Job 3 - Introduction

QUESTIONS FOR DISCUSSION 3:1-26

47.

Why is it important that we understand the literary form in which Job is written?

48.

Who speaks the most in this bookJob or his friends? What could this suggest as to the problem of suffering?

49.

What is a lament?

50.

Why are the three friends all prepared for a psalm of penitence?

51.

Job's consolers only manage to intensify his anguish. Why?

52.

What are the two subordinate themes that enter Job's lament? Why?

53.

There is only one ultimate answer to the question, If God loves me, why all this suffering and evil? What is it?

54.

Job seems to have a short memory. Why curse the day of his birth? He had lived much longer in prosperity than pain.

55.

Does Job consider suicide as an escape? Is suicide ever justified?

56.

Even in Job's selection there is an affirmation of God. Explain.

57.

The word darkness is important in these verses. How is it used?

58.

What is meant by asking that the night be barren? (Job 3:7)

59.

Cursing is used in at least two ways. What are they?

60.

What is Leviathan as used in verse eight?

61.

What are the eyelids of the morning?

62.

Why blame the night? Discuss.

63.

Whose knees are involved in Job 3:12?

64.

Why has man been preoccupied with the subject of death?

65.

What is Sheol?

66.

To what does the expression waste places in Job 3:14 refer?

67.

Death is a great equalizer. Explain.

68.

Show how God's grace is seen in our forgetfulness.

69.

Death offers welcome relief. Explain. Is this a present day attitude?

70.

There is an indirect charge against God in Job 3:20. Why?

B.

CALAMITOUS COMFORTERELIPHAZ (Job 4:1, Job 5:27)

1.

Job should not complain; the righteous will not be cut off (mild rebuke; Job 4:1-11).

TODAY'S ENGLISH VERSION

Job's Complaint to God

3 Finally Job broke the silence and called down a curse on the day on which he had been born.

Job

2-3 God, put a curse on the day I was born;

put a curse on the night when I was conceived.

4 Turn that day into darkness, God;

never again remember that day;
never again let light shine on it.

5 Make it a day of gloom and thick darkness;

cover it with clouds and blot out the sun.

6 Blot that night out of the year,

and never let it be counted again;

7 make it a barren, joyless night.
8 Tell the sorcerers to curse that day,

those who know how to command Leviathan.

9 Keep the morning star from shining;

give that night no hope of dawn.

10 Curse that night for letting me be born,

for exposing me to grief and trouble.

11 I wish I had died in my mother's womb,

or died the moment I was born.

12 Why did my mother hold me on her knees?

Why did she feed me at her breast?

13 If I had died then, I would be at rest now,
14 sleeping like the kings and rulers

who rebuilt ancient palaces.

15 Then I would be sleeping like princes

who filled their houses with gold and silver,

16 or sleeping like children born dead.
17 In the grave wicked men stop their evil,

and tired workmen rest at last.

18 Even prisoners enjoy peace,

free from shouts and harsh commands.

19 Everyone is there, great and small alike,

and slaves at last are free.

20 Why let men go on living in misery?

Why give light to men in grief?

21 They wait for death, but it never comes;

they prefer a grave to any treasure.

22 They are not happy till they are dead and buried;
23 God keeps their future hidden

and hems them in on every side.

24 Instead of eating, I mourn,

and I can never stop groaning;

25 everything I fear and dread comes true.
26 I have no peace, no rest, and my trouble never ends.