Further dialogue between God and Satan
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📚There was another day when the sons of God came to present themselves before the LORD, and Satan also came among them to present himself before the LORD. 2 📚And the LORD said to Satan, “From where have you come?” And Satan answered the LORD and said, “From going to and fro on the earth, and from walking up and down on it”.3 📚And the LORD said to Satan, “Have you considered my servant Job, that there is no one like him on the earth, a blameless and an upright man, one who fears God and shuns evil? And he still holds fast his integrity, although you incited me against him to destroy him without cause”.
4 📚And Satan answered the LORD and said, “Skin for skin, yes, all that a man has he will give for his life. 5 📚But now stretch out your hand and touch his bone and his flesh, and he will curse you to your face”.
2:4-5 Satan’s meaning is that although Job did not curse God because of the loss of all things, this was not because he was truly devoted to God, but because he was afraid that if he cursed God, God would take his life. He is saying that every person is so selfishly concerned with his own physical well-being that he will do anything to preserve it, including making a show of devotion and piety. He means that when a person’s health is gone, if he thinks God is responsible for it, he will turn against God and show that all his religion and piety was rooted only in selfishness and sin.
Satan’s estimate of man’s character in his sinful state is true. But he was wrong about Job (vs 13-15), and about other true believers. When God does His work of saving and transforming individuals He makes them willing to suffer and give up even their lives for Him (John 11:16; Acts 20:24; 21:13; Heb 11:36-38; Rev 12:11; Luke 14:26; Matt 10:38-39). It is a great glory to God to have children who will love Him in spite of personal disasters and who will endure everything for Him, even great pain and death.⚜
6 📚And the LORD said to Satan, “See, he is in your hands; but spare his life”.
2:6 Satan can do nothing to God’s people without God’s permission (Job 1:12). Why should God give him permission? Because He knows it is better to give permission than to refuse it. This matter we may not fully understand on this earth (Isa 55:8-9; Rom 11:33-34). We must simply trust God and believe that He knows better than we do what should and should not be done or permitted.⚜
Satan’s attack on Job’s health
7 📚So Satan went out from the presence of the LORD and struck Job with painful boils from the sole of his foot to the crown of his head.
2:7 When Satan is permitted he will do what he can to torment men. One boil on the body can be very painful. Imagine what severe and constant pains would result from burning, itching, festering sores over the whole body. Later in the book several verses reveal the intense suffering that Job experienced because of this (Job 2:8; 3:24; 6:10; 7:4-5; 13:28; 16:8, 16; 17:1; 19:20; 30:17, 30).⚜
8 📚And he took a piece of broken pottery to scrape himself with, and sat down among the ashes.
The words of Job’s wife and his wonderful reply
9 📚Then his wife said to him, “Do you still hold on to your integrity? Curse God, and die!”
2:9 Satan now uses Job’s wife as a tool to bring his message to Job and to increase his sorrow. She wonders what use there can be in integrity and devotion to God if they do not prevent such terrible loss and sufferings as those which came to Job. When she says “curse God and die” she is expressing the hope of Satan. It is not likely that she is suggesting suicide. Possibly she supposes that if Job cursed God, God would kill him and put him out of his misery.⚜
10 📚But he said to her, “You are speaking like one of the foolish women speaks. What? Shall we receive good at the hand of God, and shall we not receive trouble 📖?” In all this Job did not sin 📖 with his lips.
2:10 The Hebrew word translated “foolish” means both foolish and lacking in righteous character. Job does not call his wife a foolish woman but only says she is talking like one. He knew, and we should remember, that she too had lost ten children in one day, and had been watching her husband’s intense suffering. The sudden loss of even one child sometimes makes a mother almost insane with grief.⚜
The visit of Job’s friends
11 📚Now when Job’s three friends heard of all this trouble that had come on him, each of them came from his own place: Eliphaz the Temanite, and Bildad the Shuhite, and Zophar the Naamathite. For they had made an appointment together to come to sympathize with him and to comfort him.
2:11 As far as we can see these three men from neighboring regions came in a spirit of true friendship and with the best of motives. But they turned out to be poor comforters and only added to Job’s sorrows (Job 16:2). We do not know how long a period of time elapsed between the onset of Job’s bodily sufferings and the visit of his friends, but in Job 7:3 Job speaks of months of suffering.⚜
12 📚And when they lifted up their eyes at a distance and did not recognize him, they raised their voices and wept, and each of them tore his cloak and sprinkled dust on his head toward heaven.
2:12 Could these friends have expected that the greatest man in the East (Job 1:3) would be covered with loathsome sores and be sitting in ashes? They were stunned and overcome with grief (Josh 7:6; Neh 9:1; Lam 2:10; Ezek 27:30). Seven days was not an unusual time of mourning in ancient times (Gen 50:10; 1 Sam 31:13).⚜
13 📚So they sat down with him on the ground seven days and seven nights, and no one spoke a word to him, for they saw that his grief was very great.
2:13 During these seven days it is likely that Job’s friends began to doubt whether he was a good and righteous man. This comes out later in their speeches. They could not understand why God would permit such disasters and suffering to come on him if he had not sinned very grievously.⚜