Job 36-37 and Epistle of Ignatius to the Smyrnaeans 2-4

Job 36 – Elihu speaks again. He speaks to “justify my Maker” (36:3) as a “man of sound opinions” (36:4).  He, like the other “friends” refuses to let Job imply that God is not a God of justice or a God who cares for the poor. These are opinions all who love God will defend. The “fates” that men endure are fates that flow from God’s justice, he says. “If they will serve obediently, they shall spend their days in happiness. . . but if they are not obedient, they shall perish by the sword” (36:11-12). These are rationales all of us who love God will probably believe at some point in our lives, but Job’s story will be the challenge.

“God is all-powerful. Who is a teacher like him? No one can tell him what to do, or say to him, ‘You have done wrong.’ Instead, glorify his mighty works, singing songs of praise” (36:22-24).

What Elihu says is true on many levels. “”God is greater than we can know; the number of His years cannot be counted. He forms the droplets of water, which cluster into rain; they pour down on all mankind” (36:27-28).

Job 37 – Still more from Elihu: “My heart pounds as I think of this. It trembles within me. Listen carefully to the thunder of God’s voice as it rolls from his mouth” (37:1-2). God works wonders through his Voice. “He works wonders that we cannot understand” (37:5). He commands the snow and the rain; his breath forms the ice.

“Can you help him stretch out the heavens. . . Inform us, then, what we may say to Him: We cannot argue because [we are in] darkness” (37:18-19).

“Shaddai—we cannot attain to Him; He is great in power and justice” (37:23).

Ignatius to the Smyrnaeans

2 – Jesus submitted himself to these things “for our sakes, [so] that salvation might be ours” (101). And he did really suffer. “His Passion was no unreal illusion, as some skeptics aver who are all unreality themselves. The fate of those wretches will match their belief, for one day they will similarly become phantoms without substance themselves” (101).

3 – “For my own part, I know and believe that He was in actual human flesh, even after His resurrection. When He appeared to Peter and his companions, He said to them, ‘Take hold of me; touch me, and see that I am no bodiless phantom’. And they touched Him then and there, and believed, for they had had contact with the flesh-and-blood reality of Him. That was how they came by their contempt for death, and proved themselves superior to it” (101).

4 – He encourages them to avoid contact with those who do not believe these things. Pray for them, but do not talk to them. “After all, if everything our Lord did was only illusion, then these chains of mine must be illusory too! Also, to what end have I given myself up to perish by fire or sword or savage beasts?” (102)

“[I]t is only in the name of Jesus Christ, and for the sake of sharing His sufferings, that I could face all this; for He, the perfect Man, gives me strength to do so” (102).

Job 34-35 and Epistle of Ignatius to the Smyrnaeans - Introduction through 1

Job 34 – Elihu continues: The reason God gives us is meant to weigh arguments so that we can decide what is just and unjust. Job has declared that he is right and that God has deprived him of justice (34:5). But while he differs somewhat in how he thinks he’s come to truth, he essentially agrees that God does “repay people according to their deeds. He treats people as they deserve” (34:11).

“If God were to take back his spirit and withdraw his breath, all life would cease, and humanity would turn again to dust” (34:14:15).

God rewards those who do good; He punishes those who do evil. “Why don’t people say to God, ‘I have sinned, but I will sin no more’? Or ‘I don’t know what evil I have done – tell me. If I have done wrong, I will stop at once’? Must God tailor his justice to your demands?” (34:31-33).

He thinks Job deserves “the maximum penalty” because of the way he’s denied responsibility for his fate. “[Y]ou have added rebellion to your sin; you show no respect, and you speak many angry words against God” (34:36-37).

Job 35 – Elihu continues to insist that it is crazy for Job to claim righteousness before God. “Look up into the sky and see the clouds high above you. If you sin, how does that affect God? Even if you sin again and again, what effect will it have on him? If you are good, is this some great gift to him? What could you possibly give him?” (35:5-6). Nothing man does has any effect on God; only other people are effected by the deeds we do.

While it sometimes seems that each of the men who speak their minds in this great wisdom book are inconsistent or ironically consistent with those they feel they are in disagreement with, the things they discuss  are the same things people have been pondering since the beginning of human history. We are DIFFERENT from other animals on this earth – maybe by only a tiny fraction but that fraction creates and rather fathomless divide that we have been struggling with forever.

God is not affected by Job’s evil or his goodness. It is other men who bear the impact of Job’s actions. Job “mouths empty words, and piles up words without knowledge” (35:16). But surely God has heard him – He has heard Job’s case.

Ignatius to the Smyrnaeans

Introduction: The letter that Ignatius writes to the church at Smyrna is mostly concerned with the dangers Docetist thinking presented to the faith community. He saw it as being a real problem in their city. But it is also just the danger of separatism and church disputes that worry him. He probably looked to the authority of church officials as being the only conceivable way to deal with what he saw as heresies.

1 – Ignatius opens his letter with praise for the wisdom of the Smyrneans. They hold firm to all the key articles of faith with respect to the material reality of Jesus as man: his being “truly of David’s line in His manhood” and “truly pierced by nails in His human flesh” (101).