Essay on The Holy Bible - Role of God in the Book of Job

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The Changing Role of God in the Book of Job

The Book of Job shows a change in God's attitude from the beginning to the end. At the beginning of the book, He is presented as Job's protector and defender. At the end He appears as the supreme being lecturing and preaching to Job with hostility, despite the fact that Job never cursed his name, and never did anything wrong. Job's only question was why God had beseeched this terrible disease on him. I intend to analyze and discuss the different roles God played in the Book of Job.

As the book opens, Job is God's "pride and joy", so to speak. Job was free of sin, he "feared God and shunned evil"(1:1). God apparently thinks higher of Job than any other mortal. This is evidenced when he tells Satan that "There is no one on Earth like him; he is blameless and upright . . ."(1:8). When Satan questions Job's faith God allows him to test Job, as if to show off his favorite servant. This is an almost human quality in God--pride. Satan's test involves the total destruction of everything Job owns and lived for: his children his animals, and his estate. Everything was destroyed but his wife, and of course the Four Messengers of Misfortune. "In all this, Job did not sin by charging God with wrongdoing"(1:22).

God shows more of the human characteristic of pride when He meets with Satan again. God is almost gloating in this brief scene. He praises Job further and maintains that Job is loyal:

Have you considered my servant Job? There is no one on

Earth like him; he is blameless and upright, a man who fears

God and shuns evil. And he still maintains his integrity, though

you incited me against him to ruin him without any rea...

... middle of paper ...

...tried to make sense out of something they could not possibly understand. God's anger could have also been instigated by the assumption that Job was getting closer and closer to cursing Him. With each step of questioning, Job's faith might have been starting to be questioned. This would embarrass God to Satan. The former seems to be the more obvious reason however, the later, my own observation can not be ignored. God exhibited human qualities in the beginning, like pride, and integrity, why would this God be immune to embarrassment?

In any case, acknowledging that Job did not curse him in all of his misfortune, God once again returned to the status of Job's protector, and Job once again became God's favorite servant. God blessed the later part of Job's life with double the fortune he had before and another ten children. Job lived a full life.

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