NOTES for Job 42:1

Having seen and heard everything said and shown to him by God, Job repents of what he had said to God before meeting Him (vv. 1-6). And this second repentance was not like the first (Job 40:3-5). The first repentance was caused by the realization that Job had been wrong before God, that he had been mistaken in thinking that God had no concern for an individual human being in general or for him, Job, personally. Now Job's repentance is deeper; he himself says that he repents "in dust and ashes" (v. 6), an expression used when a person wanted to say that he deeply regretted everything he had done before. Such repentance evidently had to mean also a renunciation of what Job had previously considered righteousness, of the demands he had made on God while wanting to contend with Him in court (vv. 3-4). Job himself explains his renunciation simply. He says to God: before, I had only heard of You, but now I see You (v. 5).

It would appear that exactly what Job had waited for so long and desired so intensely had happened; now, at last, he can say everything to God. But evidently during the meeting something happened that completely changed both Job himself and his view of his own righteousness. As is clear, only now did he truly become a real righteous man, and he himself understood this; his former righteousness now appeared to him like a child's toy that he had seriously displayed to God, demanding in exchange some special rights and some special position in a world where a war is going on between God and the forces of darkness. Job's former righteousness had not yet gone beyond religious limits; it was human righteousness, unquestionably valuable to God, but it did not give a person the possibility of living a full spiritual life. Now Job understood what God's righteousness is, which can be obtained only by giving oneself completely over to God's will and ceasing to rely on any merits of one's own, even those connected with achievements in religious life. But complete surrender to God's will was, of course, utterly impossible without that face-to-face meeting with God which Job so desired, although he expected from this meeting something entirely different from what happened. He wanted to contend with God in court, but having seen everything God could reveal to a human being, he abandoned his intention and surrendered to God, admitting defeat. Yet this was a defeat not so much before God's power as before His love and wisdom. That is why God entrusts Job's friends to his prayers (vv. 7-9): Job has already traveled the path on which they have not yet even set foot. Of course, religiosity has its own significance and meaning; it has its own relative truth. God tells Job that his friends have not spoken of Him "as rightly as Job" (v. 7). But there is something greater in relations with God than religion: revelation and the Kingdom, experienced by Job during his meeting with God as an unquestionable reality.