Bildad’s First Speech: The System at Its Simplest [Job 8] Job: The Wisdom of the Cross

{Pray}

Humans beings are almost hardwired to think things ought to be fair all the time. From the student upset because the teacher punished the wrong child to the sport’s crowd who protests and are furious at the referee’s obvious mistaken or missed call… we know with passionate intensity that unfairness is rotten. We know things are not always fair, but we feel deeply that they ought to be. This instinct is testimony to the justice of God and undergirds the strong traditional conviction that God is just.

But what happens when this belief, along with divine sovereignty, is all there is to say about God? This is the worldview of Job’s friends and the understanding of many religions in which there is believed to be one supreme being. It is certainly where Bildad stands.

Where Eliphaz, the first friend to speak, was gentle and sensitive (chapters 4, 5), Bildad is already angry. After an angry protest, he gives Job a short, punchy speech built upon a simple axiom, following that with a negative and positive outworking of that axiom, supported by the evidence of tradition and illustrated vividly from the world of plant life, before concluding with a summary.

A Protest [Job 8:1-2]

“Then Bildad the Shuhite answered and said: “How long will you speak these things, And the words of your mouth be like a strong wind?” [v.1-2]

“How long?” asks Bildad. Chapters 6, 7 have been much too long for poor Bildad to listen to! Not because he has no stamina for discussions; indeed, he loves “wise” discussions, and seminars of the intellectual elite. It is too long because, as far as Bildad is concerned, Job’s speech is stuff and nonsense, a lot of hot air. Job is a windbag. In 6:26 Job has accused his friends of treating his words as hot air; now Bildad confirms that is exactly what they think.

The reason Job is talking hot air, in their view, is because he begins from an utterly false starting point. So Bildad comes straight to the point.

Axiom: God is Fair [Job 8:3]

Does God pervert justice?

Or does the Almighty pervert the right? (v. 3)

Bildad’s convictions are, in this regard, the same as those expressed famously in the song of Moses at the end of Deuteronomy:

The Rock, his work is perfect,

for all his ways are justice.

A God of faithfulness, and without iniquity,

just and upright is he. (Deuteronomy 32:4)

To “pervert justice” (v. 3) is to twist it, bend it, make it crooked, like a merchant using false weights (Amos 8:5: “… deal deceitfully with false balances”); it is to make crooked what ought to be straight. But, says Bildad, it ought to be an unquestioned axiom of religion and philosophy that God never does that. Not ever. So for Job to suggest that God has treated him unfairly is out of order.

So, says Bildad, let’s see how this great truth works out in practice:

Outworking #1-The Negative [Job 8:4]

If your children have sinned against him,

he has delivered them into the hand of their transgression. (v. 4)

Bildad begins with a terrible negative—“If your children have sinned …” (v. 4). Clearly the “if” here expresses no uncertainty. It is clear that they must have sinned against God; that’s why they died sudden and untimely deaths. Had the rest of the Bible already been written, Bildad might have also cited the deaths of Korah and his companions (Numbers 16) or Ananias and Sapphira (Acts 5:1–11). Bad things happen to bad people; and if a really bad thing happens to someone, it proves he or she is a bad person.

There is here not only a brutality of manner of speaking to a man whose children have perished in a day, there is also a rubbing salt in the wound over the history of Job’s anxiety lest his children might have sinned and over his conscientious care in making sure their sin was covered by sacrifice (1:5). Bildad has no place in his system for sacrifice, because he has no place for redemptive suffering, and ultimately no place for the cross of Christ. For him it is a pretty simple system of double retribution—good things happen to good people, bad things to bad people.

Now Bildad turns to the positive:

Outworking #2-The Positive [Job 8:5-7]

If you will seek God

and plead with the Almighty for mercy,

if you are pure and upright,

surely then he will rouse himself for you

and restore your rightful habitation.

And though your beginning was small,

your latter days will be very great. (vv. 5–7)

Job is not yet dead, and that must mean that he has not done as bad things as his children—or so Bildad thinks, he’s such a great comforter right???. In Bildad’s philosophy Job must have done some bad things, but there is still a chance: “If you will seek God …” (v. 5). The word “seek” means literally “go early” (derived from the word for dawn) and carries a sense of urgency. This is an echo of 1:5, where Job did exactly this for his children.

“Now you must go urgently to God,” says Bildad, “ ‘and plead with the Almighty for mercy’ (v. 5). If you really can prove yourself ‘pure and upright’ [we know that Job is already “upright” from 1:1, 8; 2:3], then your ‘habitation’ (v. 6)—not only the skin of your body but the wider skins around your family and your property—will be restored.” The expression “rightful habitation” may have a double meaning, both the habitation that will be rightfully Job’s and also the habitation that is characterized by Job’s righteousness.

Verse 7 is surprising: Job’s beginnings were hardly “small,” for he was “the greatest of all the people of the east” (1:3)! Perhaps by “your beginning” Bildad means the state Job is in now. In any case, if he turns back to God, Bildad says, there is a chance that he will be wonderfully restored. That’s how Bildad’s system works, with no grace and no redemptive suffering.

To support his case Bildad appeals to long tradition.

The Evidence of Tradition [Job 8:8-10]

For inquire, please, of bygone ages,

and consider what the fathers have searched out.

For we are but of yesterday and know nothing,

for our days on earth are a shadow.

Will they not teach you and tell you

and utter words out of their understanding? (vv. 8–10)

Earlier Eliphaz claimed to have searched out The System, and he is sure it works (5:27), not least because his strange nightmare confirmed it (4:12–16). Bildad appeals to “bygone ages … the fathers” (that is, previous generations and ancestors [v. 8]). This is a sure and tested truth, for they “have searched [it] out” (v. 8). Besides, he says, how can we who live such a short time expect to reinvent truth (v. 9)? It is much safer (v. 10) to consult the unanimous tradition of moral and religious people down the ages. That’s where we’ll find “understanding” (v. 10).

The justice of God may indeed be discerned through our innate grasp of the created order. What cannot be found, except by revelation, are the truths of redemptive suffering and consequent grace.

In verses 11–19 Bildad develops his axiom by either one or two illustrations. Scholars differ about this. Some read verses 11–19 as one negative illustration. The problem with this is that verse 16 gives a thoroughly positive contrast to verse 15, as do verses 17, 18, and verse 19 seems to conclude on an ultimately positive note. So it seems better to take these verses as giving two complementary illustrations, shining light on both sides of the concluding truths of verses 20–22.

Illustration #1-The Negative [Job 8:11-15]

Can papyrus grow where there is no marsh?

Can reeds flourish where there is no water?

While yet in flower and not cut down,

they wither before any other plant.

Such are the paths of all who forget God;

the hope of the godless shall perish.

His confidence is severed,

and his trust is a spider’s web.

He leans against his house, but it does not stand;

he lays hold of it, but it does not endure. (vv. 11–15)

Here is the first plant (v. 11). The “reeds” from which “papyrus” is taken are common in Egypt. In a damp, swampy area with a warm climate, like the Nile, they grow quickly to between eight and ten feet. They “flourish” just as the wicked may grow metaphorically tall and proud (v. 11). But take away their water supply and they die quickly (v. 12), an untimely death while still in full flower (just as happened with Job’s children). Like the fool pictured by Eliphaz in 5:3, their dwelling is suddenly cursed.

What do we learn from this lesson from nature? “Such are the paths of all who forget God” (v. 13). They have a short-lived “hope” but will perish suddenly (v. 13). Their grounds for “confidence” and “trust” are like leaning on “a spider’s web” (v. 14); when the pressure is applied, the support collapses. They trust in their “house” (v. 15), perhaps their family, their career, or their possessions; but when they really have to look to these things to help in time of pressure, they cannot support them. Much like an old shed with a rotten roof; put your weight on it, and it’ll crumble. This is similar to the one who puts his trust in human beings in Jeremiah’s prophecy (Jeremiah 17:5, 6) or the wicked in Psalm 1.

Illustration #2-The Positive [Job 8:16-19]

He is a lush plant before the sun,

and his shoots spread over his garden.

His roots entwine the stone heap;

he looks upon a house of stones.

If he is destroyed from his place,

then it will deny him, saying, “I have never seen you.”

Behold, this is the joy of his way,

and out of the soil others will spring. (vv. 16–19)

But what of the second plant? “He”—that is, a second and very different plant—“is a lush plant” (v. 16a) even in the hot sunshine (“before the sun”) because it has a source of water, like the godly in Psalm 1 or Jeremiah 17:7, 8. It has a vigorous life (v. 16b): “his shoots spread over his garden.” He has “roots” that spread through piles of “stones” (v. 17). He may suffer setbacks (v. 18), so that “his place” doesn’t know him anymore (v. 18); but ultimately his way is full of “joy” (v. 19), and fresh shoots will come forth in his place. This probably is a picture of the righteous. Job has experienced a setback (as in v. 18), but Bildad still hopes he can prove himself righteous and flourish in the end (as in v. 19).

The Conclusion [Job8:20-22]

Behold, God will not reject a blameless man,

nor take the hand of evildoers.

He will yet fill your mouth with laughter,

and your lips with shouting.

Those who hate you will be clothed with shame,

and the tent of the wicked will be no more. (vv. 20–22)

Bildad pulls it all together. You can be sure, he says to Job, both that “God will not reject a blameless man” (we remember that word being used repeatedly of Job in 1:1, 8; 2:3) and that he will not “take the hand of evildoers [i.e., bless them]” (v. 20). If Job takes Bildad’s advice, his misery will soon be replaced by “laughter” and joyful “shouting,” and his enemies “will be no more” (which is exactly what Job fears will happen to him, 7:8, 21).

It is a simple system, supported by many centuries of morally serious religious tradition. But is it true? That is the only question that matters. If it is true, there will be no undeserved suffering in the universe. And if there is no undeserved suffering, there can be no redemptive suffering, no sacrificial substitutionary suffering.

And if there is no sacrificial substitutionary suffering, there can be no grace. Ultimately the religious system to which Bildad subscribes is a system devoid of grace and therefore devoid of comfort and ultimately devoid of the cross. It is certainly no comfort to Job, who is, as we know, suffering because his patient faith will bring glory to God and not because he is being punished for his sins.

Friend’s I’ve spoken many times about the false prosperity gospel that is being preached in our day. It’s similar to the simple system of Bildad, turn to God and only good will happen to you…but we see how quickly that crumbles when tragedy hits. As we go through Job, and this section concerning his friends, it should be a great help to us to equip us to spot those who teach this false gospel.

Next week we will look at Job’s response to Bildad in chapters 9,10…I want to urge you to read those chapters several times this week in preparation for next week…but I also want you to ask your self this question after reading Job’s response to Bildad… Is it possible to be wrong and right at the same time?

God will say that Job has spoken rightly about him (42:7). And yet Job says a great many things about God that are not right. How are we to reconcile this apparent contradiction? When we listen to Job’s speeches, we need to bear in mind the distinction between Job’s perception and Job’s heart. His heart is the heart of a believer, which is why the Lord commends and affirms him at the end. But his perceptions are partial and flawed. We hear in these speeches the honest grapplings of a real believer with a heart for God as he sees what he thought was a secure worldview crumble around him. This is why we will hear Job say some things that are plain wrong, and yet we hear him say them from a heart that is deeply right.

One of the big questions that begins to surface in Job’s speeches is, can Job discern the character of God from the actions of God? Job sees and experiences the actions of God. He believes in the sovereignty of God. He therefore believes that when something happens, it happens because God makes it happen. The natural but flawed conclusion is that because Job sees unfair things happen, God in his character is unjust.

So the question is, when bad things happen, who does them? This question of causation and agency takes us right back to the heavenly council chamber of chapters 1, 2. We gained there an insight into the true model for understanding the government of the world. This is neither polytheism nor a kind of divine tyrannical monism but rather a Sovereign God who governs the world through the intermediate agency of a number of supernatural forces (“the sons of God”), some of whom are evil. He uses evil to work out his purpose ultimately to defeat evil.

We see the tension inherent in this understanding in two revealing parallel accounts of the same Old Testament event. At some stage in his reign King David sinfully takes a census of the fighting men of Israel, a census that appears to be motivated by a desire for autonomy, to feel secure in his army rather than entrusting his safety to the Lord. So David does something evil. The question is, what supernatural power was at work to cause him to do it?

The answer is stated in two apparently contradictory ways. In the account of the books of Samuel we are told, “the anger of the LORD was kindled against Israel, and he [that is, the LORD] incited David against them, saying, ‘Go, number Israel and Judah’ ” (2 Samuel 24:1). But when the same event is recorded later by the Chronicler, he puts it in a strikingly different way: “Then Satan stood against Israel and incited David to number Israel” (1 Chronicles 21:1). So, did the Lord incite David to do this or did Satan incite him to do this? The answer is, both but in different ways.

The characteristic perspective of the writer of Samuel and Kings is that if something happens, it happens because God does it. This is Job’s perspective. When the Chronicler says that Satan did it, he is not denying that the Lord did it. The Chronicler is not a dualist. He does not believe that Satan has an existence independent from the Lord or that he can exercise autonomy in his actions. But the Chronicler draws attention to the fact that this action is God’s action by the agency of Satan.

It is therefore God’s action in a different way from some of God’s other actions. If we may put it this way, some of God’s actions express his character, while others are the outworking of his longer plan to deal with evil. When God acts in steadfast love and faithfulness, these actions express his character directly. But when evil things happen, God is acting through the agencies of evil powers, and the actions do not reveal his character. They are part of his grand plan to turn evil to good, to defeat evil, but they do not immediately reveal his character.

It is this distinction that Job does not yet grasp. We can hardly blame him. His grapplings with it all will help us as we too struggle to discern the character of God in a confused and disordered world.