Job 4, "The Righteous are Rewarded!" says Eliphaz

Job is overwhelmed with grief.  Three friends show up to grieve with him. The friends sit silently with Job for seven days but when Job finally speaks (chapter 3), cursing the day of his birth, his friends feel free to speak out. We now begin a cycle of speeches, running through chapter 14, where each of the three friends speaks out and Job responds.

The three friends of Job give advice that many of us would agree with. Indeed, it is common to hear this advice in church settings! The challenge for the reader, given insight into conversations between The Accurser and God, is to identify the error in the "good advice" of the friends. This is not easy.

Job 4:1-6, Lean on your integrity

Then Eliphaz the Temanite replied:

"If someone ventures a word with you, will you be impatient? 

But who can keep from speaking?

Think how you have instructed many, 

how you have strengthened feeble hands.

Your words have supported those who stumbled; 

you have strengthened faltering knees.

But now trouble comes to you, 

and you are discouraged; 

it strikes you, and you are dismayed.

Should not your piety be your confidence 

and your blameless ways your hope?

After hearing Job's complaints, one of his friends, Eliphaz, weighs in. Eliphaz is anxious about Job's curse against the day of his birth. He remembers Job's many contributions and suggests that Job rely on his piety and blamelessness. (This is not bad advice.) 

Eliphaz will speak the most and be the most elegant of Job's friends. This is consistent with the view that the people of Edom and Teman value wisdom (eg. Obadiah 1: 8.)

Job 4:7-11, Innocent always safe

"Consider now: Who, being innocent, has ever perished? 

Where were the upright ever destroyed?

 As I have observed, those who plow evil 

and those who sow trouble 

reap it.

 At the breath of God they are destroyed; 

at the blast of his anger they perish.

 The lions may roar and growl, 

yet the teeth of the great lions are broken.

The lion perishes for lack of prey, 

and the cubs of the lioness are scattered.

Eliphaz argues that the innocent don't perish.  Those who are destroyed are the ones who plow evil and sow trouble. (So if Job is righteous, he should be safe from trouble!)

Note that constant use of parallelism. In the first passage we have "innocent don't perish/upright aren't destroyed" followed by those who "plow evil/sow trouble." That parallelism is broken emphatically with a single short line: "reap it!"  Followed by more parallelism....

Haartley writes, "The author shows his knowledge of the animal world by using five different words for "lion" in verses 10-11."

Job 4:12-16, Gliding specter

"A word was secretly brought to me, 

my ears caught a whisper of it.

Amid disquieting dreams in the night, 

when deep sleep falls on men,

fear and trembling seized me 

and made all my bones shake.

A spirit glided past my face, 

and the hair on my body stood on end.

It stopped, but I could not tell what it was. 

A form stood before my eyes,

and I heard a hushed voice:

A disquieting thought, a specter, has raised a question to Eliphaz. This dream, this vision, will be recited below, phrased as question that expects an answer of "No."

Job 4:17-21, Errors and unrighteousness

`Can a mortal be more righteous than God?

Can a man be more pure than his Maker?

If God places no trust in his servants,

if he charges his angels with error,

how much more those who live in houses of clay,

whose foundations are in the dust,

who are crushed more readily than a moth!

Between dawn and dusk they are broken to pieces; 

unnoticed, they perish forever.

Are not the cords of their tent pulled up,

so that they die without wisdom?'

Mortals cannot be more righteous than God, says Eliphaz.  If even angels make errors, then certainly mere humans, creatures of dust who live in houses of clay, must make even more errors. A metaphor pictures a human body as an erect tent that suddenly collapses when a string is pulled. A healthy person might collapse in a day, dying without gaining wisdom in the process.

Eliphaz's argument is that good people have good results; the wicked are punished. In the simplest broad strokes this is an argument common to the book of Proverbs and should not be quickly dismissed.