Job 12

¹ Then Job answered and said: ² “No doubt you are the people, and wisdom will die with you. ³ But I have understanding as well as you; I am not inferior to you. Who does not know such things as these? ⁴ I am a laughingstock to my friends; I, who called to God and he answered me, a just and blameless man, am a laughingstock. ⁵ In the thought of one who is at ease there is contempt for misfortune; it is ready for those whose feet slip. ⁶ The tents of robbers are at peace, and those who provoke God are secure, who bring their god in their hand. ⁷ “But ask the beasts, and they will teach you; the birds of the heavens, and they will tell you; ⁸ or the bushes of the earth, and they will teach you; and the fish of the sea will declare to you. ⁹ Who among all these does not know that the hand of the Lord has done this? ¹⁰ In his hand is the life of every living thing and the breath of all mankind. ¹¹ Does not the ear test words as the palate tastes food? ¹² Wisdom is with the aged, and understanding in length of days. ¹³ “With God are wisdom and might; he has counsel and understanding. ¹⁴ If he tears down, none can rebuild; if he shuts a man in, none can open. ¹⁵ If he withholds the waters, they dry up; if he sends them out, they overwhelm the land. ¹⁶ With him are strength and sound wisdom; the deceived and the deceiver are his. ¹⁷ He leads counselors away stripped, and judges he makes fools. ¹⁸ He looses the bonds of kings and binds a waistcloth on their hips. ¹⁹ He leads priests away stripped and overthrows the mighty. ²⁰ He deprives of speech those who are trusted and takes away the discernment of the elders. ²¹ He pours contempt on princes and loosens the belt of the strong. ²² He uncovers the deeps out of darkness and brings deep darkness to light. ²³ He makes nations great, and he destroys them; he enlarges nations, and leads them away. ²⁴ He takes away understanding from the chiefs of the people of the earth and makes them wander in a trackless waste. ²⁵ They grope in the dark without light, and he makes them stagger like a drunken man.

Job 13

¹ “Behold, my eye has seen all this, my ear has heard and understood it ² What you know, I also know; I am not inferior to you. ³ But I would speak to the Almighty, and I desire to argue my case with God. ⁴ As for you, you whitewash with lies; worthless physicians are you all. ⁵ Oh that you would keep silent, and it would be your wisdom! ⁶ Hear now my argument and listen to the pleadings of my lips. ⁷ Will you speak falsely for God and speak deceitfully for him? ⁸ Will you show partiality toward him? Will you plead the case for God? ⁹ Will it be well with you when he searches you out? Or can you deceive him, as one deceives a man? ¹⁰ He will surely rebuke you if in secret you show partiality. ¹¹ Will not his majesty terrify you, and the dread of him fall upon you? ¹² Your maxims are proverbs of ashes; your defenses are defenses of clay. ¹³ “Let me have silence, and I will speak, and let come on me what may. ¹⁴ Why should I take my flesh in my teeth and put my life in my hand? ¹⁵ Though he slay me, I will hope in him; yet I will argue my ways to his face. ¹⁶ This will be my salvation, that the godless shall not come before him. ¹⁷ Keep listening to my words, and let my declaration be in your ears. ¹⁸ Behold, I have prepared my case; I know that I shall be in the right. ¹⁹ Who is there who will contend with me? For then I would be silent and die. ²⁰ Only grant me two things, then I will not hide myself from your face: ²¹ withdraw your hand far from me, and let not dread of you terrify me. ²² Then call, and I will answer; or let me speak, and you reply to me. ²³ How many are my iniquities and my sins? Make me know my transgression and my sin. ²⁴ Why do you hide your face and count me as your enemy? ²⁵ Will you frighten a driven leaf and pursue dry chaff? ²⁶ For you write bitter things against me and make me inherit the iniquities of my youth. ²⁷ You put my feet in the stocks and watch all my paths; you set a limit for the soles of my feet. ²⁸ Man wastes away like a rotten thing, like a garment that is moth-eaten.

A man had a tire blow out and his car came to a stop along a highway outside the fence of a large mental hospital. He got out of the car, assessed the damage, pulled a spare tire from his trunk, removed the hubcap, loosened the lugnuts, jacked the car up, removed the lugnuts, put the four lugnuts in the hubcap, took off the old tire, and replaced it with the new tire. All the while, on the other side of the fence, standing inside the yard of the mental facility, a patient in all white was casually leaning on the fence, chewing gum, and watching the man.

The man noticed him standing there as he turned back to gather the lugnuts out of the hubcap. The patient’s presence startled him just enough that he hit the hubcap with his hand tipping it over and causing all four of the lugnuts to fall into the grate of a storm drain in a ditch behind him. Flabbergasted, the man stood to see the new but unsecured tire sitting crookedly on the car, the overturned hubcap, and the lugnuts now all gone.

“Oh GREAT!” he exclaimed.

The patient, still slowly chewing gum, stood quietly watching from the other side of the fence.

Half to the patient and half to himself, the man said aloud, “Now what am I going to do?!”

The man behind the fence cleared his throat. The man outside of the fence turned to stare at him. “Why don’t you just take one lugnut off of the other three tires so you’ll have three on each tire?”

The man beside the car paused. “That’s a brilliant idea he said. Huh.”

He turned back to the car to begin his work then paused and turned again to speak to the patient.

“Hey, tell me something. How is it that I’m out here and didn’t think of that and you’re in there and you did think of it?”

The man in all white behind the hospital fence did not miss a beat. “Mister, I’m in here because I’m crazy, not because I’m stupid.”

Nobody likes to be thought of as stupid. That is so today and it was so in Job’s day. In Job’s response to Zophar the Naamathite, he makes this clear. Job is tired of being patronized, tired of being treated like a fool. He wants to impress upon his friends that he understands that God is sovereign, but he still maintains that he is not being punished for secret sins.

Job agrees with the basic premise that God is ultimately sovereign and that the unfolding of all things is ultimately in his hand.

Job 12 marks something of a breaking point for Job. He has sparred with his friends numerous times, but now he appears to bristle at the patronizing tone they have taken in lecturing him.

¹ Then Job answered and said: ² “No doubt you are the people, and wisdom will die with you. ³ But I have understanding as well as you; I am not inferior to you. Who does not know such things as these? ⁴ I am a laughingstock to my friends; I, who called to God and he answered me, a just and blameless man, am a laughingstock. ⁵ In the thought of one who is at ease there is contempt for misfortune; it is ready for those whose feet slip. ⁶ The tents of robbers are at peace, and those who provoke God are secure, who bring their god in their hand. ⁷ “But ask the beasts, and they will teach you; the birds of the heavens, and they will tell you; ⁸ or the bushes of the earth, and they will teach you; and the fish of the sea will declare to you. ⁹ Who among all these does not know that the hand of the Lord has done this? ¹⁰ In his hand is the life of every living thing and the breath of all mankind. ¹¹ Does not the ear test words as the palate tastes food? ¹² Wisdom is with the aged, and understanding in length of days.

Verse 1 is as sarcastic an insult as one is likely to find anywhere: “No doubt…wisdom will die with you.” It is as if Job is saying, “Oh, yes, you truly are the wisest, are you not? Nobody knows as much as you!” He then retaliates by assuring Zophar the Naamathite that, yes, Job too knows the Lord and even knows certain things about him. His friends do not have a corner on theology and they should stop thinking that they do. Didymus the Blind paraphrased Job like this:

“But I have understanding as well as you,” and still I do not think the same thoughts as you. Or do you think that your thinking is unsurpassed? I am reasonable too, and reason is not different from reason, but the difference is in the application. So it is said for example about the evil ones, “Listen to me, you stubborn of heart,” for not the creature but its evil activity he calls “stubbornness of heart.”

John Chrysostom imagines Job saying, “Did I lose my common sense, by any chance, because I fell into misery?”[1]

No, Job has not become a fool. He understands who God is. Specifically, Job understands and agrees that God is sovereign over heaven and earth. He demonstrates this powerfully:

¹³ “With God are wisdom and might; he has counsel and understanding. ¹⁴ If he tears down, none can rebuild; if he shuts a man in, none can open. ¹⁵ If he withholds the waters, they dry up; if he sends them out, they overwhelm the land. ¹⁶ With him are strength and sound wisdom; the deceived and the deceiver are his. ¹⁷ He leads counselors away stripped, and judges he makes fools. ¹⁸ He looses the bonds of kings and binds a waistcloth on their hips. ¹⁹ He leads priests away stripped and overthrows the mighty. ²⁰ He deprives of speech those who are trusted and takes away the discernment of the elders. ²¹ He pours contempt on princes and loosens the belt of the strong. ²² He uncovers the deeps out of darkness and brings deep darkness to light. ²³ He makes nations great, and he destroys them; he enlarges nations, and leads them away. ²⁴ He takes away understanding from the chiefs of the people of the earth and makes them wander in a trackless waste. ²⁵ They grope in the dark without light, and he makes them stagger like a drunken man.

Job 13

¹ “Behold, my eye has seen all this, my ear has heard and understood it ² What you know, I also know; I am not inferior to you.

Job therefore makes a partial concession, but a significant one: the sovereignty and power of God are not what is being debated. The power of God is so self-evident that even the beasts of the earth know it. That God is almighty is not a great secret and it is certainly not something that his friends know and he does not.

To be challenged on one’s theology is one thing. To be treated as if you have forgotten even the rudimentary things of theology is quite another. Job appears to have begun to feel as if his friends are questioning his grasp on even the most self-evident truths. Paul speaks of the power of God as evident through the witness of creation in Romans 1.

¹⁹ For what can be known about God is plain to them, because God has shown it to them. ²⁰ For his invisible attributes, namely, his eternal power and divine nature, have been clearly perceived, ever since the creation of the world, in the things that have been made. So they are without excuse.

The question, then, is not what can God do. Job makes it abundantly clear that this is a settled question. The question is what does God do. In other words, the question of whether or not God could enact retributive justice is not the question. The question is whether or not this is, in fact, how God works.

Yet Job still maintains that Zophar and his other friends are still mistaken in their basic assumption that human tragedy is always a result of human sinfulness.

In chapter 13, Job makes it clear that this is not how God works. He knows this because he has not sinned and therefore this cannot be the cause of his tragedy.

³ But I would speak to the Almighty, and I desire to argue my case with God.

Job reveals a staggering confidence at this point. He wants his day in court. This is not presumption and it is not blasphemy. This is the confident if broken heart of one who knows that were he to admit guilt he would be violating his own conscious as well as affirming a view of God he knows is faulty. His disdain for this faulty theology and the damage it can cause can be seen in his rebuke of his friends.

⁴ As for you, you whitewash with lies; worthless physicians are you all.

Job’s friends are worthless physicians because they are offering medicine that does not address the real sickness. The wise ancient, Didymus the Blind, explains this analogy quite skillfully.

A worthless physician is literally one who applies curing strategies that are not useful for the suffering. This happens in two ways: either it is due to lack of experience in the physician or to his wickedness. The friends who are contradicted here speak out of a lack of knowledge rather than wickedness in saying, “You suffer due to your sins.”[2]

Didymus the Blind rightly argues that Job’s friends are ignorant, not malicious. Job pleads for silence and he yearns for his friends to understand that if they are wrong in what they say about God, they are guilty of bearing false witness in a most tragic way.

⁵ Oh that you would keep silent, and it would be your wisdom! ⁶ Hear now my argument and listen to the pleadings of my lips. ⁷ Will you speak falsely for God and speak deceitfully for him? ⁸ Will you show partiality toward him? Will you plead the case for God? ⁹ Will it be well with you when he searches you out? Or can you deceive him, as one deceives a man? ¹⁰ He will surely rebuke you if in secret you show partiality. ¹¹ Will not his majesty terrify you, and the dread of him fall upon you? ¹² Your maxims are proverbs of ashes; your defenses are defenses of clay. ¹³ “Let me have silence, and I will speak, and let come on me what may.

After chastising his friends for their empty and dangerous words, Job now moves to his defense. It is predicated, as always, on Job’s conviction that he is innocent.

¹⁴ Why should I take my flesh in my teeth and put my life in my hand? ¹⁵ Though he slay me, I will hope in him; yet I will argue my ways to his face.

Verse 14 is extremely important. It reveals that even now Job trusts in God even as he is convinced that God has struck him. Regardless, he trusts and he will argue his case. For those who do not realize that faith can still be faith even if it is struggling, this is a difficult verse, but, in reality, Job is saying something very similar to the suffering boy’s father in Mark 9:24: “I believe; help my unbelief!”

Job offers his defense:

¹⁶ This will be my salvation, that the godless shall not come before him. ¹⁷ Keep listening to my words, and let my declaration be in your ears. ¹⁸ Behold, I have prepared my case; I know that I shall be in the right. ¹⁹ Who is there who will contend with me? For then I would be silent and die. ²⁰ Only grant me two things, then I will not hide myself from your face: ²¹ withdraw your hand far from me, and let not dread of you terrify me. ²² Then call, and I will answer; or let me speak, and you reply to me. ²³ How many are my iniquities and my sins? Make me know my transgression and my sin. ²⁴ Why do you hide your face and count me as your enemy? ²⁵ Will you frighten a driven leaf and pursue dry chaff? ²⁶ For you write bitter things against me and make me inherit the iniquities of my youth. ²⁷ You put my feet in the stocks and watch all my paths; you set a limit for the soles of my feet. ²⁸ Man wastes away like a rotten thing, like a garment that is moth-eaten.

Again and again throughout the book, Job asserts that he is innocent.

^16b the godless shall not come before him

^18b I know that I shall be in the right

^23b Make me know my transgression and my sin.

To say that Job’s entire case depends upon his innocence is an understatement. If Job is indeed innocent his friends are mistaken about God. However, if Job is innocent it still leaves the question of why he suffers. In a sense, Job’s response to Zophar is not intended to prove what is, it is intended to prove what is not. That is, Job is simply trying at this point to prove that whatever the answer might be, it is not what his friends are claiming: the theory of retributive justice.

Job might be wrong about many things, but he is not wrong about his innocence, therefore, the answer to the question of why he suffers as he does must be situated elsewhere. This admission moves him no closer to the correct answer, but it helps to move him beyond certain wrong answers, namely, those being offered by his friends.

At this point in Job’s argument, the most significant admission is found in verse 15: “Though he slay me, I will hope in him.” It reminds us of the image of St. Peter Martyr, a Christian martyred by Cathars in the 13^th century. In some artistic depictions of his death, the Cathar stands behind Peter, killing him with a sword. In these particular scenes, Peter Martyr can be seen in his last moments of life stooped to the ground and writing with his finger in his own blood the word, “Credo,” “I believe.”

Job is having his own Peter Martyr moment. Even as he suffers, and even as he struggles to understand why he suffers, and even as he questions the throne of Heaven, he still writes in his own blood, “Credo!”

Credo…I believe…I still believe. Even if God slays me, I believe!

It raises an important question: is our faith strong enough to survive and endure even if it does not have all of the answers it wants? Can we write “Credo!” in our own blood? Are we willing to believe, even as we struggle to understand?

Job could, even in the midst of seemingly incomparable suffering, still say that he hoped and that he still believed.

Wherever you are, do not let go. Whatever you are going through, do not let go. Whatever you are suffering through, do not let go. Dare to believe, against all that your doubting mind might tell you, that God has not let go of you. For, indeed, He has not.

 

[1] Manlio Simonetti and Marco Conti, eds. Job. Ancient Christian Commentary on Scripture: Old Testament. Gen.Ed. Thomas C. Oden. Vol.VI (Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity Press, 2006), p.67.

[2] Manlio Simonetti and Marco Conti, eds., p.74.