Were Job, Eliphaz, Bildad and Zophar Speaking by Inspiration, and how Must We Read Job 3-31?

[Sam Jer]

Hello Brethren,
In the Book of Job, we have leangthy speeches recorded by Job of Uz and his 3 friends: Eliphaz the Temanite, Bildad the Shuhite and Zophar the Naamathite. We know the book is given by inspiration of God, and is profitable for doctrine, for reproof, for correction, for instruction in righteousness: That the man of God may be perfect, thoroughly furnished unto all good works.

However, later in the book we have the LORD telling Job:

Who is this that darkeneth counsel by words without knowledge? (Job 38:2)

And telling Eliphaz the Temanite:

My wrath is kindled against thee, and against thy two friends: for ye have not spoken of me the thing that is right, as my servant Job hath.
Therefore take unto you now seven bullocks and seven rams, and go to my servant Job, and offer up for yourselves a burnt offering; and my servant Job shall pray for you: for him will I accept: lest I deal with you after your folly, in that ye have not spoken of me the thing which is right, like my servant Job. (42:7b-8)

Did Job, and did his friends, then, speak of their'e own folly, or the inspiration of God? How must we understand the monologs of chapters 3-31?


I note the Westminster Confession does cite all three as authorities to substantiate doctrine. One example includes:

WCF 18.1: Although hypocrites and other unregenerate men may vainly deceive themselves with false hopes and carnal presumptions of being in the favour of God and estate of salvation, which hope of theirs shall perish: yet such as truly believe in the Lord Jesus, and love him in sincerity, endeavoring to walk in all good conscience before him, may in this life be certainly assured that they are in a state of grace, and may rejoice in the hope of the glory of God, which hope shall never make them ashamed.

Which cites Bildad the Shuhite, in Job 8:13-14:

So are the paths of all that forget God; and the hypocrite's hope shall perish:
Whose hope shall be cut off, and whose trust shall be a spider's web.

Now while I defenitely lean towards the view that Job, Eliphaz, Bildad and Zophar were Speaking by Inspiration, I do not actually know how to solve this conondrum (nor the conundrum the doctrine of scripture would cause if we took the opposite view).

 

[JP Wallace]

Personally I think the three friends get an overly bad press! Remember the beginning of the book - it was only when they opened their mouths that they became unhelpful - but as friends they were the only ones including family who did not abandon him.

They also do not always speak error, but they do misapply truth at times to Job.

The Book of Job is an inspired record of these conversations, but there is no necessity that they spoke by inspiration themselves anymore than any other unbeliever or believer whose speech is recorded in Scripture - especially when they misspeak, speak sinfully or misapply God's Word.
An almost random example : Was Jacob inspired when he rejected Joseph's dreams?

Genesis 37:10 ESV “But when he told it to his father and to his brothers, his father rebuked him and said to him, “What is this dream that you have dreamed? Shall I and your mother and your brothers indeed come to bow ourselves to the ground before you?””

I think we would say no. But Moses account of his words is an inspired record.

 

[Sam Jer]

Personally I think the three friends get an overly bad press! Remember the beginning of the book - it was only when they opened their mouths that they became unhelpful - but as friends they were the only ones including family who did not abandon him.

They also do not always speak error, but they do misapply truth at times to Job.

The Book of Job is an inspired record of these conversations, but there is no necessity that they spoke by inspiration themselves anymore than any other unbeliever or believer whose speech is recorded in Scripture - especially when they misspeak, speak sinfully or misapply God's Word.
An almost random example : Was Jacob inspired when he rejected Joseph's dreams?

Genesis 37:10 ESV “But when he told it to his father and to his brothers, his father rebuked him and said to him, “What is this dream that you have dreamed? Shall I and your mother and your brothers indeed come to bow ourselves to the ground before you?””

I think we would say no. But Moses account of his words is an inspired record.

Well I think the problem is the records of the speeches of Job and his friends are much longer. You'd have to then explain how 3-31 are still profitable for doctrine, for reproof, for correction, for instruction in righteousness. Could a preacher take Job 4-5 as his text?

(And confessionally you also have the problem that this puts you at odds with how the confession seems to use the book. Unless I misunderstood it completly, perhaps someone who read what a bunch of Westminster Divines or Puritan and Covenanter contemporaries wrote on the book could clarify.)

 

[Ploutos]

Well I think the problem is the records of the speeches of Job and his friends are much longer. You'd have to then explain how 3-31 are still profitable for doctrine, for reproof, for correction, for instruction in righteousness. Could a preacher take Job 4-5 as his text?

(And confessionally you also have the problem that this puts you at odds with how the confession seems to use the book. Unless I misunderstood it completly, perhaps someone who read what a bunch of Westminster Divines or Puritan and Covenanter contemporaries wrote on the book could clarify.)

For starters, don't read those 29 chapters as a theological treatise. They are a narrative of an extended back and forth discourse between Job and his friends.

Yes, a preacher could use Job 4-5 as his text. He could talk, among other things, about Eliphaz's claim that he is speaking with divine authority.

How many times have you actually read Job all the way through? Maybe you should start there. The 29 chapters you read are far from boring or monolithic. There is development and counterpoint of unsurpassed variety and creativity in those pages. Read the book slowly, not just once or twice, but half a dozen times, stopping along the way to ask yourself what's going on.

Afterwards, see if you're still inclined to speak so offhandedly of that golden middle section.

As for length... well, the Bible is 1189 chapters of people saying and doing stupid stuff. That's part of the point. What's the big question about a mere 29 of those chapters?

 

[Sam Jer]

For starters, don't read those 29 chapters as a theological treatise. They are a narrative of an extended back and forth discourse between Job and his friends.

Yes, a preacher could use Job 4-5 as his text. He could talk, among other things, about Eliphaz's claim that he is speaking with divine authority.

How many times have you actually read Job all the way through? Maybe you should start there. The 29 chapters you read are far from boring or monolithic. There is development and counterpoint of unsurpassed variety and creativity in those pages. Read the book slowly, not just once or twice, but half a dozen times, stopping along the way to ask yourself what's going on.

Afterwards, see if you're still inclined to speak so offhandedly of that golden middle section.

As for length... well, the Bible is 1189 chapters of people saying and doing stupid stuff. That's part of the point. What's the big question about a mere 29 of those chapters?

I am not sure you are understanding my question. I am not trying to denigrate these passages, but to the contrary, understand how I should be understanding them. I am confused, that is all.

For starters, don't read those 29 chapters as a theological treatise. They are a narrative of an extended back and forth discourse between Job and his friends.

Could you elaborate on how that affects the interpetation? How do I understand specific verses?

As for length... well, the Bible is 1189 chapters of people saying and doing stupid stuff. That's part of the point. What's the big question about a mere 29 of those chapters?

Would you really say a majority, or even significant minority, of the verses in these chapters are disagreeable?
Take for example this passage from chapter 11:7-9:

Canst thou by searching find out God? canst thou find out the Almighty unto perfection?
It is as high as heaven; what canst thou do? deeper than hell; what canst thou know?
The measure thereof is longer than the earth, and broader than the sea.

There are tons of passages like it. This one, by Zophar, is cited in support of WCF 2.1.

 

[Ploutos]

I know you are not trying to denigrate Job. But I think if you spend more time reading it and getting a sense of the organic unity of the book, questions such as you're asking will start answering themselves. That's why I advised you - and I'll repeat myself - to read the whole book of Job, slowly and deliberately, several times over.

Then, instead of approaching individual verses or passages atomistically, you will have a sense for their place in the larger passage from which they come.* What is Zophar doing in his first discourse as a whole? Why is he saying what he says? How does he engage with and build upon the first volleys of Eliphaz and Bildad, and Job's responses to them? You can't realistically expect to understand that isolated passage and others like it until you are familiar enough with the whole book of Job to have ready answers for those questions. Once you get to that point, you'll start to see why I'm giving you a bit of a hard time for an implicit tendency to approach these chapters as a set of verses to be arranged into two columns, one with the orthodox verses and one with the heretical ones. That's not how you read Job.

"Remember that verse and chapter divisions are uninspired additions to the text.

 

[Ed Walsh]

In the Book of Job, we have leangthy speeches recorded by Job of Uz and his 3 friends: Eliphaz the Temanite, Bildad the Shuhite and Zophar the Naamathite. We know the book is given by inspiration of God, and is profitable for doctrine, for reproof, for correction, for instruction in righteousness: That the man of God may be perfect, thoroughly furnished unto all good works

Personally, I have become fairly sure that Job is about the struggle between the Father and the Son during Jesus' state of humiliation. If Job is not about that, then I don't understand it at all.

One thing further.
I don't yet claim to be sure nor do I have a good scriptural background to prove my point. It's kind of an inkling at this point, but a pretty strong one. Anybody else of this persuasion? Or even heard of this interpretation?

Ed

 

[TylerRay]

Hello Brethren,
In the Book of Job, we have leangthy speeches recorded by Job of Uz and his 3 friends: Eliphaz the Temanite, Bildad the Shuhite and Zophar the Naamathite. We know the book is given by inspiration of God, and is profitable for doctrine, for reproof, for correction, for instruction in righteousness: That the man of God may be perfect, thoroughly furnished unto all good works.

However, later in the book we have the LORD telling Job:

And telling Eliphaz the Temanite:


Did Job, and did his friends, then, speak of their'e own folly, or the inspiration of God? How must we understand the monologs of chapters 3-31?


I note the Westminster Confession does cite all three as authorities to substantiate doctrine. One example includes:

Which cites Bildad the Shuhite, in Job 8:13-14:


Now while I defenitely lean towards the view that Job, Eliphaz, Bildad and Zophar were Speaking by Inspiration, I do not actually know how to solve this conondrum (nor the conundrum the doctrine of scripture would cause if we took the opposite view).

Job and his friends weren't speaking by inspiration, but the record of their speeches is inspired. That being said, they all had sound doctrine; they just misapplied it. In making use of the book of Job, we need to distinguish between the good doctrine taught, and its wrong application to Job's case.

If Job's friends had been correct about Job's case, i.e., that Job was an unrepentant hypocrite, then all that they said to him would have been appropriate.

My personal view is that Job's friends were probably godly men; they just lacked discernment, so that, like Job, they darkened counsel with their words.

 

[Logan]

It is an inspired record of what people said. That doesn't mean that what they said is inspired.

Many other people in Scripture said things. For example, the people saying Herod's voice was the voice of a god and not of a man. What they said wasn't true at all, but it is true that they said it.

Job and his friends have some good things to say, but not all of it is true or specifically true about Job.

 

[Ploutos]

One of the central themes of Job is how man relates to God. Job's friends hold an overly simplistic view of our dealings with God - if good things happen to you it's because God is rewarding you, while if bad things happen it is punishment for sins. It's as if they read nothing but the book of Proverbs and came away with a literalist prosperity-style reading of it.

Job, blinded and half-crazed with grief, adopts a fatalistic view of a capricious and arbitrary view of God who indiscriminately doles out suffering with no regard to our actions whatsoever. But through it all he continues to plead with God. He maintains a very lively and personal relationship throughout the entire book and never wavers in his belief in God's ultimate goodness, giving us some of the OT's best statements about belief in a resurrection, afterlife, and the eventual total spiritual triumph of good over evil. Job, though unaware of Satan's specific machinations, foresees his eventual destruction with great clarity.

In contrast, Job's friends, having reduced religion to a simple set of platitudes, don't seem to feel much need to talk to God or give much thought to their faith at all. Why should they? They have it all figured out and are ready and waiting to apply their ready-made solutions to any problems that come their way. They have a lot of good theology and a solid understanding of sin and depravity, but their understanding of grace and redemption is shallow at best, and they don't seem to have much in the way of deep communion with God. I don't think they ever address God in the book, whereas Job in virtually every discourse eventually stops talking to his friends and shifts over to prayer.

This is why, despite both parties having a mistaken view of God meriting rebuke, Job's friends appear to be in some sort of actual danger from which God allows Job's intercession to rescue them. In their simplistic mechanistic religion they have dismissed God altogether, which God will not allow to go unnoticed. Job on the other hand, while needing correction, is blessed with the gift of divine self-revelation. Like Moses in weakness pleading to see God, Job in his persistent wrestlings is granted a faint glimpse of divine glory.

 

[JP Wallace]

I'm not sure I'm completely sure of what you mean in response to me? But I'll have a go at answering.

"Well I think the problem is the records of the speeches of Job and his friends are much longer. You'd have to then explain how 3-31 are still profitable for doctrine, for reproof, for correction, for instruction in righteousness. Could a preacher take Job 4-5 as his text?"

Yes of course a preacher could, and indeed I have, because it is the inspired Word of God. I have also preaches on Matthew 4 where Satan (surely you would agree not speaking under the inspirtation of God) speaks quite a lot of terribly wicked temptations. It is not that every word spoken and recorded in Scripture being inspired that makes the Bible the Word of God, it is every word that is written by the Spirit moving the authors that makes it the Word of God infallible and inspired in all its parts. I can preach on Eliphaz's words though wrong, perhaps sinful, and almost certainly missapplied because in observing all of those features we can learn lessons just as we can preach from Pilate's word "What is truth?" or "So you are a King?" both expressed in sinful skepticism - but still God's Word records them for our edification.

I'm not claiming the subject your raise is easy to sort out in our minds - but it is clear....All Scripture is God's Word...even the records of the lying the decpetive Serpent in the Garden of Eden, but that Serpent in the speaking of the Words was not inspired - what he spoke he spoke from his own polluted evil heart.

(And confessionally you also have the problem that this puts you at odds with how the confession seems to use the book. Unless I misunderstood it completly, perhaps someone who read what a bunch of Westminster Divines or Puritan and Covenanter contemporaries wrote on the book could clarify.)

I'm pretty confident there is no disagreement between me and the Westminster Divines on this point. Bildad's words in the text you cite are true in principle and from an eternal perspective. However he was wrong to apply them a) to Job who was not a hypcrite and b) he understands them as being absolutely true in each and every instance in the lifetime of the hypocrite. But I'm sure we all know hypocrites who live lives of hypocrisy and never get caught out in life. They will not escape the net they have made for themselves in eternity however.

So the Divines were quite right to quote him as a proof text that proves the general and certainly eternal principle that they propose that hypocrites though they deceive themselves will not deceive God.

 

[Sam Jer]

I'm pretty confident there is no disagreement between me and the Westminster Divines on this point. Bildad's words in the text you cite are true in principle and from an eternal perspective. However he was wrong to apply them a) to Job who was not a hypcrite and b) he understands them as being absolutely true in each and every instance in the lifetime of the hypocrite. But I'm sure we all know hypocrites who live lives of hypocrisy and never get caught out in life. They will not escape the net they have made for themselves in eternity however.

So the Divines were quite right to quote him as a proof text that proves the general and certainly eternal principle that they propose that hypocrites though they deceive themselves will not deceive God.

Okay, I guess that is fair enough, but I am not sure I completly understand. Could one be making use of something in one of these speeches in sorting out a specific doctrinal controversy? Is the way you are doing it going to differ from how one uses a passage from one of Paul's epistles (or, rather, in which way will it differ, and in what ways will it not)?

 

[Blood-Bought Pilgrim]

The Westminster Divine Joseph Caryl does say in his commentary that he believed everything the friends said was doctrinally true, though wrongly applied in Job's case. So he expounds the speeches of the friends as doctrinal truths to be understood and applied, just like one of Paul's epistles. I lean toward agreeing with him, though I certainly don't think that position is necessary to uphold a proper doctrine of Scripture. As someone noted above, there are plenty of other places in Scripture where we have an inspired record of someone saying something false.

@Ed Walsh I am curious about your connection from Job to the Father and the Son. Is this something you arrived at on your own or is there someone you got this from? It's an intriguing idea.

 

[Ed Walsh]

Job and his friends weren't speaking by inspiration, but the record of their speeches is inspired.

That was well said.

I have come to believe strongly that the Man on the scene was the Son, Jesus, not the Father, facing off against Job's questions. The OT adds a lot about the personality of our Savor.

 

[No Other Name]

That was well said.

I have come to believe strongly that the Man on the scene was the Son, Jesus, not the Father, facing off against Job's questions. The OT adds a lot about the personality of our Savor.

What Man? Elihu? The young man that listened and then spoke up after a while?

 

[Redeemed Ronin]

To your question (from a layman perspective), the three friends can possibly be used to prove doctrine insofar as they agree with other places in the Bible, that is, what they say is true about God.

Christopher Ash has a commentary on Job that I found illuminating.

He goes into details, but essentially Ash presents that the three friends say some things that are true about God based on human wisdom and tradition (they were moral pagans essentially), but they have no category of redemptive suffering, that is: upright people can suffer even though they didn't do anything overtly wrong. Their definition of God's justice is not far off from the common understanding of karma or the basic understanding of reading and sowing. The friends press Job saying that he's suffering because he sinned, even though God (unbeknownst to them) affirms that Job is upright multiple times, and therefore implying those that suffer suffer because of unconfessed actual sin, which the Bible shows is not necessarily true.

The fourth man is a type of prophet for God:

• He prefaces what he says as being divinely inspired.
• God's speeches validate and expound on what he says.
• God does not admonish him as He does the other three men, suggesting what he said was an accurate portrayal of God.

 

[Sam Jer]

The Westminster Divine Joseph Caryl does say in his commentary that he believed everything the friends said was doctrinally true, though wrongly applied in Job's case. So he expounds the speeches of the friends as doctrinal truths to be understood and applied, just like one of Paul's epistles. I lean toward agreeing with him, though I certainly don't think that position is necessary to uphold a proper doctrine of Scripture. As someone noted above, there are plenty of other places in Scripture where we have an inspired record of someone saying something false.

@Ed Walsh I am curious about your connection from Job to the Father and the Son. Is this something you arrived at on your own or is there someone you got this from? It's an intriguing idea.

Is Caryl's commentary availble online so I can read what he has to say in support of that view and how he applies it in specific instances?

Personally, I have become fairly sure that Job is about the struggle between the Father and the Son during Jesus' state of humiliation. If Job is not about that, then I don't understand it at all.

One thing further.
I don't yet claim to be sure nor do I have a good scriptural background to prove my point. It's kind of an inkling at this point, but a pretty strong one. Anybody else of this persuasion? Or even heard of this interpretation?

Ed

That is interesting. I myself had the thought that Job 42:10 has a lot of paralells to Christ.

 

[Blood-Bought Pilgrim]

Is Caryl's commentary availble online so I can read what he has to say in support of that view and how he applies it in specific instances?

Here is a link to pdf scans. Not the easiest to navigate but it's all there is online. I believe the remark I'm thinking of was at the beginning of when he talked about either chapter 11 or 14.

 

[Sam Jer]

Here is a link to pdf scans. Not the easiest to navigate but it's all there is online. I believe the remark I'm thinking of was at the beginning of when he talked about either chapter 11 or 14.

I am not finding the link

 

[Blood-Bought Pilgrim]

I am not finding the link

I apologize, I forgot to include it! https://www.monergism.com/exposition-job-practical-observations

 

[Semper Fidelis]

Some really good points have been made in this thread.

I think Job is especially poignant if you've ever walked beside a man or a family who is in the midst of overwhelming grief.

It's been noted already, but Job's friends unseasonably apply God's Word to a suffering man. Instead of comforting Him with God's Word, they weaponize truths about God's punishment for sin or His holiness and apply them to Job. They assume a sort of formulaic rule about suffering that it only comes about when someone has sinned that Job needs to repent of whatever sin has brought this calamity upon him.

Why would this be a Scriptural text illustrating how people can misuse God's Word? It almost speaks for itself when the question is asked. If anything, it points out that the wrestling with God that occurs as His people suffer requires a much deeper appreciation for the inscrutability of God and the way that answers to our present misery in this world are found.

We don't find answers to our suffering by trying to penetrate the Divine mystery. Even the disclosure at the beginning of the text that Satan gets permission to tempt Job doesn't probe the depths of God's wisdom.

Job's complaints are very interesting because they give voice both to the ways in which they articulate that one feels as if God has raided His hand against him combined with a confidence that there is a Redeemer Who will stand for him. He expressed confidence, in the midst of sorrow, that his Redeemer lives.

The book is a good reminder that you don't read Scripture for "life verses," but it is to be meditated upon and that the whole tells us something that we grow in our appreciation for.

This is the Book that I providentially have been reading through with my family during family devotions and I constantly point to a family in suffering right now. I point out how, instead of being friends with Job, his friends constantly accuse him of sinning. Likewise, people suffering the loss of a child receive terrible advice or rebuke from fellow believers where people will just throw out verses or wonder why a parent isn't just "getting over" the death of a child or, worse, that the death is evidence that the parent didn't pray enough for that child.

A pan-Scriputal understanding of suffering takes Job into account and also the things we know from the fuller Revelation in Christ. We're provided endurance in our present state of sin and misery. We're given the hope of the Resurrection as well as the fact that God will one day vindicate the suffering of the Saints. In the meanwhile, we groan and we groan in ways that don't allow us to express the depths of our current misery. Thankfully, the Spirit doesn't come alongside us to tell us that our present suffering is for hidden sin but groans in words too deep for human understanding - on our behalf.

 

[Ploutos]

Some really good points have been made in this thread.

I think Job is especially poignant if you've ever walked beside a man or a family who is in the midst of overwhelming grief.

Not to mention, if one has experienced such grief one's self.

 

[Semper Fidelis]

Not to mention, if one has experienced such grief one's self.

True. Hopefully, they have friends that know how to walk with them in the midst of it.

 

[TylerRay]

1 Cor 3:19: “For the wisdom of this world is foolishness with God. For it is written, He taketh the wise in their own craftiness.”

Where is it "written?" In the speech of Eliphaz, Job 5:13: "He taketh the wise in their own craftiness: and the counsel of the froward is carried headlong."

Thus, Paul takes Eliphaz's doctrine as authoritative.

 

[Ploutos]

1 Cor 3:19: “For the wisdom of this world is foolishness with God. For it is written, He taketh the wise in their own craftiness.”

Where is it "written?" In the speech of Eliphaz, Job 5:13: "He taketh the wise in their own craftiness: and the counsel of the froward is carried headlong."

Thus, Paul takes Eliphaz's doctrine as authoritative.

Can we deduce a normative rule from that?

 

[Sam Jer]

1 Cor 3:19: “For the wisdom of this world is foolishness with God. For it is written, He taketh the wise in their own craftiness.”

Where is it "written?" In the speech of Eliphaz, Job 5:13: "He taketh the wise in their own craftiness: and the counsel of the froward is carried headlong."

Thus, Paul takes Eliphaz's doctrine as authoritative.

Thank you. I think this settles it (not the details but defenitely the general idea).

 

[LanceJ]

Personally, I have become fairly sure that Job is about the struggle between the Father and the Son during Jesus' state of humiliation. If Job is not about that, then I don't understand it at all.

One thing further.
I don't yet claim to be sure nor do I have a good scriptural background to prove my point. It's kind of an inkling at this point, but a pretty strong one. Anybody else of this persuasion? Or even heard of this interpretation?

Ed

Hi Ed,

Is there a historical precedence of this view? It's the first time I've heard the book of Job applied in this way.

 

[LanceJ]

Hi Ed,

Is there a historical precedence for this view? It's the first time I've heard the book of Job applied in this way.

 

[Ed Walsh]

Is there a historical precedence of this view? It's the first time I've heard the book of Job applied in this way.

I think it's mostly an idea of mine. That statement alone makes me doubt my thoughts.

Here's something I posted previously:

Jude 1:5-7 ESV​

Now, I want to remind you, although you once fully knew it, that Jesus, who saved a people out of the land of Egypt, afterward destroyed those who did not believe. And the angels who did not stay within their own position of authority but left their proper dwelling, he has kept in eternal chains under gloomy darkness until the judgment of the great day— just as Sodom and Gomorrah and the surrounding cities, which likewise indulged in sexual immorality and pursued unnatural desire, serve as an example by undergoing a punishment of eternal fire.​

~~~~~~~​

Hi Chris,

The question I have is kind of the reverse. Where isn't Christ in the Old Testament? I have come to think that the party the most absent from the Old Testament is God the Father. I believe that in the beginning, rather than before the beginning, the Father put the whole work of Creation in the hands of his Son, who is Himself, God. It was Jesus the Mighty God who delivered Israel from Egypt, then later destroyed those who did not believe (or, as the word may mean, obey). God the Son is the one who thundered from the mount as he gave the law. It was Jesus who destroyed Sodom and Gomorrah, and Jesus who spoke those harshest of words to Job in chapters 38-41. I could go on and on.

But I do have a concern about what I just said. Although I see this clearly taught in the Bible, when I posted my thoughts a month and a half ago, I got zero response. Nada. So, as convinced as I am personally, I understand that I have no right to a private interpretation of the Scriptures. So, I offer you a link to that post for your consideration. And please, to you and others, I make the request that I be shown where I have gone wrong and what I have come to think is right.

Thanks

 

[Ploutos]

Christopher Ash has a commentary on Job that I found illuminating.

@Redeemed Ronin I really appreciated these thoughts. What is the title of that commentary? It sounds like a resource worth looking into.

I have come to think that the party the most absent from the Old Testament is God the Father. I believe that in the beginning, rather than before the beginning, the Father put the whole work of Creation in the hands of his Son, who is Himself, God. It was Jesus the Mighty God who delivered Israel from Egypt, then later destroyed those who did not believe (or, as the word may mean, obey). God the Son is the one who thundered from the mount as he gave the law. It was Jesus who destroyed Sodom and Gomorrah, and Jesus who spoke those harshest of words to Job in chapters 38-41. I could go on and on.

But I do have a concern about what I just said. Although I see this clearly taught in the Bible, when I posted my thoughts a month and a half ago, I got zero response. Nada. So, as convinced as I am personally, I understand that I have no right to a private interpretation of the Scriptures. So, I offer you a link to that post for your consideration.

@Ed Walsh I would be concerned about speaking of a person of the Trinity being comparatively or objectively absent from the OT. Seeing Christ doesn't mean not seeing the Father. In fact (as I'm reminded currently in my reading of John) the exact opposite is true. When you see Christ in the OT you can't help but see the Father.

At a more specific level, in Genesis 1, Exodus 20, and Psalm 33, we see references to God speaking, and from a Trinitarian perspective, it is the Father who speaks from eternity and the Son who is the Word that is eternally spoken forth or generated of the Father. So there are three places right off the bat where I would argue that the Father is in view.