Abstract

In the Book of Job, the ancient author masterfully weaves together the related themes of “human grief and divine silence” and “human consolation and divine speech.” As Job debates with his friends and teeters on the brink of blaming God for his suffering, God, though present, remains silent. At the last, however, God bursts forth in speech, provoked because Job and his friends have presumed to know God's intentions. In his speeches, God assures Job that although things may not be righted to his liking, God will nevertheless, through the gifi of God's creative presence, provide sources of consolation amid grief and tragedy.