Adult Class
Job
Lesson 2
Job 3
At the conclusion of Job's seven days of silent mourning with his friends, Job launches his lament at his condition. The book shifts from its former prose form to Hebrew poetry at this point. It will remain in poetic form until the final half of the final chapter, when it reverts to prose again.
Poetry was the typical way that ancient stories were told. In a time with little writing, poetry made the exact wording of the text easier to understand and remember. But with the focus by the Israelites on literacy, the development of the prose form rose to artistic heights. Robert Alter claims that the prose form is the unique development and contribution of the Israelites, since there were no prose records prior to the Israelites. At any rate, prose is reserved for God's activity in this book, while poetry is used to reveal the actions and thoughts of Job and his friends.
Job 3 is divisible into three roughly equal sections, each of which deals with a serious question asked throughout time by people who are in severe distress. The chapter opens with the briefest of beginnings in verses one and two as Job curses his birth. This is no tirade of profanity, but a formal anathema leveled against his own birthday. His misery is obvious, but one thought never enters Job's mind: suicide. For him, life is given by God and taken by God (1:21).
Why was I ever born? Job 3:3-10.
Job opens his curse with a fascinating call for the creation order itself to roll backwards. He speaks of "day" and "night" when creation takes place "evening and morning." Job is formally calling upon the day of his birth never to have been created. He calls for the darkness of chaos to return. A literalistic rendering might be "let it be darkness" in direct opposition to God's statement, "Let there be light." He calls for God to ignore that day and then urges the day to settle back into oblivion.
He calls for his birthday to be taken off the calendar, to make it as though it had never happened. That's the one day he wishes resulted in no births at all, and no joyous shouts when a child enters the world. There is a word play here between the word for "joyous shout" and the word used earlier in verse five for "heavy, dark cloud." Job calls for the cloud to settle over and muffle the joyous shout. There should never have been any joy at his birth.
Job calls for help in cursing the day. He calls for those who are skilled in such things to take part with him and lend their expertise. These are the "sorcerers" who know all the secrets that allow them to stir up the sea-monster Leviathan, who destroys at their command. Perhaps the sea-monster can swallow up that day and make it disappear.
Job wants his birthday to be one of complete darkness, where no life can exist. There should be no hope of dawn, no messenger of the morning to give hope. That was the day that should have prevented Job from seeing life. Since it failed to keep him from being born, he has come to this terrible place in life where he is consumed by trouble, sorrow and grief. He is miserable beyond words.
Why didn't I die immediately? Job 3:11-19.
If the day of his birth cannot be destroyed and removed from the calendar, Job seeks the next best thing-his immediate death. He is distressed that he ever drew breath. At this point, he would have preferred to be discarded at birth and allowed to die rather than nurtured and cared for as he was. He holds that his parents were wrong to accept him and preserve his life rather than abandon him to swift death.
If he had died immediately, he would be at peace now. He would gain rest and release from his current agony. Job doesn't care to remember the former days when he was rich, powerful and in perfect happiness. He can only focus on his current pain. In this, we are all like Job. We only want relief from our distress and release from the agony we suffer.
Job thinks of others, like him, who had once been great and now are dead. All their works perished with them; even their cities and impressive tombs have crumbled into ruin. They, too, had great wealth, but it is forever gone from them. Unlike Job, though, they don't care about any of this. They are at peace, with nothing like his misery to disturb their rest.
Alternatively, Job suddenly asks why he couldn't have been stillborn. After all, if it must inevitably be that he was born, why couldn't he at least have lived and died in an instant? Without further comment, he returns to consider those already dead.
In death, the wicked can do no more evil and the weary gain their rest. (It is possible that Job has in mind the victims of the wicked here, but nothing is certain.) That kind of rest is something to be coveted-see Revelation 14:13. In death, the captives (perhaps prisoners of war who have been enslaved) are freed and their oppressive taskmasters have no power over them. Indeed, all classes and categories of people are represented in death. The slave and his master have absolutely equal status. It would have been better if Job had gained that status immediately at birth.
Why can't I die now? Job 3:20-26.
Job opens this section with a question asked by many in long-term, chronic distress. Why do those who are miserable have to continue living? It seems so unfair and unnecessary. After all, there are people who are eager for death and they pursue it as a wonderful goal. They are actually happy when they finally breathe their last and find a permanent home in the grave.
Job again wonders why people must keep living when God has hemmed them in on every side and driven them into an inescapable corner. It is fascinating to see that Job also considered that God had placed a hedge around him (see 1:10!)-but his view was that it was a trap designed to keep him from evading God's torments! His daily portion is "shrieks" ("sighs" is not strong enough here) and moans instead of food and water.
Job admits that what has happened to him is exactly what he always feared would happen-everything he cared about, everything he worked for has been taken away, including his joy of life. This may help to explain his "preventive" sacrifices on behalf of his children, motivated as much by fear as by piety. Regardless, the final verdict on his condition is that there is for Job no peace, no quietness (calm), no rest-just more misery with no hope in sight. And then his friends begin to speak.