Job and his friends held an entirely different understanding of time and lived a different pace of life. For Job and his friends to make long speeches was entirely normal and even expected. Men would patiently hear the full outpouring of an anguished heart, so what we have here is surprising rudeness from Job’s friends. Meanwhile, a long and rambling speech imploring God for some sense of relief is wholly within protocol. Should a lord bid his servant speak, it would be for the lord to choose when he’d heard enough. His silence and lack of response would be taken as a sign to keep talking. For the trio to interrupt Job’s long appeal to God was nearly unforgivable.
Most Westerners fail to understand how men spoke in ancient times in the Near East. It seems to us wandering and changing sentiments. This is false. Job is entirely consistent with his emotional outpouring. The attitudes of a wise man in his social setting are more complex and nuanced than would be imaginable in our late Western times. A primary element of protocol is for Job to speak of God’s anger, but it hardly means the same as it does in our culture. He does not suppose to know God’s feelings or motives, but refers to what he experiences at God’s hands.
So this chapter begins with a full confession that man deserves whatever sorrow God hands down. He is Creator; who would question His actions? Man is just a troublesome infestation on God’s hobby. Man isn’t worthy of God’s attention. Subtly here Job suggests it’s probably easier for those people whom God ignores as not part of His central plans. Job is held by an overpowering sense of divine calling and his flesh would be glad just for a short vacation from it. He asks that God at least let him have a sense of having fulfilled his mission before what seems his certain death soon.
It’s poetry to weave together the images of a tree that recovers at the merest hint of water before it comes to revive its roots. Even cut down, aged roots will send forth shoots. But man is more like the water in an arid country such as where Job sat. When struck down, men do not recover, but drain away and are forgotten.
The ancient Mesopotamian view of the afterlife was incomplete. Most knew there was another realm of existence they might see, something far beyond words. However, few had a clear understanding of what Jesus called “Paradise.” Even among those who did understand, Sheol remained a figure of speech for going down into the place of the dead somewhere in the bowels of the earth. While it seems Job might still cling to this old view, he also knows that God can resuscitate or resurrect the dead. He clearly expects there will be a day when the Lord will call up the dead and judge them. So Job prays that God let him pass until some later date and wrath is complete, then call him back, because even the dead will hear the call of their Creator. Job is fully aware of his Lord’s favor and expects to see Him some day.
But for now, Job’s life is full of sorrow. God has limited the days of his life. Job was confident God would cover his sins, but human hope for better days had been worn away to nothing. There’s nothing any man could do to counter God’s omnipotence. When a man dies, he’s not there to see how his hopes and dreams turned out, good or bad. Nor can his survivors know his sorrow after he’s gone. Job would be the only one to know his pain.
