Job’s Friends in Calamity
When we are in misery we dearly want friends to confide in, and we want them to empathize or at least sympathize with us. Sometimes we’ll settle for just having others in the same predicament so we don’t have to suffer alone.
When Job, a rich and godly patriarch in the Bible was suddenly hit by one calamity after another, including the sudden death of all ten of his children, four of his friends showed up to sit with him in the ash heap, where he was scraping his painful boils with pieces of broken pottery. (Ashes were considered clean and useful for healing at some point in the past, so this might have been a medical procedure).
Somewhat like when you are in the Intensive Care Ward in a hospital, people come to stare and whisper to each other about your chances of surviving, I suspect Job’s friends sat in awe and silence. They were speechless for seven days and seven nights. The Bible says they tore their robes and sprinkled dust on their heads. All but the death wail, it would appear, so they must have really thought he was dying.
But then Job spoke up and wished he had never been born, expressing his great grief.
At that his friend Eliphaz, the Temanite, spoke up, saying in effect, “Wow! How the mighty have fallen. You must have sinned big! If I were in your sandals I’d confess it to God.”
These were very wordy conversations, I’m paraphrasing, but in essence Job replied, “Don’t you see my anguish, and NO, I have not denied God. Can you prove I have sinned?”
Then Bildad jumps in with, “You’re blustering. Where there is smoke there is a fire. Confess your sin to God, and soon you’ll be laughing again.”
Job replied, “I know all that, but consider how great and awesome God is; who can really do frank business with Him?”
Then he turns to God and does ask a lot of frank questions about things he can’t understand. In all of this Job shows that he grasped the greatness, the mystery and the power of God.
Now Zophar the Naamanthite can’t resist accusing Job of mocking God. “You are talking way-way too intimately with God. Get back into your submissive role, and get rid of the sin in your life. Then you can forget all your troubles and lie down secure and unafraid.”
Joe retorts sarcastically, “Sure, all wisdom is going to die with you! Well, I have a mind too, and eyes to see how people are laughing at me. Just look at nature though. There’s all kinds of evidence that God is a wise and thoughtful Being, besides being powerful. I’d rather dwell on His sovereignty.”
He addresses God again, “I know You are profoundly great. I just wish I could talk things over with You and find out what’s going on here in my life, and why! I do believe there is no point in life aside from Your intervention and authority. Is there life after death? I think so…”
Friend Eliphaz the Temanite cuts Job off with, “Oh, you think you are so smart! You’re condemning yourself with your own words. Stop venting your rage against God. Listen, I’ll tell you how it really is–”
Read the rest of the article at Job’s Friends in Calamity
[Note: if you missed any articles in this series of article on Friendships in the Bible, and want to read them, you'll find them all linked from this index which is about Friendship]