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"Chapter 20.
Zophar Speaks; 2nd Speech.
“You can laugh and sneer at us Job, but everything we’ve ever been taught has confirmed that the wicked may laugh for a time but their laughter soon turns to wailing. The wicked may have pride that reaches to the heavens, but they will perish in the earth like their own dung. They will disappear like a dream. The evil he has feasted on, God will cause him to vomit it up, because he has oppressed the poor and evicted them from their houses. The money he has made won’t help him when God turns his anger against him, like spears and arrows cutting him down, heaven will expose his guilt and earth will rise up and a flood will carry him away. These are the proverbs and sayings we have learnt and we know them to be true’’.
Chapter 21.
Job’s Seventh Speech.
Just do me one favour at least will you? Give me at least one consolation. Please just listen to me. Because so far you haven’t listened. When I have spoken then you can carry on mocking some more. You accuse me of being impatient. Don’t you think I have every cause to be. I am not dealing with man, I am dealing with God. If it was with a man I could easily find him and face him. But I can’t take such initiative with God.
I shudder almost to say such things as I am going to say now, for I never thought I would say such things. What I am about to say may astonish you, but it is the truth. They may be things opposite to what we have all been taught and all have believed but I must say these things even though I am almost in dread of saying them. We have always believed in God, and that He dispenses justice to men according to their deeds. But isn’t it a fact that we see much in life that seems to indicate that this is not so. Be honest, is this not true?
Do not the wicked prosper? Is it not true that their children live happily around them. Their homes are safe and no judgments from God fall on them. They and their families dance merrily through life, right on to the grave. They mock at spiritual things and say, “we don’t want God, we want money in our pockets. While we’ve got money, how do we need to serve God.? What need do we have to pray?" But who gives them their prosperity if it isn’t God? I know it’s God, but they don’t. But they don’t have to spend time thinking about their beliefs and philosophising about life. As far as they see it, it doesn’t make any difference whether they believe in God or not. You have all sorts of clichés and maxims about the wicked. You say that the “lamp of the wicked will be snuffed out” and ” that God allots his anger against the wicked’’. But how often do you see that happen? If your honest, you’ll admit it is seldom. How often are they “like chaff before the wind”? How often do they see a man struck down by God. It is so seldom, that when it happens they don’t believe it is God’s doing. We argue that a man may not receive his punishment in this life but that his children will suffer. But where is the justice in that ? Why should the guilty get away with it and the innocent suffer because of the guilty? As lawyers we know that is as far from justice as the man in the moon. The father who does all the sinning doesn’t even see the end result of his sins, borne by his children. If ever we could literally say “God knows what’s going on in this earth’’, it is now, because if we see it, God must see it also So we are not sinning against Him to say such things, even though it might seem to reflect on His justice. But it is not for us to question what the great creator chooses to do. We may not understand all that He allows and why, but it is not wrong to state facts as they exist. We don’t have to patronise God or show partiality in trying to defend Him. Nor have we to repeat maxims which are lies to pretend that everything in the garden of life is rosy and all neat, fair and square. For life is not fair and square. But we can say that it is how God determines it to be. He know best; with Him is all wisdom. All are still under His control. He judges rich and poor alike. In the end we all get the same wages whether we are rich or poor. We all die and lie in the same dust. We all get to the same place in the end.
I know that when you see my home and property in ruins, that you think it is the judgement of God on me, but ask anyone who has travelled the world a bit and ask them about whether life is fair and if all get their just rewards or not. All over the world people prosper who are ungodly. In fact they are honoured by other people. No-one ever rebukes them. Their riches make them respectable and respected. They go to the grave in peace and even after death their names are honoured. So you cannot console me with your idle narrow minded talk. What you are left with in this argument are lies and untruths.
Zophar Speaks; 2nd Speech.
“You can laugh and sneer at us Job, but everything we’ve ever been taught has confirmed that the wicked may laugh for a time but their laughter soon turns to wailing. The wicked may have pride that reaches to the heavens, but they will perish in the earth like their own dung. They will disappear like a dream. The evil he has feasted on, God will cause him to vomit it up, because he has oppressed the poor and evicted them from their houses. The money he has made won’t help him when God turns his anger against him, like spears and arrows cutting him down, heaven will expose his guilt and earth will rise up and a flood will carry him away. These are the proverbs and sayings we have learnt and we know them to be true’’.
Chapter 21.
Job’s Seventh Speech.
Just do me one favour at least will you? Give me at least one consolation. Please just listen to me. Because so far you haven’t listened. When I have spoken then you can carry on mocking some more. You accuse me of being impatient. Don’t you think I have every cause to be. I am not dealing with man, I am dealing with God. If it was with a man I could easily find him and face him. But I can’t take such initiative with God.
I shudder almost to say such things as I am going to say now, for I never thought I would say such things. What I am about to say may astonish you, but it is the truth. They may be things opposite to what we have all been taught and all have believed but I must say these things even though I am almost in dread of saying them. We have always believed in God, and that He dispenses justice to men according to their deeds. But isn’t it a fact that we see much in life that seems to indicate that this is not so. Be honest, is this not true?
Do not the wicked prosper? Is it not true that their children live happily around them. Their homes are safe and no judgments from God fall on them. They and their families dance merrily through life, right on to the grave. They mock at spiritual things and say, “we don’t want God, we want money in our pockets. While we’ve got money, how do we need to serve God.? What need do we have to pray?" But who gives them their prosperity if it isn’t God? I know it’s God, but they don’t. But they don’t have to spend time thinking about their beliefs and philosophising about life. As far as they see it, it doesn’t make any difference whether they believe in God or not. You have all sorts of clichés and maxims about the wicked. You say that the “lamp of the wicked will be snuffed out” and ” that God allots his anger against the wicked’’. But how often do you see that happen? If your honest, you’ll admit it is seldom. How often are they “like chaff before the wind”? How often do they see a man struck down by God. It is so seldom, that when it happens they don’t believe it is God’s doing. We argue that a man may not receive his punishment in this life but that his children will suffer. But where is the justice in that ? Why should the guilty get away with it and the innocent suffer because of the guilty? As lawyers we know that is as far from justice as the man in the moon. The father who does all the sinning doesn’t even see the end result of his sins, borne by his children. If ever we could literally say “God knows what’s going on in this earth’’, it is now, because if we see it, God must see it also So we are not sinning against Him to say such things, even though it might seem to reflect on His justice. But it is not for us to question what the great creator chooses to do. We may not understand all that He allows and why, but it is not wrong to state facts as they exist. We don’t have to patronise God or show partiality in trying to defend Him. Nor have we to repeat maxims which are lies to pretend that everything in the garden of life is rosy and all neat, fair and square. For life is not fair and square. But we can say that it is how God determines it to be. He know best; with Him is all wisdom. All are still under His control. He judges rich and poor alike. In the end we all get the same wages whether we are rich or poor. We all die and lie in the same dust. We all get to the same place in the end.
I know that when you see my home and property in ruins, that you think it is the judgement of God on me, but ask anyone who has travelled the world a bit and ask them about whether life is fair and if all get their just rewards or not. All over the world people prosper who are ungodly. In fact they are honoured by other people. No-one ever rebukes them. Their riches make them respectable and respected. They go to the grave in peace and even after death their names are honoured. So you cannot console me with your idle narrow minded talk. What you are left with in this argument are lies and untruths.
