Job · chapter 16 of 42
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In Job 16 Job answers Eliphaz by saying that he has heard many such things and that his friends are miserable comforters. He describes God as an enemy who has worn him out, broken him and set him up as a target, though there is no violence in his hands. Even so he declares that his witness is in heaven and pleads for someone to plead his case with God.
This chapter is Job's reply to Eliphaz in the second cycle, and it mixes two opposite movements: the rawest description of how he feels attacked by God, and one of the boldest declarations of hope in the book, that of a witness in heaven. It shows how faith and protest can live in the same prayer.
Job answers that he has heard many such things: miserable comforters are you all. Will windy words have no end? If they were in his place, he too could speak as they do, heap up words against them and shake his head. But he would strengthen them with his mouth, and the comfort of his lips would ease their pain. Whether he speaks or is silent, his pain is not lessened.
Then he describes what God has done to him. God has worn him out, made desolate all his company, shriveled him up and made him a witness against himself; his gauntness rises up against him and testifies to his face. God tears him in his wrath and hunts him down, gnashes his teeth at him, and his adversary sharpens his eyes. People open their mouths against Job, strike him on the cheek in contempt and gather together against him. God gives him up to the ungodly and casts him into the hands of the wicked. He was at ease and God broke him apart, seized him by the neck and dashed him to pieces, and set him up as his target. His archers surround him and pierce his kidneys without mercy. He breaks him with breach upon breach and runs at him like a warrior. Job has sewn sackcloth over his skin and thrust his horn in the dust; his face is red with weeping and deep darkness is on his eyelids, although there is no violence in his hands and his prayer is pure.
Then he cries out: O earth, do not cover my blood, and let my cry find no resting place. Even now my witness is in heaven, and he who testifies for me is on high. My friends scorn me, but my eye pours out tears to God. Oh that someone would plead for a man with God, as a person pleads for his neighbor. For when a few years have come I shall go the way from which I shall not return.
References follow ESV book names and verse numbers. Read each verse in your Bible before the explanation.
Job says he has heard many such things and that his friends are miserable comforters. The phrase has become a proverb about those who, wanting to help, add to the pain with ready-made answers.
Job describes God as an enemy who broke him when he was at ease, set him up as a target and runs at him like a warrior. They are violent images, and the Bible preserves them as part of an honest prayer.
Job insists that there is no violence in his hands and that his prayer is pure. It is his central defense: he knows of no sin that explains his pain, and so he feels unjustly treated.
In the middle of his complaint, Job declares that his witness is in heaven and his advocate on high. A spark of hope that dares to think that God himself will, somehow, defend him before God.
6 questions with answers and references, ready for Sunday school, small group or a Bible quiz night.
Answer: Miserable comforters. — Job 16:2
Answer: He would strengthen them with his mouth, and the comfort of his lips would ease their pain. — Job 16:4-5
Answer: Worn him out, broken him, set him up as a target and run at him like a warrior. — Job 16:7-14
Answer: That there is no violence in his hands and that his prayer is pure. — Job 16:17
Answer: In heaven, and his advocate on high. — Job 16:19
Answer: Plead for a man with God, as a person pleads for his neighbor. — Job 16:21
Job 16 invites an uncomfortable question: are we comforters or miserable comforters? We often respond to another person's pain with words that calm us rather than the one who suffers. In your group, talk about what helps and what does not when someone is grieving or ill.
The chapter also teaches that faith can voice a complaint and a hope at the same time. Job feels that God attacks him, and yet says that his witness is in heaven. For the believer, that witness and advocate is shown in Jesus Christ, who intercedes for us. We do not need to resolve the tension: we can bring it before God in prayer.
Job 16 ends with Job about to go the way of no return, clinging to a witness on high. In Job 17 he will continue his lament: he will feel his spirit breaking, ask for a pledge and wonder where his hope is.
The text does not say clearly. Some understand that Job refers to God himself as a witness of his innocence, others to a heavenly intercessor distinct from God. For Christians, Job's intuition finds fulfillment in Jesus Christ, who intercedes for us before the Father.
In the Bible, blood shed unjustly cries out for justice. Job asks that the earth not hide his blood, that is, that his case not be forgotten and his unjust death be exposed. It is a poetic image that expresses his desire to be vindicated.
Job speaks out of pain and goes so far as to attribute to God the actions of an enemy. The book does not approve of everything he says, but neither does it condemn him for praying so bluntly. In the end God will say that Job spoke rightly of him, and will show the difference from the friends, who spoke with false assurance.