Глава 42

1–6. Job's second answer. 7–16. Epilogue. Job 42:1. Job answered the Lord and said: Job 42:2. I know that You can do everything, and that Your intention cannot be stopped. The description of the hippopotamus and crocodile explains to Job the full power of divine omnipotence (cf. Job 41.2–3). And if justice rests on this property (Job 40.3–9), then he is obliged to admit that the suffering sent to people is a normal phenomenon in the matter of divine world rule. Job 42:3. Who is this one who darkens Providence, not understanding anything? - So, I spoke about what I did not understand, about things that were wonderful to me, which I did not know. Depending on this, Job recognizes his previous speeches as unfounded reasoning about what he did not understand, an unjust denial of providence (cf. Job 38.2). Job 42:4. Listen, I cried, and I will speak, and what I will ask You, explain to me. Job 42:5. I have heard of You by the hearing of the ear; now my eyes see You; Job 42:6. therefore I renounce and repent in dust and ashes. God demanded an answer from Job (Job 38.4), and it is now given by the sufferer. Everything previously said by him is a product of imperfect external experience (“heard... by the hearing of the ear”), true knowledge was communicated to him through revelation that enlightened the mind. Without doubting him, Job renounces his previous judgments, while grieving that they were expressed to him: “I repent in dust and ashes” (cf. Job 2.8, 12). Job 42:7–17. Job's Vindication Job 42:7. And it came to pass after the Lord had spoken these words to Job, that the Lord said unto Eliphaz the Temanite, My wrath burneth against thee and against thy two friends, because ye have not spoken of Me so truly as My servant Job. Job was only mistaken in his judgments about God’s attitude towards him (vv. 2-3) and was certainly right in defending his innocence. On the contrary, his friends were doubly wrong: they accused him of alleged sins without any reason (Job 22.5 etc.) and based the fact on an assumption - the thought of Divine Justice. As they are obviously insincere towards Job, they, especially Eliphaz, who with his speeches set the tone for the reasoning of his friends, incur divine wrath (cf. Job 13.7 etc.). Job 42:8. Therefore take for yourselves seven bulls and seven rams, and go to My servant Job and offer a sacrifice for yourself; and My servant Job will pray for you, for I will only accept his face, so as not to reject you because you have not spoken as truly about Me as My servant Job. The Lord’s response to Job (v. 7) serves as his justification and proves the innocence of the sufferer. A clear manifestation of this latter is Job’s performance as a priest, interceding for his friends before God. As such, even from their point of view he must be recognized as a sinless righteous man (Job 22.30; cf. Gen. 20.7, 17; Exodus 22.31; Num. 12.13, etc.). The sacrifice of propitiation is the same as at the beginning of the book (Job 1.5), the burnt offering, and the number of animals - fourteen - indicates its special solemnity. Job 42:10. And the Lord restored Job’s loss when he prayed for his friends; and the Lord gave Job twice as much as he had before. “God put an end to Job’s slavery” (instead of: “returned... the loss”), i.e., illness (Job 7.12, 13.27). Recognized as innocent, Job is healed of his illness, freed from what served in the eyes of people as proof of his sinfulness (cf. Job 10.15–17). The moment of healing coincides with the moment of sacrifice: having forgiven his friends, forgetting all the insults they caused, Job himself receives forgiveness from God. Job 42:11. Then all his brothers and all his sisters and all his former acquaintances came to him, and ate bread with him in his house, and grieved with him, and consoled him for all the evil that the Lord had brought upon him, and they each gave him a kesit and a gold ring. Just as before illness, a sign of supposed sinfulness, alienated everyone from Job, starting with his wife (Job 19.13 etc.), so now recovery, obvious proof of his righteousness, attracts relatives and friends to him. In the same way, the previous mockery (Job 19.18) and ridicule (Job 30.1) are replaced by words of consolation and the bringing of gifts - kesites (Gen. 33.19; Joshua 24.32), - a metal ingot of more than a shekel value (Gen. 33.19; cf. Job 23.16), and gold rings, - male and female jewelry ( Exodus 32.3). This is how respect for the sufferer, which had disappeared for a while, is restored. Job 42:12. And God blessed Job's last days more than his first: he had fourteen thousand flocks, six thousand camels, a thousand yoke of oxen, and a thousand donkeys. Job 42:13. And he had seven sons and three daughters. In relation to children, there is no doubling (v. 10) (cf. Job 1.2). But since dead children are not considered, according to the Old Testament view, to be lost forever (2 Samuel 12.23), then, indeed, the recovered Job had twice as many children as before. Job 42:14. And he called the name of the first Emima, the name of the second Cassia, and the name of the third Kerengappuh. "Emima" (Arabic "yemane") "dove", "pure as a dove"; “Cassia” “delicate, like the fragrance of cassia”, “Kerengappuh” “rouged horn” - graceful not so much by nature as by the use of rouge (cf. 2 Kings 9.30, Jer 4.30; Ezek 23.40), cosmetics. Job 42:15. And there were no such beautiful women in all the earth as Job’s daughters, and their father gave them an inheritance among their brothers. The names of Job's daughters were fully consistent with their appearance. According to the laws of the Israelites, daughters received the right to own land only in the absence of brothers (Numbers 27.8). The customs of the Arabs (Job 1.3) were obviously different. Job 42:16. After this Job lived a hundred and forty years, and saw his sons and his sons' sons to the fourth generation; Job's lifespan before suffering is unknown. The Greco-Slavic translation defines it at 78 years: “Job lived after the plague for one hundred and seventy years, but in all he lived two hundred and fourty eight years.” - “I saw my sons” (cf. Job 5.25) Job 42:17. and Job died in old age, full of days. Wed. Job 5.26; Gen 25.8, 35.29. Verse 17 is followed in the Greco-Slavic text by a postscript borrowed from the “Book of Syria” indicating the genealogy of Job (“the son of Zareth, the mother of Bozorrah, the son of Esau”), the time and place of life (“he will be the fifth from Abraham”; “in the land of the living Absitidia, on the borders of Idumea and Arabia”) and identifying him with the King of Edom Joab. Since it is missing in the translations of Aquila and Symmachus, it cannot be recognized as original, but most likely can be recognized as the work of some Christian. Her words vouch for this: “It is written that he (Job) will rise again, and with them the Lord will rise.” You might be interested in: