Job 16 and Book of job

Job 16-17 may be likened to a scene revealed by a high-intensity, high-definition camera or television. It records the same information as its less refined counterpart, but it does so with more sharpness, color and liveliness. The three themes we encounter in these chapters are familiar themes, but Job develops them with such focus and clarity that their description easily lodges in our minds. In short, the themes are God's attack of Job, Job's growing hope and Job's inconsolable grief.

The Divine Attack

Job suspected as early as his second speech that God was behind his brutal assault. "For the arrows of the Almighty are in me; my spirit drinks their poison (6:4)." Job couldn't understand it. "Why have you made me your target (7:20)?" God seemed to be controlled by unremitting anger (9:5, 13) in destroying Job (10:8).

But in 16:7-14 Job piles up unforgettably vivid pictures to describe that attack. God has gnashed Job with his teeth (v.9), mashed and torn Job in wrath (v.9), dashed him to pieces when he seized him by the neck (v.12), smashed him hopelessly with the fury of the divine energy and slashed him unmercifully by cutting open his kidneys and pouring out his gall on the ground (v.13). The piling up of colorful terms to stress God's attack emphasizes Job's sudden and irreversible tragedy. In a word, "I was at ease, and he broke me in two (16:12)."

Hope Again

An advanced essay will go into this hope in more detail. It is enough to say here that in the midst of Job's most frightening description of his torments hope once again blazes forth. This time it is a more defiant and more tangible hope than in chs. 9 or 14. The reference to the earth not covering his blood (16:18) is reminiscent of the blood of Abel crying out for vindication after his murder by Cain (Gen. 4:10). Plaintively, defiantly, insistently it calls. Then Job talks about a witness in heaven who will vindicate him (16:19). His anguish has driven him to posit another heavenly creature to buttress his cause. Earlier Job couldn't even entertain the idea of a heavenly umpire; now that thought is front and center.

Job's Grief

Soon, however, Job's grief returns. Earlier we heard him saying that he would never see good again (7:7) and that his hope was a mirage (14:18-22), but now he lingers on his grief. The thought is not sustained; it is like a staccato or wavelike motion, as if the surges of overmastering grief overtake him and then leave temporarily. Three verses capture its power: "My spirit is broken, my days are extinct, the grave is ready for me (17:1);" "My eye has grown dim from grief, and all my members are like a shadow (17:7);" and then, most poignant, "My days are past, my plans are broken off, the desires of my heart (17:11)." Numbing, immobilizing, enervating grief is the place to which Job has come. It opens its vast arms and welcomes him.

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