Editorial June 11, 1938 Issue

Job and His Friends

George Shaw Cook

The book of Job is a dramatic poem illustrative of the problem of evil. Whether the principal character was drawn from history, as many believe, or was purely fictional is of secondary importance. The book of Job illustrates the plight of one who, although humanly good, finds himself the victim of loss, deprivation, disease, and suffering. As is frequently the case under similar circumstances, Job sought to justify himself and to blame God for the difficulty in which he found himself. Believing God to be capable of knowing both good and evil, he quite naturally thought it possible for God to send evil upon him.

Job's three friends, who came to reason with him and to comfort him, did not improve his condition, for they, too, entertained a finite, personal sense of God, quite in harmony with the teachings of Hebrew orthodoxy. From that standpoint they argued that Job was but suffering the consequence of self-righteousness, and that God had brought upon him the condition of suffering in order to punish him for his faults. "Behold, God will not cast away a perfect man, neither will he help the evil doers," said one.

Finally, when apparently weary of fruitless argument, Job turned from his would-be comforters directly to God and said: "I have heard of thee by the hearing of the ear: but now mine eye seeth thee. Wherefore I abhor myself, and repent in dust and ashes." Self-righteousness had fled, and Job found himself ready humbly to acknowledge God as the source of goodness and justice, as well as power. Then he was receptive to the healing power of divine Love, and the story ends with his restoration to health and prosperity. Commenting on this, on page 262 of "Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures," Mary Baker Eddy says: "Mortals will echo Job's thought, when the supposed pain and pleasure of matter cease to predominate. They will then drop the false estimate of life and happiness, of joy and sorrow, and attain the bliss of loving unselfishly, working patiently, and conquering all that is unlike God."

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