Job 42:1-17

Job Is Humbled and Satisfied

42:1 Then Job answered the LORD:

2 “I know that you can do all things,

and that no purpose of yours can be thwarted.

3 ‘Who is this that hides counsel without knowledge?’

Therefore I have uttered what I did not understand,

things too wonderful for me, which I did not know.

4 ‘Hear, and I will speak;

I will question you, and you declare to me.’

5 I had heard of you by the hearing of the ear,

but now my eye sees you;

6 therefore I despise myself,

and repent in dust and ashes.”

Job’s Friends Are Humiliated

7 After the LORD had spoken these words to Job, the LORD said to Eliphaz the Temanite: “My wrath is kindled against you and against your two friends; for you have not spoken of me what is right, as my servant Job has. 8 Now therefore take seven bulls and seven rams, and go to my servant Job, and offer up for yourselves a burnt offering; and my servant Job shall pray for you, for I will accept his prayer not to deal with you according to your folly; for you have not spoken of me what is right, as my servant Job has done.” 9 So Eliphaz the Temanite and Bildad the Shuhite and Zophar the Naamathite went and did what the LORD had told them; and the LORD accepted Job’s prayer.

Job’s Fortunes Are Restored Twofold

10 And the LORD restored the fortunes of Job when he had prayed for his friends; and the LORD gave Job twice as much as he had before. 11 Then there came to him all his brothers and sisters and all who had known him before, and they ate bread with him in his house; they showed him sympathy and comforted him for all the evil that the LORD had brought upon him; and each of them gave him a piece of money and a gold ring. 12 The LORD blessed the latter days of Job more than his beginning; and he had fourteen thousand sheep, six thousand camels, a thousand yoke of oxen, and a thousand donkeys. 13 He also had seven sons and three daughters. 14 He named the first Jemimah, the second Keziah, and the third Keren-happuch. 15 In all the land there were no women so beautiful as Job’s daughters; and their father gave them an inheritance along with their brothers. 16 After this Job lived one hundred and forty years, and saw his children, and his children’s children, four generations. 17 And Job died, old and full of days. (Job 42:1-17, NRSV)

The following comments are repeated here from September 20, 2006 (Wednesday in the week of the Sunday closest to September 14, Year Two):

In this second brief response to the LORD, Job concedes God’s power, “I know that you can do all things, / and that no purpose of yours can be thwarted” (Job 42:2), a major theme of God’s speeches (chaps. 38-41). He quotes God’s question, “Who is this that darkens (j`yw9H4m1, machšîk) counsel by words without knowledge?” (38:2) almost verbatim: “Who is this that hides (Myl9f4m1, ma‘lîm) counsel without knowledge” (42:3a, omitting ‘by words’). Job explains, “Therefore I have uttered what I did not understand, / things too wonderful for me, which I did not know” (v. 3b, c). He thus “accepts God’s judgment . . . that he has spoken without knowledge and understanding” (Leong Seow, NOAB, 3^rd ed. on Job 42:3).

And Job quotes from the LORD again: the words, “Hear, and I will speak” (42:4a) represent the tenor of the LORD’s speeches, but are not an exact quotation. But he continues with an exact quotation of two compound words–with pronoun suffixes and a conjunction prefix--“I will question you, and you declare to me” (yn9f2yd9Ohv4 j~l4x!w4x@, ’eš’āl^ekā w^ehôdî‘ēnî, 42:4b = 40:7b). His explanation acknowledges that he has in fact made contact with God. “I had heard of you by the hearing of the ear, / but now my eye sees you” (v. 5). And he concludes with a statement of repentance. “Therefore,” he says, “I despise myself, / and repent (yT9m4H1n9v4, w^enichamtî) in dust and ashes” (v. 6). In earlier comments (on Bildad’s first speech, Job 8:1-22, Thurs. Aug. 28, 2008), I explained Job’s “repentance” in 42:6, in a manner that bears repeating here:

Bildad applies the doctrine of retribution first to Job’s deceased children. “If your children sinned against him, / he delivered them into the power of their transgression” (8:4); according to Seow, he thus “raises the possibility, already considered by Job (1:5), that his children had offended God” (op. cit., on vv. 3-4). But his direct advice to Job is to repent. “If you will seek God / and make supplication to the Almighty, / if you are pure and upright, / surely then he will rouse himself for you / and restore to you your rightful place” (vv. 5-6). Job’s “latter days” will then be greater than his “small” beginning (v. 7). We know from the Epilogue (42:7-17), that the last point will be true, but not as a result of the kind of “repentance” that Bildad calls for, though Job does say that he has misspoken (42:3); “therefore I despise myself, / and repent (yT9m4h1n9w4, w^enichamtî) in dust and ashes” (42:6; cf. 40:4-5). The term translated “repent” in 42:6 apparently means “regret” (1 Sam. 15:23), “(allow oneself to) be sorry” (Ps. 90:13; Judg. 21:8, 15), or “comfort, console oneself” (Gen. 24:67) (William L. Holladay, A Concise Hebrew and Aramaic Lexicon of the Old Testament, s.v. Mhn, n-ch-m), though some see it as repenting of sin. The more common term for repenting of sin is bUw (šûv), which has many meanings, variations on the basic meaning “turn” or “return” (Holladay, s.v. bUw, šûv). The former term is frequently used of God when he changes his mind or “relents,” as in Jeremiah 18:8: “but if that nation, concerning which I have spoken, turns (bw!v4, wešāv) from its evil, I will change my mind (yT9m4H1n9v4, wenichamtî) about the disaster that I intended to bring on it” (NRSV). For “I will change my mind,” the Authorized or King James version has “I will repent,” and Today’s New International Version has “I will relent.” In this instance the human turning from evil is expressed by the verb bUw (šûv), and the resulting change of God’s mind by the verb Mhn (n-ch-m, cf. Jer. 26:3). Two verses later, the LORD says, “But if it [i.e. ‘that nation (yOGh1, haggôy, v. 8)] does evil in my sight, not listening to my voice, then I will change my mind (yT9m4H1n9v4, w^enichamtî) about the good that I had intended to do to it” (Jer. 18:10). In Jeremiah 31:19 he puts these words in the mouth of Ephraim, “For after I had turned away (yb9Uw, šûvî) I repented (yT9m4H1n9, nichamtî) . . .” and suggests that it leads to the LORD’s mercy on Ephraim (v. 20). So, while the sense, “I repent of sin” is possible in Job 42:6, in the light of God’s overwhelming speech about his powers over the world, the LORD tells the friends of Job, “you have not spoken of me what is right, as my servant Job has done” (v. 8), which would seem to clear Job of sinning in the strict sense. Adam Clarke explains Job’s meaning in using the word “repent” in v. 6:

I am deeply distressed on account of the imaginations of my heart, the words of my tongue, and the acts of my life. I roll myself in the dust and sprinkle ashes upon my head. Job is now sufficiently humbled at the feet of Jehovah; and having earnestly and piously prayed for instruction, the Lord, in a finishing speech, which appears to be contained in the first fourteen verses of chap. xi., perfects his teaching on the subject of the late controversy, which is concluded with, ‘When thou canst act like the Almighty,’ which is, in effect, what the questions and commands amount to in the preceding verses of that chapter, ‘then will I also confess unto thee, that thy own right hand can save thee.’ (Adam Clarke, Commentary, vol. III., p 192 on Job. 42:6)

So we may conclude that Bildad’s advice to repent, advice which is appropriate in many human situations, was inappropriate in this instance. (quoted from August 28, 2008)

Following Job’s “repentance” (42:6), the LORD rebukes Eliphaz and his friends: “My wrath is kindled against you and against your two friends; for you have not spoken of me what is right, as my servant Job has.” (v. 7). Seow notes that:

Job is judged in 38:2 to have spoken ignorantly about God, yet he is judged here to have spoken correctly about God; Job was right about his innocence and the fact that his suffering came from God. The friends who were quick to defend God, on the other hand, were wrong. Moreover, the friends are regarded as fools, just like Job’s wife, who had encouraged Job to curse God and die (2:10). Still, there is hope for them through sacrifice and through intercession by Job, a veritable testimony to his acceptance by God. (op. cit., on Job 42:7-9).

The friends are instructed to “offer up for yourselves a burnt offering,” at which “my servant Job shall pray for you, for I will accept his prayer not to deal with you according to your folly,” says the LORD, explaining that “you have not spoken of me what is right, as my servant Job has done” (v. 8). And they do as they have been instructed (v. 9). Mayer Gruber comments on the sacrifice:

A bull, according to Lev. 4:1-21, is appropriate for the sin or purification offering of either ‘the anointed priest’ or ‘the whole community of Israel.’ Job’s friends repeatedly offended God by intimating that Job somehow brought his suffering upon himself. They describe themselves and are described by Job as communal leaders. It is altogether appropriate that they should be asked to present, in addition to an unspecified number of burnt offerings, the sin offering appropriate either to ‘the anointed priest’ or ‘the whole community.’ Each of the seven rams would be equally appropriate as expiation for sacrilege (Lev. 5:15; cf. Job 42:7): ‘when a person, without knowing it, sins in regard to any of the LORD’s commandments about things not to be done, and then realizes his guilt’ (Lev. 5:17) or ‘when a person sins and commits a trespass [i.e., sacrilege] against the LORD by dealing deceitfully with his fellow’ (Lev. 5:21). The author of the book of Job knew the Torah, and therefore knew quite well that both seven bulls and seven rams have nothing to do with what is commonly called a burnt offering. Job must pray for the friends, showing the empathy that they had not shown, and leaving his cocoon of self-interest and self pity. (The Jewish Study Bible, 2004, pp. 1561-1562 on Job 42:8)

The restoration of Job’s “fortunes” (v. 10) seems almost anticlimactic in the light of the LORD’s “reversal” of the statuses of Job and his friends. But we note that, when Job “had prayed for his friends,” the LORD’s restoration “gave Job twice as much as he had before” (v. 10). His livestock herds were doubled (v. 12, cf. 1:3), but he was given the same number of sons and daughters (v. 13, cf. 1:2). The sons and daughters of the first family were not named, but the three daughters of the second family are named, Jemimah (‘Dove’), Keziah (Cinnamon’), and Keren-happuch (‘Horn of Eyeshadow,’ v. 14; translations by Seow, op. cit.), and praised for their beauty. “In all the land there were no women so beautiful as Job’s daughters” (v. 15a). They were treated as the equals of their brothers with respect to the inheritance (v. 15b). Although Job’s disease is not mentioned in the restoration (cf. Seow on v. 10), he has a long and satisfying life. “After this Job lived one hundred and forty years, and saw his children, and his children’s children, four generations” (v. 16). “And Job died, old and full of days” (v. 17).

Acts 16:16-24

Paul and Silas in Prison

16 One day, as we were going to the place of prayer, we met a slave-girl who had a spirit of divination and brought her owners a great deal of money by fortune-telling. 17 While she followed Paul and us, she would cry out, “These men are slaves of the Most High God, who proclaim to you a way of salvation.” 18 She kept doing this for many days. But Paul, very much annoyed, turned and said to the spirit, “I order you in the name of Jesus Christ to come out of her.” And it came out that very hour.

19 But when her owners saw that their hope of making money was gone, they seized Paul and Silas and dragged them into the marketplace before the authorities. 20 When they had brought them before the magistrates, they said, “These men are disturbing our city; they are Jews 21 and are advocating customs that are not lawful for us as Romans to adopt or observe.” 22 The crowd joined in attacking them, and the magistrates had them stripped of their clothing and ordered them to be beaten with rods. 23 After they had given them a severe flogging, they threw them into prison and ordered the jailer to keep them securely. 24 Following these instructions, he put them in the innermost cell and fastened their feet in the stocks. (Acts 16:16-24, NRSV)

On August 1, 2007 (Wednesday in the week of the Sunday closest to July 27, Year One), comments were repeated with some editing and supplement from September 20, 2006 (Wednesday in the week of the Sunday closest to September 14, Year Two); they are repeated again here:

When Paul and company arrived in Philippi, “on the sabbath day we went outside the gate by the river, where we supposed there was a place of prayer; and we sat down and spoke to the women who had gathered there” (Acts 16:13). For a while, at least, this continued as their meeting place. So it was on the way “to the place of prayer,” when, as Luke says, “we met a slave-girl who had a spirit of divination and brought her owners a great deal of money by fortune-telling” (v. 16). According to Beverly Roberts Gaventa, the words “spirit of divination” are literally “a spirit of the python” (pneu:ma puvqwna, pneuma pythōna), which was associated with the Delphic oracle” (HarperCollins Study Bible, rev. ed., 2006, on Acts 16:16).

This was the beginning of “many days” when she would follow them and cry out, “These men are slaves of the Most High God, who proclaim to you a way of salvation” (vv. 17-18a). We might wonder whether Paul–or perhaps some modern preacher–would welcome this free publicity. But Paul would have none of it, and considering the source, he turned to exorcism. “Paul, very much annoyed, turned and said to the spirit, ‘I order you in the name of Jesus Christ to come out of her.’ And it came out that very hour” (v. 18b). But this action of Paul had repercussions. The girl’s owners had lost her as a source of income, so “they seized Paul and Silas and dragged them into the marketplace before the authorities” (v. 19). The accusation is unusual. Later in Thessalonica (Acts 17:5-7) and Corinth (18:12-17), Paul’s opposition will come from the Jews, but here the charge is that they “are disturbing our city; they are Jews” (v. 20), “and are advocating customs that are not lawful for us as Romans to adopt or observe” (16:21). According to Gaventa, “The charge against Paul and Silas manipulates opinion by characterizing them as outsiders” (ibid., on v. 21). Here, the Judeo-Christian tradition confronts paganism. According to Christopher R. Matthews, “Acts frowns on making money by magical or supernatural means (see 8:18-24; 19:25n)” (NOAB, 3^rd ed., 2001, on Acts 16:19). His cross-reference is to the comments on burning books of magic later at Ephesus (19:19). Matthews says, “The story makes it clear that the name [i.e. the Christian way] does not belong to the realm of magic. On a number of occasions Acts attempts to distinguish Christian miracle working from the activities of religious charlatans and profiteers” (on 19:15-16). When “the crowd joined in attacking them” (16:22a) and they were stripped, flogged with rods, and put in prison (vv. 22b-23), the jailor follows the instructions of the magistrates (v. 24a, cf. v. 20), “and put[s] them in the innermost cell and fasten[s] their feet in the stocks” (v. 24b). From the Roman perspective, they should be totally secure–barring such events as earthquakes–but that comes later (v. 26).

This would be one of the “far more imprisonments, with countless floggings” to which Paul later refers in 2 Corinthians 11:23, but it is the only imprisonment reported by Luke prior to the time when he was taken into custody in Jerusalem (Acts 21). This one example of such an imprisonment reminds us of Luke’s pattern of giving one extensive description of various kinds of situations, for example, one example of an extensive sermon by Paul in a synagogue (13:16-41), and another of a sermon to a Gentile audience (17:22-31).

Tomorrow’s reading is about the miraculous deliverance of Paul and Silas from prison, but for now we leave them in prison.

John 12:20-26

20 Now among those who went up to worship at the festival were some Greeks. 21 They came to Philip, who was from Bethsaida in Galilee, and said to him, “Sir, we wish to see Jesus.” 22 Philip went and told Andrew; then Andrew and Philip went and told Jesus. 23 Jesus answered them, “The hour has come for the Son of Man to be glorified. 24 Very truly, I tell you, unless a grain of wheat falls into the earth and dies, it remains just a single grain; but if it dies, it bears much fruit. 25 Those who love their life lose it, and those who hate their life in this world will keep it for eternal life. 26 Whoever serves me must follow me, and where I am, there will my servant be also. Whoever serves me, the Father will honor. (John 12:20-26, NRSV)

On April 3, 2007 (Tuesday of Holy Week, Year One), comments were repeated from March 22, 2006 (Tuesday of Holy Week, Year One) when they were repeated on March 22, 2005 (Tuesday of Holy Week, Year One), and were repeated again on September 20, 2006 (Wednesday in the week of the Sunday closest to September 14, Year Two). They are repeated again here.

All of the Gospels anticipate the Church’s mission to the Gentiles, each in it’s own way. From four Gentile women in the genealogy of Jesus (Tamar, Mt. 1:3, Rahab and Ruth, v. 5, and the wife of Uriah [Bathsheba], v. 6), the Magi of the Christmas story to the Great Commission to “make disciples of all nations” (28:19), Matthew clearly looks forward to the mission to the Gentiles, though he includes Jesus’ instruction to the disciples, “Go nowhere among the Gentiles, and enter no town of the Samaritans, but go rather to the lost sheep of the house of Israel” (Mt. 10:5-6). Mark refers to Jesus’ tour north from Galilee, where he healed (exorcised) the daughter of a Syrophoenician woman (Mk. 7:24-30). Luke’s second volume, the Acts of the Apostles, describes the mission to the Gentiles in detail after narrating events by which God confirmed the mission (e.g., Peter’s ministry in Cornelius’ house); but he has many hints, for example, a genealogy that goes back to Adam, the account of Jesus’ healing of the Centurion’s slave (7:1-10), and so forth. But today’s reading from John offers an intriguing example. At the close of Jesus’ public ministry, after the raising of Lazarus has pushed the Pharisees to the limit (Jn. 11:46-53; 12:19), and before Jesus, “troubled” in soul, says this is the “hour”: “Now my soul is troubled. And what should I say–‘Father, save me from this hour’? No it is for this reason that I have come to this hour. Father, glorify your name” (12:27-28), he has a brief encounter with “some Greeks. John tells us, “Now among those who went up to worship at the festival were some Greeks” (Jn. 12:20). It was Philip, whose Greek name is the name of the father of Alexander the Great, whom the Greeks first addressed. “They [the Greeks who wanted to approach Jesus] came to Philip, who was from Bethsaida in Galilee, and said to him, ‘Sir, we wish to see Jesus’ ” (v. 21). An aside might be appropriate here. As a guest speaker in a large Friends church many years ago, I was impressed to find these words taped to the pulpit: “Sir, we would see Jesus.” It as much as said, “You are not in this pulpit to speculate or share your own ideas, but to preach Christ for this congregation.” But to return to John’s narrative, Philip responded quickly to the Greeks’ inquiry. He “went and told Andrew; then Andrew and Philip went and told Jesus” (v. 22).

Jesus’ response to these Greeks, though apparently brief, leads into a speech that essentially concludes John’s narrative of Jesus’ public ministry, and marks a decisive turn in the narrative at large. “Jesus answered them, ‘The hour has come for the Son of Man to be glorified’ ” (v. 23). He thus announces the coming of his “hour,” of which, up to this point, he has said, “has not yet come” (2:4b; cf. 7:30; 8:20). This and what follows, amounts to a description of the significance, not only of Jesus’ public ministry, but the meaning of his “glorification,” a term that suggests John’s understanding of the arrest, trial, crucifixion and resurrection to follow in what Raymond E. Brown calls “the Book of Glory” (Jn. 13:1-20:31, The Gospel according to John XIII-XXI, Anchor Bible 29A, 1966, p. ix). “Very truly,” says Jesus, “unless a grain of wheat falls into the earth and dies, it remains just a single grain; but if it dies, it bears much fruit” (v. 24). This metaphor refers, of course, to his coming crucifixion and resurrection, but, by extension to our death and resurrection as well (cf. Paul’s similar metaphor, 1 Cor. 15:35-38, 42-44).

We, too, should aspire with Paul “to know Christ and the power of his resurrection and the sharing of his sufferings by becoming like him in his death, [so that] if somehow [we] may attain the resurrection from the dead” (Phil. 3:10-11). But Jesus continues with an interpretation of his reference of the dying and rising of a grain of wheat. “Those who love their life lose it, and those who hate their life in this world will keep it for eternal life. Whoever serves me must follow me, and where I am, there will my servant be also. Whoever serves me, the Father will honor” (Jn. 12:25-26; cf. Mk. 8:34-35; Mt. 16:24-25; Lk. 9:23-24).

Ronald D. Worden, Ph.D.

rdworden@hgst.edu

deanworden@comcast.net