Scripture Daily

Context No. 1889 of 4322 · Job

Context · Reflection

Job 15:1-16: in context

1Then Eliphaz the Temanite answered, 2“Should a wise man answer with vain knowledge, and fill himself with the east wind? 3Should he reason with unprofitable talk, or with speeches with which he can do no good? 4Yes, you do away with fear, and hinder devotion before God. 5For your iniquity teaches your mouth, and you choose the language of the crafty. 6Your own mouth condemns you, and not I. Yes, your own lips testify against you. 7“Are you the first man who was born? Or were you brought out before the hills? 8Have you heard the secret counsel of God? Do you limit wisdom to yourself? 9What do you know that we don’t know? What do you understand which is not in us? 10With us are both the gray-headed and the very aged men, much older than your father. 11Are the consolations of God too small for you, even the word that is gentle toward you? 12Why does your heart carry you away? Why do your eyes flash, 13that you turn your spirit against God, and let such words go out of your mouth? 14What is man, that he should be clean? What is he who is born of a woman, that he should be righteous? 15Behold, he puts no trust in his holy ones. Yes, the heavens are not clean in his sight; 16how much less one who is abominable and corrupt, a man who drinks iniquity like water!

Eliphaz answers Job a second time, and more harshly. He accuses Job of empty, crafty talk that undermines devotion to God, and then turns to condescension: are you the first man ever born? Have you heard God's secret counsel? Do you have wisdom to yourself? What do you know that we do not know? He is certain that he and his friends have cornered the truth, and that Job, in his suffering and protest, is simply and obviously wrong.

What is striking, and troubling, in Eliphaz is his certainty. He is sure, entirely sure, that he understands Job's situation, that his theology is right and Job's protest is wrong, and he presses this certainty on the suffering man with condescension: what do you know that we do not know? He does not consider, even for a moment, that he might be missing something, that his tidy explanation might not fit, that Job's protest might contain a truth he has not grasped. And in this he is wrong; the book will vindicate Job, not the friends, and rebuke them for not speaking rightly of God. Eliphaz's certainty made him both wrong and cruel. There is a warning here against the arrogant certainty that will not consider it might be mistaken. It is possible to be so sure we are right, about a matter of doctrine, about someone else's situation, about the meaning of another's suffering, that we cease to listen, dismiss what does not fit our view, and press our certainty on others with a condescension that wounds. What do you know that we do not know? is the voice of a certainty closed to correction; and it is a dangerous voice, for it can be both wrong and hurtful, as Eliphaz was to Job. The wise hold their conclusions with more humility, especially about the deep things of God and the hidden situations of others' hearts. Do you see a man wise in his own eyes? the proverb asks; there is more hope for a fool than for him. And Paul warns that the one who thinks he knows something does not yet know as he ought. A humbler uncertainty, open to the possibility that we are missing something, that our tidy explanations may not fit, is both wiser and kinder than Eliphaz's closed certainty. The one who is sure he has cornered the truth, and presses it on the suffering with condescension, may be, like Eliphaz, both mistaken and cruel.

Am I ever so certain I am right, about a matter of doctrine or about another person's situation or suffering, that I cease to listen and press my certainty with condescension, like Eliphaz asking what do you know that we do not know, and can I hold my conclusions with a humbler openness, ready to consider that I might be missing something, especially about the deep things of God and the hidden hearts of others?

Sources