When things go wrong the first thing I tend to do is question whether God is in control–do you? Like He fell off the throne or, worse, fell asleep on the job. I hate that that is my first reaction, I wish I was one of those people who went to faith first. But I don’t, my prayers sound like I’m begging God to take back control, I’m begging Him to intervene, to wake up and notice what is happening. The Book of Job really challenges that way of thinking.

The Book of Job locates itself within the Sapiential Tradition (Wisdom Books within the Hebrew Bible), in a wider set of genres known as Wisdom Literature. Wisdom literature was commonplace within the ancient Near-Eastern world and can be found throughout ancient Mesopotamian and Egyptian societies. It is within this technical grouping that the Book of Job is set, chiefly due to the presence of ‘dialogue, discourse, narrative, hymn and lament’ styles of writing. These are woven together into a poignant piece of wisdom literature.

How are you going in the Book of Job? Don’t your friends look amazing compared to Job’s friends? Here at TYB, we want you to read the Bible and gain a new perspective. Most people read Job and get angry at a God that would do this to him. How dare God do these things! But is that really what is happening in this text, or are we missing the whole point?

The Book of Job introduces us to the genre of Old Testament Wisdom Literature. Throughout the history of the Church, there have been numerous debates concerning the authorship and historicity of Job and as such, it is all too easy to be buried under scholarly technicalities that readers will often abandon any real attempt to dive into Job before they’ve even begun. The simplest question to ask wisdom literature like Job, is this: ‘What lesson am I supposed to come away with?’