Job 2, Chapter 3

Job 2:1-3:

 “1. Again there was a day when the sons of God came to present themselves before the LORD, and Satan also came among them to present himself before the LORD. 

“2 And the LORD said to Satan, “Whence have you come?” Satan answered the LORD, “From going to and fro on the earth, and from walking up and down on it.” 

“3 And the LORD said to Satan, “Have you considered my servant Job, that there is none like him on the earth, a blameless and upright man, who fears God and turns away from evil? He still holds fast his integrity, although you moved me against him, to destroy him without cause.”

The story repeats itself but with a final difference.

The time between the two assemblies of the sons of Elohim is not mentioned, it seems it happened soon after the first strike against Job. We see as before, the Heavenly assembly of the sons of Elohim where each presents himself before the Eternal. Satan also comes among them–same as last time and with the same emphasis to show that he is not really included as a “son of Elohim,” rather an infiltrator or usurper. He claims to have walked up and down on the Earth or in other words, claims to be the representative of our world. He has no good words to report about anyone, only accusations of the most righteous man on the earth–Job. 

And Satan, as before is determined to destroy righteous Job and to bring doubt upon the wisdom of the Most High. And again, the Lord asks him: “from whence do you come?” As if God is taunting Satan again, “why are you here, have you not done enough damage? He brings up Job again and again Satan accuses him of unfair judgment of Job:

Job 2:4-6:

“4 Then Satan answered the LORD, “Skin for skin! All that a man has he will give for his life. 5 But put forth thy hand now, and touch his bone and his flesh, and he will curse thee to thy face.” 6 And the LORD said to Satan, “Behold, he is in your power; only spare his life.”

Satan continues to accuse the Eternal in front of the Sons of Elohim. They are witnesses of this trial of Job. How would they have reacted if God had said: “Enough” of your accusations, and banned Satan forever from the courtroom? Might there have been doubt in someone’s mind that perhaps the accuser was right? It is almost as if God was on trial and not Job. It might be unfair to ask this, but it seems that Job was the test for the honor of the Almighty Judge of the universe. What God did with this would determine, perhaps for all time, what the Universe thought of Him. Why does this matter? Why, if it was going to be so damaging to God’s reputation, did he not just destroy Satan, and poof, he is gone forever? So then what would the Universe have done? They might have obeyed God, but would it have been from love and respect? Indeed the Eternal was in a hard place with no wiggle room! 

What God should have done is a dangerous area for humans to contemplate. We don’t want to blame the Eternal for playing games with human lives just to save His reputation in the universe. It is definitely a hard question,  and as humans who have also been tested at times with apparent injustice, it is easy to doubt that we even matter– that we are mere dust anyway–that there is no Supreme Being in charge of what happens to us…but when faced with joining the accuser and his hatred of all that is good, let us patiently wait for the outcomes and never swerve in our trust in Hashem. That is what Job did and what he said later:

“Though He slay me, yet will I trust in Him.” (ch. 13:15). In the end we will see how things worked out for him. 

Job 2:7-8: “So Satan went forth from the presence of the LORD, and afflicted Job with loathsome sores from the sole of his foot to the crown of his head. “And he took a potsherd with which to scrape himself, and sat among the ashes.”

Now Job suffers and tries to relieve himself by scraping his sores and sitting in a pile of ashes. 

Job’s wife turns tempter:

Job 2:9-10: “Then his wife said to him, “Do you still hold fast your integrity? Curse God, and die.” But he said to her, “You speak as one of the foolish women would speak. Shall we receive good at the hand of God, and shall we not receive evil?” In all this Job did not sin with his lips.”

If we look at Job’s wife and how much she suffered we may understand why she said what she said. She had lost as much as Job had. A woman’s children are the offspring of her womb and she feels very deeply. She also was left without much hope of any support. Job appeared ready to die at any moment. 

Yet, what she said was used to tempt Job to doubt God’s wisdom and in that she erred. How would it be  possible to restrain one’s lips in a time like this? Yet Job rebuked her simply as being foolish (נָבָל nâbâl) and further educated her about being willing to accept bad times along with the good. If we look at the Hebrew word above: נָבָל nâbâl, we see the name of the husband of Abigail who hated David and died upon hearing what she had done to help him. 

 It is very clear that Job did well in saying that we need to accept good as well as evil from the hand of the Lord. No, he didn’t blame Satan, he put the source of it all squarely in the Hands of the Creator. And the verse says that in this Job did not sin with his lips.

Upon this three of Job’s friends (Eli’phaz the Te’manite, Bildad the Shuhite, and Zophar the Na’amathite) get together when they hear about Job’s calamity and decide to visit him. (see verses 11-13). They sit on the ground for 7 days during which time they do not speak to him as they observe his suffering. This seems to be where the practice of sitting shiva  (see link) began.

The three friends came from different places in the middle east. Maybe there is a reason for mentioning these places. Teman is a place in Saudi Arabia, Shuhu is a place near the Euphrates in modern day Turkey, and Naamah is a place that would correspond anciently to Southern Canaan or today, Judea and Samaria, known as the West Bank to non Zionists. (Link). How they all got together is a bit of a mystery, but perhaps the event was long enough that the surrounding nations heard about it. 

Job is mentioned as from the land of Uz which is somewhere in the Middle East, but the location is not clear. Maybe the Negev of Israel or part of Jordan. Wikipedia. Uz was the name of a grandson of Shem. Uz is thought to be a place in Aramea (named for Aram son of Shem). This is modern day Syria. The other possibility is Edom or Saudi Arabia, but the majority of Biblical references tie Uz to Aram or Aramea. (Link).

Where did Job live and who was he really?

As far as who Job descended from, it’s pretty sketchy, other than a possibility in Genesis 46:13, which some Bible scholars support the idea that he was one of the sons of Issachar who was included in those who migrated to Egypt with Jacob during the famine in the land of Canaan. Job is also mentioned in the genealogy of Jacob in 1 Chronicles 7:1. (Note: Most Bibles render the name Jashub or Yashuv in 1 Chronicles which is difficult to explain: for example why is the son of Isaacar called iov or Job in Genesis 46, and the same son in the lineage, called Jashub or Yashuv later in other places?) 

Did Issachar live in Aramea? Maybe. As mentioned above, Uz (Job’s country) is most likely located in Aram. Two schools of thought find him in Aram or in Edom. What seems to tie Uz to Aram if this is the same Job that the book is written about, is that  Jacob is called a wandering Aramean by Moses in Deu 26:5 when instructing Israel about bringing an offering from the harvest of the firstfruits once they entered the land of Israel: 

“Then you shall declare before the LORD your God: “My father was a wandering Aramean, and he went down into Egypt with a few people and lived there and became a great nation, powerful and numerous.”

But some things do not add up to make Job a son of Issachar who traveled to Egypt with Jacob. It is close, perhaps not exact. Was Job too old when he died to be alive much later than the time of Abraham? Is it possible that he is the same Job as mentioned in Jacob’s genealogy and went down to Egypt and lived part of his later life during Joseph’s rulership? So Job remains a mystery. Is the story a mere parable for all of us? Maybe. I like to think that it is written that way for us to apply the lessons personally. 

Something else that possibly ties Job to the lineage of Jacob is that Eliphaz, one of the three friends who tormented Job with accusations, was possibly a son of Esau.

The Chicago Bible Students website says: 

“We also read that Jacob had a twin brother called Esau, who had 4 sons, one of them named Eliphaz. (1 Chronicles 1:35)”

“Within the book of Job, we find both names. Job had three comforters, or friends, who came to talk with him; one man was called Eliphaz (Job 2:11). Thus, the relationship between Job and Eliphaz may be proven by connecting Genesis 46, 1 Chronicles 1, and Job 2. However, some may say that the people in the book of Job reference a different Job and a different Eliphaz. Are there any other scriptures which might further connect them? Yes!”

“In Eliphaz’s talk to Job he said, “What knowest thou, that we know not? what understandest thou, which is not in us?  With us are both the grayheaded and very aged men, much elder than thy father.” Job 15:9,10”

“Eliphaz mentioned Job’s father, and he indicated that he knew him. He also mentioned that one of them (indirectly pointing back to himself) was older than his father. Eliphaz mentioned that he was older than Job’s father (Issachar), and that was very true. We remember that Esau married when he was only 40 years old (Genesis 26:34), and he took two wives. Jacob didn’t get married until he was about 70 years old. So of course Esau’s sons were older than Jacob’s sons. This was exactly what Eliphaz said – that he (Eliphaz) was older than his father (Issachar). So this scripture supports the assertion that the genealogy from Genesis is connected to Job.” 

There is one more thing connected to the name Job (Yov) versus Jashuv (Yashuv). Considering the meanings of name and the stories of name changes in Tanakh, ie: Avram/Avraham, Yacov/Yisrael, is it possible the Job’s name was changed, even in the literature, to represent what happened to him? 

Let’s have a look at the Hebrew:

From Brown Driver Briggs Hebrew dictionary:

 “אִיּוֹב ʼÎyôwb, ee-yobe’; from H340; hated (i.e. persecuted); Ijob, the patriarch famous for his patience:—Job. 

Jashuv

 “יָשׁוּב Yâshûwb, yaw-shoob’; or יָשִׁיב Yâshîyb; from H7725; he will return; 

Job’s life turned from being persecuted to a return to blessing at the end. In a way his very life portrays this name change. 

However possible, there is a lot of evidence to show that his name was never changed, for example in Ezekiel 14:14,20, he is still referred to as Job. 

There is one possibility and that is that in the masoretic text, there could be scribal errors. 

“Over centuries of hand-copying ancient Hebrew manuscripts, small visual or phonetic shifts occurred between similar-looking words. The Hebrew name Yashub (יָשׁוּב, meaning “he returns”) was lightly corrupted or miscopied in certain textual traditions into the spelling resembling Iob/Yov” (Link).