Was Job really so naïve as to suggest that God’s vocabulary was faulty? His very question constituted a provocation. With his undoubtedly uncalled-for insolence, he wanted to irritate God, to force Him to justify His actions even retroactively. Since punishment there was, let it at least have some basis, some motivation. He wanted it to be a result, a consequence rather than a gratuitous act. In other words, Job would have preferred to think of himself as guilty. His innocence troubled him, left him in the dark; his guilt might give the experience a meaning. He would gladly have sacrificed his soul for knowledge. What he demanded was neither happiness nor reparations, but an answer, an answer that would show him unequivocally that man is not a toy, and that he is defined only in relation to himself. That was why Job turned against God: to find and confront Him. He defied Him to come closer to him. He wanted to hear His voice, even though he knew he would be condemned. He preferred a cruel and unjust God to an indifferent God.

Moreover, Job needed God because he felt abandoned by man. His wife was pushing him to the solution of the weak: resignation, denial, abdication. His friends had nothing to offer him except their pity, their incredulity. They were willing to concede that he was indeed suffering, but rather less than was apparent. They felt that he was wrong to react so intensely and wrong to wallow in his sorrow. Did he suddenly realize that he would never be able to communicate to them the enormity of his grief? He rebelled against those who refused to listen to the end, to look all the way, just as he stood up against this God in whose name his friends claimed to lie. On a deeply human plane, his revolt ultimately was directed against his own solitude, which he knew to be irreducible, for it concealed God’s face beneath that of man.

• • •

There is no need to embellish the scene: it is described in the Book and illustrated in the Midrash in masterly fashion.

As the two celestial players withdrew backstage, Job received the visit of three of his friends: Elifaz the Yemenite, Bildad of Shukh, Tzofer of Naamat.

At first glance they did not recognize him: he had changed, they had not. Then they burst into tears, tore their garments, covered their foreheads with ashes, sat down beside him on the ground and did not open their mouths for seven days and seven nights. (In “Job’s Testament,” quoted earlier, his friends did not remain silent but questioned him a whole week on what had happened.) Says a Midrash: In deference toward the mourner, one imitates his behavior. Job’s visitors rose when he rose, ate when he ate, drank when he drank. Without ever uttering a word, for certain griefs beget a silence that is commensurate to them; words could only betray them. We are moved by the three silent friends, but the moment they begin to speak they disappoint. Talkative. Hypocritical. Their emotions seem false, calculated. They had to choose between taking a stand for their beaten and defeated friend or for God. They made the wrong choice, the easiest one. These three self-righteous strangers from afar exaggerated when they tried to explain to Job events whose tragic weight rested only on his shoulders. He suffered, and they made speeches on suffering. He was crushed by sorrow, and they built theories and systems on the subjects of grief, suffering and persecution.