THE WISDOM TRADITION

The Wisdom Tradition in the Bible as Exemplified in the book of Job

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The Wisdom Tradition in the Bible as Exemplified in the book of Job

Introduction

Of the various Wisdom books of the Old Testament the book of Job, by general consent, is outstanding both for literary beauty, for penetration of thought, and still more for the intenseness with which one of the fundamental problems of life is wrestled with. It is one thing to recognize wisdom as essential to our race, but quite another thing to know what wisdom is, where it is found, how it might be applied. (Comay, 1993) Typical understandings abound. “Is not wisdom found among the aged?” the suffering Job asks his friend Zophar, in a book of wisdom literature (Job 12:12). It is easy to answer the question 'Why do men suffer?' by saying that they suffer because they sin—easy, so long as the thinker holds himself aloof from the real facts of human experience and is content to view the whole subject in abstraction. One of the most influential theologians of our generation has contrasted what he calls the 'balcony' view of life—which looks down upon the crowded street from a comfortable detachment and philosophizes about all that appears to be taking place down there—with the view that one gets down on the street as one of the crowd itself.

Discussion

Whatever advantage is gained by the detachment of the balcony is outweighed by the lack of personal experience, personal involvement in all that is taking place. Job in the days of his ease was well content to accept the conventional solution of suffering with which he had been brought up—that a man's suffering was proportioned to his sin. But when he himself was involved in the, mystery of undeserved suffering, it assumed quite a different aspect. And the reason for the perennial appeal of the story of Job lies in the fact that the problem with which he had to grapple—and for which he found no satisfactory solution—is perhaps the most poignant problem with which ordinary men and women still have to grapple. (Fiorenza, 1994)

The bulk of the book of Job is cast in poetical form, but it is provided with a prose prologue (1:1—2:13) and a prose epilogue (42:7-17). In the prologue Job is introduced to us as a Bedouin sheikh, living in the land of Uz, in northwest Arabia, belonging to a clan which, like the Israelites, traced its ancestry back to the family of Abraham (cf. Gen. 22:21; 36:28). He was possibly of Edomite stock, as also were his friends, although there is no convincing ground for identifying him with the Edomite king Jobab of Gen. 36:33 ff.1 The prose parts of the book may be older than the main poetical part; at any rate, the reference to him in Ezek. 14:14-20 suggests that his reputation for righteousness was famed from ancient days. (Fuller, 1965)

The reader enjoys an advantage over Job and his friends; he is told at ...