Job and His Friends, Ilya Repin, 1869, Russian Museum

Fr. Smith’s Commentary on the First Reading
Fifth Sunday in Ordinary Time
Job 7:1–4, 6–7
February 7, 2021

The great miracle of the Old Testament is the end of the Babylonian exile. We have examined this and its effects many times in these commentaries. For centuries, the Jewish leaders maneuvered between the major players in the Mid-East with varying success. By 598-96 BC, they had exhausted their options, Jerusalem and its temple were destroyed, and the elite sent off to exile in Babylon. This should have been the end of Judaism both as a religion and a people. Yet Ezekiel and Jeremiah prophesied that both would be reborn. Most memorable was Ezekiel testifying that the dry bones of the people would come back to life. Indeed, this came to pass when the Assyrian leader Cyrus allowed Jews to volunteer to return and rebuild their capital. Enough did that Jerusalem and its Temple rose again. This was a miracle and prophets, poets and scholars attempted to interpret it properly. The book of Job is one attempt to understand and one that has much to offer us today.

The returning Jews collected and edited their sacred writings that now form the basis of the Old Testament. One of the themes they used to give coherence to this material was that the life of Jews—social, religious, and political to the extent that they were separate—was good when they obeyed the law of the Lord and bad when they did not. This became known as Deuteronomic history. It was remarkably useful and explained much. Yet what of the good person whose life has not gone well? Indeed, one who has seen the wicked prosper at his expense. This is the predicament of Job.