Job 15

My Bible studies have been sort of lax the last year and so I am hoping to give it some structure by posting my post-thoughts on a blog. I don't believe in magic bullets in spiritual exercises where "If you do x,y,z you will be blessed..." but at the same time I do think that there is intrinsic merit in studying the Bible, sharing your thoughts and doing this with regularity (practiced).

Job 15 is a continuation of a back and forth argument between Job and three of his friends about whether or not God was fair to Job. In the first few chapters we learned why Job's life so suddenly fell apart but the characters in the book only know that all of the sudden Job has lost everything.

The discussion starts reasonably polite where Job is in pain and asking why God has done this to Him and his friends saying that God is fair and Job must have done something to deserve it. That dialog has gone back and forth several times and each time it gets a little more tense and hostile.

By chapter 15 one of the friends, Eliphaz, says God is so holy that nothing can insist upon any goodness in His sight... "how much less one who is abominable and corrupt, a man who drinks injustice like water!" (v. 16)

Now verses 1-15 I agree with completely... but at 16 where Eliphaz suggests that his friend, who he has shared bread with, is a wicked, wicked man shows a real disconnect. I don't know why he thinks Job is so horrible all of the sudden but I think it is because Job has suffered. He believes, as was not uncommon in the ancient world, that God only allowed the wicked to suffer but never the innocent. I had heard the same sort of argument used to justify the cruelty in the Hindhu caste system: "they deserve to be untouchables because of what they did in their last life."

This is of course a logical error: "God punishes sinners with suffering, you are suffering THEREFORE you must be a sinner." is the same sort of statement as "When it rains the street is wet, the street is wet THEREFORE it must have rained."

But for me even if it were not such a classic logical fallacy it would still be wrong... because Eliphaz knows (as only Eliphaz could) that even if he were a better person than Job... he wasn't that much better. If Eliphaz really thought God was punishing Job it should have scared the heck out of him because he could (should) be next.

The Bible is pretty clear that though God does judge the wicked and the just with punishments and rewards in this life there is still a lot of rewards for the wicked and punishments for the just. Early in Job there is one answer as to why this happens but that is not interesting to me right now. It is enough to know that even if I lived a life more justly than Job I could still expect a fair share of tragedy. Much of the Bible would suggest that this just living would result in greater tragedy here and now.