The Bible contains a lot of questions, and it doesn’t always provide satisfactory answers. So I’ve been answering some of the Bible’s questions myself. This time, I’m looking at questions that Job was asked.

Eliphaz’s questions

Eliphaz asks Job: If someone ventures a word with you, will you be impatient? Answer: Yes. I don’t know why people think of Job as patient.

Eliphaz asks: But who can keep from speaking? Answer: Elihu can, for a while anyway.

Eliphaz asks Job: Should not your piety be your confidence and your blameless ways your hope? Answer: Apparently not. They clearly didn’t do him any good.

Eliphaz asks: Who, being innocent, has ever perished? Answer: Who hasn’t?

And he asks: Where were the upright ever destroyed? Answer: On Earth.

He asks: Can a mortal be more righteous than God? Can even a strong man be more pure than his Maker? Answer: lol that doesn’t sound hard

Eliphaz asks Job: Call if you will, but who will answer you? Answer: God will. Sort of. Eventually.

Eliphaz asks Job: Are you the first man ever born? Answer: No.

And he asks Job: Were you brought forth before the hills? Answer: No.

He asks Job: Do you listen in on God’s council? Answer: No.

And he asks Job: Do you have a monopoly on wisdom? Answer: No.

He asks him: What do you know that we do not know? What insights do you have that we do not have? Answer: He knows his own past better than you do.

Then he asks him: Are God’s consolations spoken gently to you not enough for you? Answer: Maybe they would be if God had actually said anything to him…

And he asks him: Why has your heart carried you away so that you vent your rage against God? Answer: Because God is torturing him and ruining his life.

He asks: What are mortals, that they could be righteous? Answer: If a perfect God made them, they must be perfect.

Eliphaz asks: Can a man be of benefit to God? Can even a wise person benefit him? Answer: No, that’s why he… didn’t create us?

Eliphaz asks Job: What pleasure would it give God if you were righteous? What would he gain if your ways were blameless? Answer: He wouldn’t be affected at all.

He asks Job: Is it for your piety that he rebukes you and brings charges against you? Answer: It’s not really a reaction to Job’s behavior at all. It’s just a test, that God failed.

He asks him: Is not your wickedness great? Are not your sins endless? Answer: Yes, they are not.

Eliphaz asks: Is not God in the heights of heaven? Answer: Apparently not. Why would God say he was lifting his hand “to heaven” if he was already in heaven? Why would the Bible say his judgment “rises as high as the heavens” if that was where it was coming from? How could Jesus go to heaven when he died and then come back without having returned to God, if that was where God was? It’s not even possible for God to be in heaven. The heavens can’t contain him.

Eliphaz imagines Job asking: What does God know? Answer: Little enough that he feels the need to perform unethical experiments on people in order to learn more about them.

He imagines Job asking: Does he judge through such darkness? Answer: The Father judges no one.

Eliphaz asks Job: Will you keep to the old path that the wicked have trod? Answer: No, you can’t stay where you’ve never been.

Eliphaz imagines the wicked asking: What can God do to us? Answer: See preceding verse.

Bildad’s questions

Bildad asks Job: How long will you say such things? Answer: 20 chapters.

Bildad asks: Does God pervert justice? Does the Almighty pervert what is right? Answer: All the time.

Bildad asks Job: Will former generations not instruct you and tell you? Answer: No, no one from an older generation participates in this conversation. (Unless you count God.)

Bildad asks Job: When will you end these speeches? Answer: Chapter 31.

He asks Job: Why are we considered stupid in your sight? Answer: Because you have faith in the goodness of God, and that’s stupid.

And he asks him: Is the earth to be abandoned for your sake? Or must the rocks be moved from their place? Answer: No, God mainly just needs to stop actively tormenting innocent people.

Bildad asks: Can God’s forces be numbered? Answer: Let me see… Zero. Yeah, that wasn’t so hard.

He asks: On whom does his light not rise? Answer: “Rise”? Are you talking about the sun? Then some possible biblical answers are: Pharaoh, the wicked, Israel, prophets, and Paul.

Bildad asks: How can a mortal be righteous before God? Answer: I already answered that when Eliphaz asked it.

Zophar’s questions

Zophar asks: Are all these words to go unanswered? Answer: No.

He asks: Is this talker to be vindicated? Answer: Yes.

Zophar asks Job: Will your idle talk reduce others to silence? Answer: No.

He asks him: Will no one rebuke you when you mock? Answer: No, no one will not rebuke him.

And he asks: When God sees evil, does he not take note? Answer: If he does, he must not care much. Most of the time he does nothing about it.

Elihu’s questions

Elihu asks: Must I wait, now that the rest are silent, now that they stand there with no reply? Answer: No.

He asks: Why do you complain that he responds to no one’s words? Answer: Because God hasn’t responded to Job’s words.

Elihu asks: Who appointed God over the earth? Who put him in charge of the whole world? Answer: Theists.

He asks: Can someone who hates justice govern? Answer: Yes.

Elihu asks Job: Will you condemn the just and mighty One? Answer: No, just the unjust and mighty One.

Elihu asks: Is he not the One who calls kings worthless and nobles wicked, who shows no partiality to princes and does not favor the rich over the poor? Answer: God isn’t unique in thinking that way.

He asks: The cry of the poor comes before God, and he hears the cry of the needy. But if he remains silent, who can condemn him? Answer: Anyone who cares about the needy.

And he asks: If he hides his face, who can see him? Answer: Moses.

Elihu asks Job: Should God then reward you on your terms, when you refuse to repent? Answer: Yes, Job should be rewarded without repenting, because he has nothing to repent of.

Elihu asks Job: Do you think this is just, for you to think you’re in the right and God isn’t? Answer: Yes, he does think it’s right, and it is right, for him to think what he thinks.

Elihu imagines Job asking: What do I gain by not sinning? Answer: There are plenty of personal benefits, but that’s the wrong question.

Elihu asks: If you sin, how does that affect God? If your sins are many, what does that do to him? If you are righteous, what does he gain? Answer: He’s affected way more than he should be, apparently. He’s always getting excessively angry and overreacting to what humans do.

Elihu claims that no one asks: Where is God my Maker? Answer: Well, we’ve already established that he’s not in heaven. And he can’t be found anywhere on Earth, either. Maybe he’s underground?

Elihu asks Job: Be careful that no one entices you by riches; do not let a bribe turn you aside. Would your wealth or all your mighty efforts sustain you so you would not be in distress? Implied answer: No. Real answer: Probably, but that’s not who you should be most concerned about here. What about the victims of whatever he’s hypothetically being bribed to do?

Elihu asks: Who is a teacher like God? Answer: Laozi, Confucius, Mencius, Epicurus, Hillel, Epictetus, Diogenes, Seneca, Marcus Aurelius…

He asks: Who has prescribed his ways for him, or said to him, “You have done wrong”? Answer: Abraham, Moses, Hezekiah, Ezekiel, Amos, a Canaanite woman…

Elihu asks: Who can understand how he spreads out the clouds, how he thunders from his pavilion? And he also asks Job: Do you know how God controls the clouds and makes his lightning flash? Answer: People who have gotten past the useless God hypothesis can discover the real explanations.

He asks Job: Do you know how the clouds hang poised? Answer: Job doesn’t know, but I do.

He asks him: Can you join him in spreading out the skies, hard as a mirror of cast bronze? Answer: No… Who would be stupid enough to block out the sun like that, anyway?

Elihu asks: Should he be told that I want to speak? Answer: No, God doesn’t need to be told, and you’re not the one who wants to speak with him.

He asks: Would anyone ask to be swallowed up? Answer: Vorarephiles?

And he asks: Does God not have regard for all the wise in heart? Answer: The Bible says he likes wise people, but of course it also says he doesn’t.

God’s questions

God asks: Who is this that obscures my plans with words without knowledge? Answer: You? Nobody else here seems to really know anything about your plans, so you must be the one keeping them secret. And here come the divine words without knowledge…

God asks: Who marked off the earth’s dimensions? And also: Who gives the ibis wisdom, or gives the rooster understanding? Who has the wisdom to count the clouds? Who can tip over the water jars of the heavens? Answer: Obviously the answer is supposed to be God. So why are you acting like it’s a mystery?

He asks: On what were the earth’s footings set, or who laid its cornerstone? Answer: “Or”? You only want an answer to one of those questions? Okay… Job said you suspend the earth over nothing, and you said he spoke the truth about you, so the answer to the first one is nothing.

And he asks: Who shut up the sea behind doors when it burst forth from the womb, when I made the clouds its garment and wrapped it in thick darkness, when I fixed limits for it and set its doors and bars in place, when I said, “This far you may come and no farther; here is where your proud waves halt”? Answer: Well, it sounds like you did… What’s the point of asking and giving away the answer at the same time?

God asks: What is the way to the abode of light? And where does darkness reside? Answer: In places that are bright or dark?

God asks: What is the way to the place where the lightning is dispersed, or the place where the east winds are scattered over the earth? Answer: Those things can happen anywhere on earth, can’t they?

He asks: Who cuts a channel for the torrents of rain, and a path for the thunderstorm, to water a land where no one lives? Answer: Yeah, who would do that? Who would decide to put the water where it’s not needed, instead of where it is needed? Must be somebody who doesn’t care about all the people who have to live through droughts.

And he asks: Does the rain have a father? Who fathers the drops of dew? From whose womb comes the ice? Who gives birth to the frost? Answer: No one. You don’t need something as complex as biology to explain that stuff.

God asks: Who provides food for the raven when its young cry out to God and wander about for lack of food? Answer: Sounds to me like no one’s providing food for it.

God asks: Who let the wild donkey go free? Who untied its ropes? Answer: Nobody. God doesn’t appear to know the meaning of the word “wild”.

And he asks: Will you rely on the wild ox for its great strength? Will you leave your heavy work to it? Can you trust it to haul in your grain and bring it to your threshing floor? Answer: No, it seems somebody didn’t design it very well if it was supposed to do those things.

God asks: Will the one who contends with the Almighty correct him? Answer: He already did correct God quite a bit, but now he’s stopping for some reason.

God asks: Can anyone capture the Behemoth by the eyes, or trap it and pierce its nose? Answer: All animals have been given into the hands of man. So yes, I guess.

He asks: Will traders barter for the Leviathan? Will they divide it up among the merchants? Answer: I suppose they could if they found it dead.

God asks: Who then is able to stand against me? Answer: Jacob.

He asks: Who has a claim against me that I must pay? Answer: Job.

And he asks: Who can strip off the Leviathan’s outer coat? Who can penetrate its double coat of armor? Who dares open the doors of its mouth, ringed about with fearsome teeth? Answer: Nobody, apparently. God doesn’t seem to have done a very good job of giving us dominance over all the animals like he said he would.

God’s questions aimed specifically at Job

God asks Job: Where were you when I laid the earth’s foundation? Answer: Well, he certainly can’t be expected to have been present where the earth’s foundation was being laid, because things that don’t exist don’t have locations. God asks the stupidest questions.

He asks Job: Have you ever given orders to the morning, or shown the dawn its place, that it might take the earth by the edges and shake the wicked out of it? Answer: No, have you? Obviously not, since the wicked are still here. So what’s your point?

He asks him: Have the gates of death been shown to you? Have you seen the gates of the deepest darkness? Answer: Kinda?

And he asks him: Have you comprehended the vast expanses of the earth? Answer: No, he hasn’t, but you clearly don’t know any more about the earth than he does.

God asks Job: Can you take light and darkness to their places? Do you know the paths to their dwellings? Answer: You mean, can he make a place light or dark, or go somewhere where it’s lighter or darker? How hard can that be?

He asks Job: Have you entered the storehouses of the snow or seen the storehouses of the hail? Answer: Really, now you’re making fun of him for not knowing about things that you just made up? No, he’s never been to your fictional weather factory.

God asks Job: Can you bind the chains of the Pleiades? Can you loosen Orion’s belt? Can you bring forth the constellations in their seasons or lead out the Bear with its cubs? And also: Can you set up God’s dominion over the earth? Can you raise your voice to the clouds and cover yourself with a flood of water? Do you send the lightning bolts on their way? And: Will the wild ox consent to serve you? Can you hold it to the furrow with a harness? Do you give the horse its strength or clothe its neck with a flowing mane? Does the hawk take flight by your wisdom? Does the eagle soar at your command? And: Do you have an arm like God’s, and can your voice thunder like his? And: Can you pull in Leviathan with a fishhook or tie down its tongue with a rope? Can you put a cord through its nose or pierce its jaw with a hook? Can you fill its hide with harpoons or its head with fishing spears? Answer: No, he never said he could. How about you stop changing the subject and avoiding the real question, and just explain yourself already. You have a lot to answer for.

He asks Job: Do you know the laws of the heavens? Answer: No, Newton hadn’t figured those out yet.

He asks him: Do you hunt the prey for the lioness and satisfy the hunger of the lions? Answer: No, the lions do.

God asks Job: Do you know when the mountain goats give birth? Do you watch when the doe bears her fawn? Do you count the months till they bear? Do you know the time they give birth? Answer: I don’t know if Job knows, but those aren’t particularly hard questions.

God asks Job: Would you discredit my justice? Would you condemn me to justify yourself? Answer: Yes, it’s pretty obvious by now that he would. Are you really going to pretend that he’s wrong to do so??

God asks Job: Will the Leviathan keep begging you for mercy? Will it speak to you with gentle words? Will it make an agreement with you for you to take it as your slave for life? Answer: I doubt it would speak at all.

He asks Job: Can you make a pet of it like a bird or put it on a leash for the young women in your house? Answer: The Bible says all kinds of animals have been tamed, so why not? Except I’m not sure Job has any young women left in his house…

To be continued…