Have You Considered My Servant Job?: Understanding the Biblical Archetype of Patience

311 Pages·2015·3.73 MB·English

by  Samuel E. Balentine

Have You Considered My Servant Job?
Studies on Personalities of the Old Testament
James L. Crenshaw, Series Editor
Have You Considered
My Servant Job?
Understanding the Biblical
Archetype of Patience
samuel e. balentine
The University of South Carolina Press
© 2015 University of South Carolina
Published by the University of South Carolina Press
Columbia, South Carolina 29208
www.sc.edu/uscpress
24 23 22 21 20 19 18 17 16 15 10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Balentine, Samuel E. (Samuel Eugene), 1950–
Have you considered my servant Job? : understanding the biblical archetype of
patience / Samuel E. Balentine.
pages cm. — (Studies on personalities of the Old Testament)
Includes bibliographical references and index.
ISBN 978-1-61117-451-9 (hardcover : alk. paper) — ISBN 978-1-61117-452-6 (ebook)
1.Bible. Job—Criticism, interpretation, etc. 2. Job (Biblical figure) 3. Patience—
Biblical teaching. I. Title.
BS1415.52.B35 2015
223’.106—dc23
2014044828
To Betty, Graham, and Lauren, thank you for the support and understanding
that makes it possible for me to do what I do
This page intentionally left blank
Contents
Series Editor’s Preface ix
Preface xi
Introduction xiii
Prologue
“There was once a man in the land of Uz whose name was Job” 1
Part I
Introduction to the Characters in the Didactic Tale (Job 1–2 + Job 42:7–17)
1 The Job(s) of the Didactic Tale
A Saint in the Making 15
2 God and the Satan
“Have you considered my servant Job?” 50
3 There Was Once a Woman in the Land of Uz
Job’s Wife 77
Part II
Center Stage: The Wisdom Dialogue (Job 3–42:6)
4 Job’s Words from the Ash Heap
The Scandalous Voice of Defiance 113
5 God on Trial
“Who ever challenged Him and came out whole?” (Job 9:4) 135
6 Job’s Comforters
“Do not despise the discipline of the Almighty” (Job 5:17) 156
vii
COnTenTS
7 “Then the Lord answered Job out of the whirlwind . . .” (Job 38:1, 3) 177
Epilogue
Job’s Children (Job 42:7–17) 202
Notes 221
Bibliography 255
Author Index 279
Subject Index 285
viii
Series editor’s Preface
Critical study of the Bible in its ancient Near Eastern setting has stimulated inter-
est in the individuals who shaped the course of history and whom events singled
out as tragic or heroic figures. Rolf Rendtorff’s Men of the Old Testament (1968)
focuses on the lives of important biblical figures as a means of illuminating his-
tory, particularly the sacred dimension that permeates Israel’s convictions about
its God. Fleming James’s Personalities of the Old Testament (1939) addresses an-
other issue, that of individuals who function as inspiration for their religious
successors in the twentieth century. Studies restricting themselves to a single
individual—for example, Moses, Abraham, Samson, Elijah, David, Saul, Ruth,
Jonah, Job, Jeremiah— enable scholars to deal with a host of questions: psycholog-
ical, literary, theolo gical, sociological, and historical. Some, like Gerhard von Rad’s
Moses (1960), introduce a specific approach to interpreting the Bible, hence pro-
viding valuable pedagogic tools.
As a rule these treatments of isolated figures have not reached the general
public. Some were written by outsiders who lacked a knowledge of biblical criti-
cism (Freud on Moses, Jung on Job) and whose conclusions, however provocative,
remain problematic. Others were targeted for the guild of professional biblical
critics (David Gunn on David and Saul, Phyllis Trible on Ruth, Terence Fretheim
and Jonathan Magonet on Jonah). None has succeeded in capturing the imagina-
tion of the reading public in the way fictional works like Archibald MacLeish’s
J.B. and Joseph Heller’s God Knows have done.
It could be argued that the general public would derive little benefit from
learning more about the personalities of the Bible. Their conduct, often less then
exemplary, reveals a flawed character, and their everyday concerns have nothing
to do with our preoccupations from dawn to dusk. To be sure some individuals
transcend their own age, entering the gallery of classical literary figures from
time immemorial. But only these rare achievers can justify specific treatments of
them. Then why publish additional studies on biblical personalities?
The answer cannot be that we read about biblical figures to learn ancient
history, even of the sacred kind, or to discover models for ethical action. But what
ix