Job 13:19

My final note on this verse was “They seem mutually exclusive.” Seems that neither option I have right now will be able to overcome the conundrum. Maybe I was overreacting. As I tell myself, time to pray, listen, and obey. If only I did not get distracted praying, I might listen and obey better.

The first question is whether stitch one is a statement by Job or a statement by God. There is no attribution, but my favorite source adds that it is a statement of God. He says it is the only way to overcome difficulty understanding the verse. I now think that this is the correct outcome and that my vision of a play would include Job making the quote in a voice imitating God to let it be known as a quote without mocking Him.

 

But if God says, ‘Who could contend with me?’,

   Then I must perish in silence.

 

‘Contend’ was also ‘bring charges’, ‘plead’, ‘challenge’, and ‘argue’. ‘Contend’ just seemed the right level of ‘how dare you’. ‘Who could’ was also ‘can anyone’, ‘who will’, ‘who is he who’, ‘who is it that would’, and ‘who dares’. I preferred the who even could more so than who would dare.

‘Perish in silence’ was also ‘be silent and die’, ‘keep silent and expire’, ‘shut my mouth once and die’, ‘be silent, breath my last’, and another take altogether. The other take was ‘If now I hold my tongue, I die.’ I now see that this is an attempt to understand the verse by modifying the second stitch to match the first if Job were held as speaking himself. With the first stitch being a rhetorical question we would have:

 

Who could bring charges against me?

   If I hold my tongue now, I will die.

 

So once again I am brought into a condition of not sure which is the way to go. Except Job already wants to die and cannot, so this second sentiment does not follow from everything else he says. Therefore, I am going with the first option that fits with the whole premise that God will not even let Job protest and Job will just suffer until he dies.

So, what did I learn? What little nugget can I pass along? I believe that Job was wholeheartedly for God. As such, we should never expect that his words were questioning the authority or supremacy of God. Job was simply miserable and wanting to know ‘Why me?’. Our entire lives are to learn about God and give Him glory. We do not need to understand the why, so long as we understand the who. My daily reading spoke about praying to prepare for whatever is coming. But the sentiment is not that you are preparing to do something in your own strength, but that you are preparing yourself to use the power of God to deal with whatever He has before you. He does, we just follow and praise.

Written 5/15/2024, Posted 8/10/24, Job 302