Today, I am reading and commenting on  Job 29-33.

I am always struck by Job’s friend Elihu.  He is not mentioned earlier in the Book, when the other three were first introduced, and he is not mentioned at the end when God tells the other three to ask Job to pray for them.  In today’s passage we are told that Elihu was angry with Job for justifying himself rather than God, and that he was angry with the other three friends because they condemned Job, but could not refute his arguments.  Now I want to consider what Elihu had to say.  He acknowledges that it was right that he wait and listen while the others, his elders, spoke, but now that they have had their say (and failed to prove Job wrong), he would speak.  In his speech Elihu makes two statements which show greater wisdom than anything said by Job’s other friends.  Elihu declares that he is no better than Job.  He is as much of a flawed, limited mortal as Job.  Then he challenges Job’s complaint that God does not respond when mortals cry out to Him.  Elihu contends that God does indeed speak to us, but we, all too often, fail to hear when He does so.  Elihu makes the claim that God’s apparent silence is our fault for not listening, not God’s fault for failing to speak.  This should remind us of the still, small voice with which God spoke to Elijah, but Elihu does go on to list some of the ways in which God speaks to some of us.

I use the daily Bible reading schedule from “The Bible.net” for my daily Bible reading.

Today, I am reading and commenting on  Job 29-33.

Elihu responds to Job in today’s passage, he is the only one of Job’s friends whom God does not condemn when He finally speaks.  Also, Elihu is not mentioned at the beginning of the book when Job’s other friends are introduced.  This, and some stylistic differences, have led some scholars to conclude that Elihu’s portion is a later addition to the Book of Job.  We should certainly be aware of the possibility that what Elihu said was added by a later scribe.  Nevertheless, there are a couple of things in what Elihu says to which we should pay attention.  Elihu starts out by telling Job that he, Elihu, was no better than Job, that Job should not fear him.  Elihu made clear that he did not think he was better than Job, and that none of what either of them said would change that. Elihu also challenges Job’s contention that God does not speak.  We, as human beings, often miss what God has to say, but that does not mean the He does not speak to us.  Elihu is right, God is not silent.  If we will buy open our ears, we will hear what He has to say.

I use the daily Bible reading schedule from “The Bible.net” for my daily Bible reading.

I am using the daily Bible reading schedule from “The Bible.net” for my daily Bible reading.

Today, I am reading and commenting on Job 29-33.

We can take a lesson about what is important in life from Job’s list of things of which he is not guilty.  The first of those things, and one to which he returns after touching on another, is lust.  He emphasizes that he has not looked on a woman with lust and calls lust a shameful sin.  The presentation here suggests to me that when a society starts to find lust acceptable all of the other sins become more prevalent.  This does not mean that the other sins to which Job refers are any less bad, just that lust is the one which we are most likely to pass over and justify in others (and perhaps in ourselves).  However, lying and deception, mistreating those over whom we have power, abusing the powerless, and greed are all deep sins of which Job finds it worth proclaiming innocence.  Most of these sins are sins of commission, but Job also gives prominence to sins of omission.  We should all be challenged by Job’s reference to the sins of failing to help the poor or allowing someone to go hungry.  Do we help the poor in all of the ways that we can?  Have we allowed someone to go hungry when it was within our power to feed them?  If we are not sure that the answer to the first is “yes” and to the second is “no”, let us look for ways to change that.

Now we hear from Elihu for the first time.  It has always struck me that Elihu is the only one of the characters in this account whom God does not chastise for what they said when He speaks.  Elihu starts by stating that he waited until his elders were done speaking before speaking his piece.  He only spoke up because he thought none of the others had made the argument which he thought most telling.  Elihu makes clear that, while he thinks he is not inferior to Job or the others, he also does not think that he is better than them.  We need to seek to emulate Elihu when we attempt to correct others, or enter into a disagreement with them.  Consider yourself neither inferior not superior to those with whom you are disputing.  Each and everyone of us has been made in the image of God.