israel traditionally viewed
God as a liberator and as one who would deliver them out of any oppressive situation.
Christopher J.H. Wright says in reference to God as a father, “We have all seen a father pick up and carry a child in his arms, on his back or shoulders.”6 This is who God was for Israel—the rescuer—and to picture him allowing Satan to tempt one of his children was unfathomable.
Throughout the entire Old Testament God is revealed as a parental figure. The familial relationship with God is deeply rooted within Israel’s theological understanding. God is not shy

!4 about letting it be known that Israel is his “Son” and “Firstborn” (Exod 4:22, Hos 11:1). God’s love for his people is prevalent throughout the Old Testament. It is God the father who has established Israel and brought the people out of bondage (Deut 32:6). Isaiah says “You are our
Father, though Abraham does not know us, and Israel does not acknowledge us; you, O Lord are our Father” (Isa 63:16). Although for some it may not seem like it, this is still the case for Job.
God is still a loving parent who watches over and cares for his children. Understandably, it is hard to see God as being a good parent in parts of the Job story. Although Job stands in contradiction to a simplistic formula of reward and punishment, still God is faithful, even in the midst of all the chaos and crisis that Job endures.
Wisdom Literature
Unlike other Old Testament literature, which deals with the Creator-God operating in the story line of history, wisdom literature, especially Proverbs, deals with living in the everyday. It is made up of common-sense adages permeated with the idea of God's holy will. The sum of it:
“The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom” (Prov 1:7). It offers a model of ethical behavior, which supports the common good. Wisdom and righteous conduct lead to life; foolish and wicked conduct lead to death. Also, “In Proverbs we see the Wise, Solomon and others, seeking to understand the working out of God’s providence among men.”7 However, the theodicy in Proverbs doesn't work in Job. In writing about Proverbs, John Gable says, “We are not surprised, therefore, to find that throughout the book a necessary connection between behavior and fortune in life is always assumed.”8 However, this is not the case for the book of Job. This is a crisis in theodicy! Job is blameless and upright. He is the ideal in Wisdom ethics, but he suffers for nothing that he has done wrong.

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Those considered wise in Ancient Israel were those who had knowledge of and followed the ways of God. The wiser a person was, the wealthier they were. Therefore, many in ancient
Israel associated wealth with wisdom. In the writings of Solomon this is very evident when he writes, “My son, do not forget my teaching, but let your heart keep my commandments, for length of days and years of life and peace they will add to you” (Prov 3:1-2). Solomon is basically saying that if you want to have peace and a long life, all you need to do is follow God’s
Word by doing what it says. Solomon goes on to encourage his readers to trust in the Lord, and as a result the path of life will be straight (Prov. 3:5-7). Seemingly, what great wisdom.
However, this is not the case for everything and everyone, and this formula flies in the face of human experience. People—whether rich or poor, free or enslaved—do not always deserve what they are experiencing. Unearned suffering is a reality! And this is the hard knowledge with which
Job struggles.
Introduction to the Book of Job
The book of Job turns wisdom literature “upside down.” The wisdom formula, “if you do good, good things will come” does not fit the typical wisdom pattern in this book. Actually, for the most part, the book of Job is the exact opposite. The formula seems to not work in the beginning of the story, but at the end the formula is complete. In spite of all of Job’s suffering and loss, his fortunes are restored.
Job is a righteous man and he loves his family, loves God, and is very reputable in his community. Job is considered to be perfect and upright (1:1). Job seems to have made all the right decisions in life; nevertheless, he is challenged like no other. Job is a righteous man who lives up to the demands of his God, who fears God and shuns evil, who is obedient, perfect,

!6 without blemish. God affirms this as does Job. It never is denied.9 The question is then, why does God allow him to be tested in the most painful way?
The Psalmist writes that as long as he has been living he has never seen the righteous forsaken or begging for bread (Ps 37:25). This sounds really good, but according to the book of Job this is not true. Job is righteous and yet he loses everything—his wife, children and possessions. God clearly forsakes Job, the righteous man!
The entire central section of the book is mostly made up of the speeches from Job’s friends, all agreeing that the righteous prosper and the wicked suffer. Since Job is suffering, he must have sinned and must repent. “The reader is also surprised that God does not explain to Job why he suffers, and especially why light is not thrown on the general problem of suffering.”10
There are some who would argue that Job is not a historical fact. It is fiction, like Shakespeare is fiction. Furthermore, depicting the devil as God's devil is a literary device. But most would agree that whether fiction or fact, nothing happens without God's consent.
The Confrontation
It is very important to note that the Hebrew translation of Satan is “the Satan.” “The word satan is a common noun, meaning ‘accuser,’ ‘adversary,’ and is related to a verb meaning ‘to accuse,’ to oppose.”11 Here, the Satan does not appear as evil incarnate, but more like a prosecuting attorney who is on speaking terms with God. The accuser comes to God and says that the only reason that Job is doing so well is because God has a hedge around him. However,
God is convinced and confident of Job's faithfulness to him. God goes on to allow the accuser to challenge Job, but the only thing that the accuser cannot touch is his life.

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The accuser was sure that he could throw Job off track by causing tragedy. He was going to do all that was possible to destroy Job's joy and to get him to relinquish his faith in and worship of God. Ultimately, his goal was to show that Job only loves and honors God because of all the goodness he has experienced. In accepting the accuser’s challenge, God accepted a grave responsibility. Job has to be the involuntary subject of this experiment; he must suffer in order that God's confidence may be justified.12
It is interesting to note that the accuser thinks the only reason Job is so faithful to God is because of the blessings he has been given. “Like Satan, many have suggested that the religious person is not motivated by love of God but by concern of self….” 13 The accuser is cynical about the loyalty of humanity to divinity. However, God is the one who has complete trust in his creation. Who better knows a man than the one who created him? “Like Job, ‘the Satan’ expects the worst of everyone. Only God has complete faith in the goodness of a human being.” 14
Confident God
The question asked by some readers is, “Why Job?” God asked the Satan, “Have you considered my servant Job?” (1:8) God has known something about Job. There must have been a prior relationship in order for God to have the confidence in Job's ability to endure the test of the accuser. In essence, God is the one who starts this challenge. “God initiates the action of the story by praising Job to Satan.”15 God was willing to take a gamble; however, God in his omniscience must have known what the outcome would be.
Job was a righteous man, which means that he was in right relationship with God. In order for this to be so, it can be properly assumed that Job spent much time in prayer, reading the Torah, and being in the presence of The Lord. However, “Though Job had just been hailed as one of the

!8 greatest human beings whoever lived, God rather casually permits this faithful and good man to be exposed to all sorts of terrible things.”16
There are some scholars who would say that God was not confident, but the only way that he would find out is to allow the Satan to put Job to the test. However, “Even God has no guarantee that God’s people will always be obedient and faithful in the face of temptations and trials.” 17
God knew exactly what he was doing. “Job suffers not because God thinks he's a bad man—he suffers because he's the best.”18 God obviously had been watching Job and was proud of Job’s trust in him. “We may pause to note that the cause of Job’s suffering was more than the Satan’s insinuation against him. He was suffering to vindicate more than himself. He was vindicating
Job's trust in him.”19
Blessing God
God has truly been good to Job. Even prior to losing everything, Job lived a comfortable and prosperous life. He had to total of seven sons and three daughters. Seven sons is significant because it indicates completeness. Job had all that he needed. He had a beautiful wife who was faithful and cared for him deeply. (That is why, later in the story, she tells Job to curse God, because she cannot tolerate to see her husband suffering for no apparent reason.) Job possessed seven thousand sheep, three thousand camels, five hundred yoke of oxen, five hundred female donkeys, and very many servants, so that this man was the greatest of all the people of the east
(1:2-3).
God had been faithful to Job and God had blessed him in a tremendous way. Job was not only blessed privately, but publicly as well. The entire community, his family and all of his friends witnessed how well Job was living. However, although he had many material

!9 possessions, Job was righteous and loved God and God loved him. “All the numbers used are symbolic, suggesting completeness and perfection.... Just as Job's piety is complete and perfect, so also his family and property are complete and perfect.”20
Distant God
The first thing that happens is that one of Job's servants comes running to him letting him know that his oxen and donkeys had been stolen and all the helpers were killed (1:15). Following this first tragedy, Job continues to receive bad reports over and over again. His children are killed, his houses burned down, and his servants are killed (1:16-19). Job is so devastated that he rips his clothing off and shaves his head bald (1:20). He is devastated with a grief beyond comparison. Nevertheless, in the midst of his intense grief, he seeks God in bowing down to worship (1:20).
However, when it seems as though things could get no worse, the Satan goes back to God and presents another proposition. God boasts of Job because he has stood the test of the affliction, but the Satan is not satisfied. He says if God allows him to touch Job’s health, then he will surely not remain true and will curse God to his face (2:4-5). God tells the Satan to do what he wants, but the requirement that God has is that the Satan must not to take Job’s life (2:6). The Satan then strikes Job’s body and Job is stricken with boils from his head to his feet (2:7). Job looks and feels horrible, and he has no real explanation for why all of this is happening.
Why does God allow this? The God of Job remains hidden and inscrutable. Admittedly, God can sometimes be hard to understand. “For as the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my ways higher than your ways, and my thoughts than your thoughts” (Isa 55:9). God does things that the human mind cannot comprehend. Many of God’s choices humanity would even call

!10 foolish and certainly not the best choice. “The preaching of the cross is to them that perish foolishness, but to us who are saved, the power and wisdom of God” (1Cor 1:18). Some would say this is an absurd answer to absurdity.
Martin Luther calls this God of Job, “the hidden God.” He has two terms for this: 1) deus absconditus (the hidden wrathful God) and 2) deus cryptus (hidden God). Where is God? Why
God? Job has no idea why all of this chaos and tragedy is happening. Job has not done anything wrong, but yet he has to suffer in a terrible way. “He knows that he is innocent, but does not know why God has withdrawn his blessing. Something has gone wrong with the relationship; he wants to plead his case but God is nowhere to be found.”21 Job is searching all over for God but cannot find him at all (23:8-9). Job is desperately looking from some sign or signal that God is there, but God remains distance.
To make matters worse, Job's wife finally tells him to curse God and give up. For Job, this had to be like a dagger in his heart. First, he does not understand why all of these horrible things are happening to him. And now, his wife tells him to turn his back on everything that he believed. Job does not understand what is going on, but he stays faithful to God despite people around him saying discouraging things. It must have been agonizing for Job to hear his own wife telling him that he should curse God (2:9). “Verbally, her speech echoes both God's evaluation of Job (2:3) and the Satan’s prediction of what Job will eventually say.”22 However, Job boldly responds, “You speak as one of the foolish women would speak. Shall we receive good from
God, and not receive the evil?” (2:10)
Job’s Friends

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The word had spread about Job’s misfortunes and all that was going wrong in his life.
Because of Job’s status it was inevitable that rumors had started around the town. Finally, Job’s friends, Eliphaz, Bildad, and Zophar (2:11) come by to spend time with him. “The friends’ action, going to Job ‘to console and comfort’ him, is a traditional expression of solidarity in grief. To be deprived of this gesture of friendship made suffering even more difficult to endure.”23 However, when they arrived on the scene and look at Job they became emotionally overwhelmed because of his appearance—so overwhelmed, they began to weep, tore their robes, and sprinkled dust on their head (2:12). Furthermore, for the next seven days they sat with him in silence (2:13).
Job friends were certain that the reason Job was going through so much was because in some way he had sinned against God. Zophar tells him he is guilty and deserves to be punished (11:6).
They just could not fathom that God would allow something like this to happen to Job if he had not done anything wrong. “There is a strong impulse among pious folk to rush to God’s defense.
So it was with Job’s counselors. In spite of evidence to the contrary, they retained their belief in retribution.”24 However, Job’s friends in a sense wanted to play God, trying give reasons for what Job was going through. They stood in judgment of him. However, humanity is limited in comprehension because of the inability to see into the future and what God has in store. The truth of the matter is that humanity does not know what the end looks like and has a myriad of ways to deal with loss. “There are many ways to accept the finality of loss, because people bring different understandings of the world and of God to that process.”25
Obviously, at the end of the story the friends’ theology was totally wrong and misguided.
“Although the friends appeal to firsthand experience when they repeatedly assert that everyone

!12 gets what they sow (4:8; 5:27), we quickly learn that their theories are fortified by not considering the reality of Job's suffering.”26 They are more concerned about what they assumed
Job had done rather than how Job was feeling. “The friends are invested in maintaining the sacred order by which they benefit. Theodicy, the justification of God, often gives way to anthropodicy, the justification of ourselves.” 27
It is a safe assumption that one’s theology informs one’s anthropology. In other words, if one thinks that God is a vengeful God, it is highly likely that that person will be less compassionate toward their brother or sister who has fallen into to assumed transgression. God was not punishing Job because he had done something wrong. Job did nothing wrong, but God in his sovereignty allowed the bad things to happen.
Job’s Response
“Job's initial response to his affliction is the proverbial blessing: again, ‘the LORD gave, and the LORD has taken away; blessed be the name of the LORD.’” (1:21)28 However, after things progressively get worse, Job starts to vent his frustrations. He starts to curse the day that he was born, but in all actuality, based on the images that he uses, he was taking a shot at God’s creation. 29
One of the most well-known sayings of Job is, “Though He slay me, I will hope in Him.
Nevertheless I will argue my ways before Him” (13:15). “The hope and the deliverance of which Job speaks are not that he will escape death but that he will be vindicated, since his integrity will be attested by the very fact of his daring to come before God.”30 Job is determined to trust God through the pain. It is interesting that Job thinks that it is God who is “slaying” him, but he will still trust God.

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Job protests, saying that God is being unjust and indifferent for condemning a blameless man
(27:2). The end result tramples on the moral certainty established in Proverbs. Notice that when
God has his final say, he concedes Job's innocence. “In all this Job never swerves in his devotion, nor charges God with wanton cruelty.” 31 Job knows that if he can just make it through this ordeal, he will be refined, “like gold” (23:10). “Job is God-intoxicated— we might say theocentrically obsessed. Indeed what he seeks most is to see God and to have God recognize and acknowledge him. This would be his badge of honor.”32
Comforting God
“Job, after being smitten by God, is a man badly in need of comfort. He appears to the reader not only as a man absolutely wronged by God but also as one for whom consoling speeches on the meaning of life would be appropriate.”33 Job's response to God's speeches is one of shame.
He is humbled not just by the inscrutable enormity of God's order but also by the sheer wonder of God's appearing to him.34
It is very comforting to know that Satan with his power cannot conquer God with all God’s power. Satan is only allowed to do what God allows him to do. “Thus when God does break silence, it is to emphasize his own lordship over heaven and earth and to rebuke Job’s presumption.”35 Restoring God
This is where the story gets interesting. Wisdom literature has been flipped upside down, but
God is not only about to make everything right, but to make it even better than before. Job has lost everything. However, through it all, he does not lose the integrity of his faith in God. The question that comes to mind is that if God knew that Job would endure, why does God allow him

!14 to go through it? Some would say that Satan was able to manipulate God to get him to allow something to happen that had no real purpose.36
God, being the good parent, decides to bless Job. However, not only does he bless him, but he blesses him with double measure (42:10). Job then has a dinner party and in attendance are his brothers and sisters. They give him money and gold (42:13). Job’s cup is running over (Ps
23:5). God is so gracious to Job that on top of restoring his possessions and family, God gives him an additional 140 years of life.
Conclusion
God's response in all of this is that he is the unfathomable awesome Creator. God isn't interested in Job's cry for justice. Only God's sovereign power is the issue, before which Job is silenced. The issue of theodicy is never resolved. There is no resolution between Job's cry for justice and Yahweh's response. “The issue never was sin; the story is not about sin. It's about an ordeal, an ordeal of innocent suffering in a world where the power of the curse appears to hold sway but in which Praise is at work to rectify, restore, and transform.”37
So Israel's naive innocence, that living the good life engenders rewards, is no longer realistic.
Even though the book restores a family and fortune to Job, it is not the same. The tragic loss is permanent. And so is Israel's naive innocence, which loses its illusions when she lives under oppression. And that's the story of life (except for the well-off and pampered). Where is God? In the face of everyday tragedy and absurdity? What good is faith? As Jaroslav Pelikan said, "If there were no devil, we would have to create one."38 But in Job, the devil is God's devil! That leaves us with

!15 the old philosophical conundrum, “If God is good he cannot be powerful; if God is powerful, he cannot be good."39
The book of Job is certainly a corrective to the overly simplistic notion that God always rewards the good with health, wealth and wisdom, and that God punishes the bad with poverty, sickness and foolishness. That notion flies in the face of reality and gives implied permission for the well-off to ignore the needs of the poor and suffering. Jesus, in his words and deeds, flatly contradicts such attitudes and strongly condemns them as evil. It is certainly correct to say that
Jesus has a special concern for the poor and suffering who were marginalized and somehow perceived as guilty in Jewish society.
For instance, “As he walked along, he saw a man blind from birth. His disciples asked him,
‘Rabbi, who sinned, this man or his parents that the man was born blind?’ Jesus answered,
‘Neither this man nor his parents sinned; he was born blind so that God’s works might be revealed in him’” (John 9:1-2). Thus, Jesus stands in contradiction to the common theology of suffering in his time.
But in human reality, which often reflects neither a God of justice nor mercy, God appears as the God of Job, in league with Satan the accuser, and there is no explanation for the problem of evil. Certainly, neither the simplistic answer of Wisdom literature about reward and punishment, nor the book of Job’s response which reflects an all-powerful, but permissive God who is inscrutable, arbitrary and capricious, are adequate responses to the tragedy of unearned suffering.
This leads many thoughtful modern people to conclude that either God is not all powerful, or perhaps there is no God at all. We are confronted with Luther’s perception—the hidden, wrathful
God. When we try to describe or attribute responsibility to God in the face of evil, we are

!16 defining God in human categories. As Karl Barth says, we are simply shouting “MAN” with a loud voice. Barth says that, rather, God is “The Wholly Other,” beyond human categories.40
A pastoral Rabbi by the name of Harold Kushner wrote a book entitled, “When Bad Things
Happen to Good People”. He wrote the book in light of his son Aaron’s Job-like suffering.
Doctors diagnosed his son as having progeria, or “rapid aging.” He stopped growing in height by age three. By the time the boy was ten he was physiologically in his sixties. When Aaron died in his mother’s arms just after his fourteenth birthday, he weighed twenty-five pounds. What a classic example of unearned suffering. Where is God in all of this?
Out of their parental pain, Kushner wrote this book to comfort others, using the book of Job as his starting point. Kushner concludes that it is a mistake to impose such terms as “almighty” on God and thus to name God as the cause of all evil.
Whatever we may think of Kushner’s conclusion, we too must flee from the hidden wrathful
God of which Luther spoke, because in that God we will hear no gracious word to call us “son” or “daughter.” It is only beneath the cross of Jesus Christ that we can internalize something about the significance of unearned suffering, seeming absurdity and God-forsakenness. Only in
Jesus do we see “the other face of God,” not the omnipotent, but the crucified God who suffers with us in our tragedy. God, on the cross, totally identifies with our human condition of pain and suffering. If we will see something besides the inscrutable God who afflicts us —or at least lets Satan afflict us—with our griefs and sorrows, we can only find our comfort in the cross and the resurrection, where grace is sufficient for us and God’s strength is made perfect in Christ’s weakness and in ours. Thus Peake writes, “The God of the past and the future was the real God;

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Job’s God of the present was a spectre of his morbid imagination. 41 It is in this theology of the cross – -the crucified God – that we find comfort and strength amid our pain.

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ENDNOTES
Robin Routledge, Old Testament Theology: a Thematic Approach (Downers Grove, Ill.:
IVP Academic, 2009), 25.
1

2

John B. Gabel et al., The Bible as Literature: an Introduction, 5th ed. (New York:
Oxford University Press, USA, 2006), 147.

!18
3

Robin Routledge, Old Testament Theology: a Thematic Approach (Downers Grove, Ill.:
IVP Academic, 2009), 259.

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Robert Gordis, The Book of God and Man. (Chicago: The University of Chicago Press,
1965), 136.
4

5

Robert Gordis, The Book of God and Man, 136.

Christopher J. H. Wright, Knowing God the Father Through the Old Testament.
(Downers Grove, IVP Academics, 2007), 25.
6

7

H.L. Ellison, A Study of Job: From Tragedy to Triumph. 2 vols. (Grand
Rapids: Zondervan Publishing House), 19.
John B. Gabel et al., The Bible as Literature: An Introduction, 5th ed. (New York:
Oxford University Press, USA, 2006), 140.
8

9

Nahum N. Glatzer, The Dimensions of Job: A Study and Selected Readings (Eugene:
Wipf and Stock Pub, 2002), 185.
A.S. Peake, “The Problem of the Book (1905),” in Issues in Religion and Theology, ed.
James L. Crenshaw, vol. 4 of Theodicy in the Old Testament (Philadelphia: SPCK, 1983), 105.
10

11

David J.A. Clines, Job 1-20, The New Interpreter's Bible: A Commentary in twelve
Volumes, Vol 4. (Nashville, Tenn.: Abingdon Press, 1996), 346.
12

Nahum N. Glatzer, The Dimensions of Job: A Study and Selected Readings, 204.

13

Daniel J. Simundson, The Message of Job: a Theological Commentary (Minneapolis:
Augsburg Fortress Pub, 1986), 36.
James L. Crenshaw, A Whirlpool of Torment: Israelite Traditions of God as an
Oppressive Presence (Atlanta: Society of Biblical Literature, 2008), 58.
14

Timothy Polk, “Kierkegaard and the Book of Job: Theodicy or Doxology,” Word and
World 31, no. 4 (Fall 2011): 413.
15

!19
16

Daniel J. Simundson, The Message of Job: a Theological Commentary, 36.

17

Ibid., 42.

18

Timothy Polk, “Kierkegaard and the Book of Job: Theodicy or Doxology,” Word and
World 31, no. 4 (Fall 2011): 415.
19

Nahum N. Glatzer, The Dimensions of Job: a Study and Selected Readings, 124.

20

David J.A. Clines, Job 1-20, The New Interpreter's Bible: A Commentary in twelve
Volumes, Vol 4. (Nashville, Tenn.: Abingdon Press, 1996), 345.
21

Robin Routledge, Old Testament Theology: a Thematic Approach, 257.

22

David J.A. Clines, Job 1-20, The New Interpreter's Bible: A Commentary in twelve
Volumes, Vol 4. (Nashville, Tenn.: Abingdon Press, 1996), 355-56.
David J.A. Clines, Job 1-20, The New Interpreter's Bible: A Commentary in twelve
Volumes, Vol 4. (Nashville, Tenn.: Abingdon Press, 1996), 357.
23

24

Daniel J. Simundson, The Message of Job: a Theological Commentary, 15.

David J.A. Clines, Job 1-20, The New Interpreter's Bible: A Commentary in twelve
Volumes, Vol 4. (Nashville, Tenn.: Abingdon Press, 1996), 360.
25

26

Jason A. Mahn, “Do Christians Love God for Naught? Job and the Possibility of
'Disinterested' Faith,” Word and World 31, no. 4 (Fall 2011): 391.

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27

Ibid.,393.

28

Timothy Polk, “Kierkegaard and the Book of Job: Theodicy or Doxology,” Word and
World 31, no. 4 (Fall 2011): 415.
29

Ibid.,415.

!20
30

David J.A. Clines, Job 1-20, The New Interpreter's Bible: A Commentary in twelve
Volumes, Vol 4. (Nashville, Tenn.: Abingdon Press, 1996), 435.
Margaret B. Crook, The Cruel God: Job’s Search for the Meaning of Suffering.
(Boston: Beacon Press, 1959), 12.
31

32

Timothy Polk, “Kierkegaard and the Book of Job: Theodicy or Doxology,” Word and
World 31, no. 4 (Fall 2011): 415.
Raymond P. Scheindlin, ed., The Book of Job (New York: W W Norton & Co Inc,
1998), 20-21.
33

34

Timothy Polk, “Kierkegaard and the Book of Job: Theodicy or Doxology,” Word and
World 31, no. 4 (Fall 2011): 415.
35

Robin Routledge, Old Testament Theology: a Thematic Approach, 259.

36

David Penchansky, The Betrayal of God: Ideological Conflict in Job (Louisville, KY:
Westminster John Knox Press, 1990), 37.
Timothy Polk, “Kierkegaard and the Book of Job: Theodicy or Doxology,” Word and
World 31, no. 4 (Fall 2011): 416.
37

38

Thomas Strieter, Pastor, Personal Conversation. Oak Park, IL. May 3, 2013.

39

Thomas Strieter, Pastor, Personal Conversation. Oak Park, IL. May 3, 2013.

40

Thomas Strieter, Pastor, Personal Conversation. Oak Park, IL. May 3, 2013.

!21
A.S. Peake, “The Problem of the Book (1905),” in Issues in Religion and Theology, ed.
James L. Crenshaw, vol. 4 of Theodicy in the Old Testament (Philadelphia: SPCK, 1983), 106.
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BIBLIOGRAPHY

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Clines, David J.A. The New Interpreter's Bible: A Commentary in twelve Volumes, Vol 4.
Nashville, Tenn.: Abingdon Press, 1996.

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Crenshaw, James L. A Whirlpool of Torment: Israelite Traditions of God as an Oppressive
Presence. Atlanta: Society of Biblical Literature, 2008.

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Crook, Margaret B. The Cruel God: Job’s Search for the Meaning of Suffering. Boston: Beacon
Press, 1959.

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Ellison, H.L. A Study of Job; from Tragedy to Triumph. 2 vols. Grand Rapids: Zondervan
Publishing House, 1972.