Job

Abstract

‘I know that my Redeemer liveth …’: the best-known quotation from the book of Job is also the most misleading one. To the lover of Handel’s music it must sound like a Christian affirmation that all will be well, that all is best for the seeking and godly individual. The ‘I’ of the passage brushes aside Israelite destiny, the heavy burden of kingship, the martyrdom of prophets, the Messianic expectation of the Servant, indeed the whole historical testimony all over the world that no Redeemer lives. No verse taken by itself could sound less tragical, for it expresses an undaunted hope that all the evidence to the contrary can be dismissed, that the world is a good place, that the righteous will be vindicated, that social ills do not count, that political and military oppression may be ignored. One spectrum, and only one counts: the personal I, Job the man of the land of Uz.