The prose Prologue to the poetic Book of Job has two short scenes, enacted as “before the Lord,” in which appears a character named Satan,1 each scene being introduced by 3 verses in almost identical words, and commencing, “Now there was a day...,”2 That tradition’s banished Rebel should remount the battlements of heaven and hold the familiar converse related, so intimate and casual, with the Almighty, should tax even traditionalist credulity. Consistent with context, the setting could be a patriarchal altar.3 It could4 be that a nomadic visitor, envious of Job’s prosperity, slandered him, and that God (via angel or priest) made him an instrument of miracle5 to prove Job. More probably (stemming from and embodying some such human satanic comment) two suppositive scenes are inset, personifying the adverse fleshly mind which had sneeringly suggested that Job’s was but fair-weather worship, based on self-interest! This simple device, much used in Scripture,6 permits the unfolding of the record of the suffering of affliction by (the unquestionably historical7) Job, as if it were dramatically inflicted by a commissioned satan; while, in reality, the issue is solely between Jehovah and Job, who, as the righteous in all ages, is thereby disciplined to develop patience, penitence and humility. By a figure, Job is in Satan’s hand,8 but literally, in God’s. Job silences his wife in words revealing his grasp of the ancient truth9 that there is no separate Source of Evil: “Shall we receive good at the hand of God, and shall we not receive evil?”10
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Author: F. Whiteley
Keywords: Satan, Adversary
Bible reference(s): Job 1:6-12, Job 2:1-7
Source: “Satan,” The Testimony, Vol. 27, No. 314, February 1957, pg. 65.
Page indexed by: inWORD Bible Software.