Humor in connection with job

HUMOR I� JOB MY STUDY

HUMOR I� CO��ECTIO� WITH JOB

If someone asked you what book of the Bible is among the most famous

and the most funny, what would you say? The reason the answer is funny

is because it is so unexpected, for that book would be the book considered

to be so serious as to be without humor, and that book would be Job. You

may

never have heard of it, but it is considered by many to be the longest

comedy in all the Bible. It is filled with irony, sarcasm and insults

much like many a sitcom on television. It is not full of jokes, and it

is not that you are going to laugh your way through it, for it is dealing

with tragedy as bad as they come, and ongoing suffering that is being

endured by a completely innocent man, who has to put up with friends

who

are constantly trying to blame him for it all. It is full of pain, but

it is also a case where tragedy and comedy exist side by side.

William Whedbee of Pomona College wrote a study on Job and this is

part

of what his thesis said, "The Book of Job continues to evoke radically

diverse interpretations. In particular, the problem of the dominant

genre of the book has perennially challenged and frustrated interpreters.

My own thesis is that when the poem of Job is set in its full and final

literary context, replete with Prologue and Epilogue as well as the Elihu

speeches, the most apt generic designation of the book is comedy."

1 In the land of Uz there lived a man whose name was Job. This man was

blameless and upright; he feared God and shunned evil.

If you're looking for the latest buzz

Check out Job from the land of Uz.

You'll have to search the whole wide globe

To find a man greater than Job.


He was a man blameless and upright

And he chose against all evil to fight.

As through this world of woe he trod,

He lived his life in the fear of God.

This is Israel's first book of poetry and wisdom. We have here not,

the wizard of Oz, but the wisdom of Uz. Uz was in Arabia near the mouth

of the Euphrates river, or in what we today call Iraq. It is amazing

how much of the Bible revolves around this country we now call Iraq,

which is so much in the news.

1. The garden of Eden was in Iraq.

2. Mesopotamia which is now Iraq was the cradle of civilization.

3. �oah built the ark in Iraq.

4. The Tower of Babel was in Iraq.

5. Abraham was from Ur, which is in Southern Iraq.

6. Isaac's wife Rebekah is from �ahor which is in Iraq.

7. Jacob met Rachel in Iraq.

8. Jonah preached in �ineveh - which is in Iraq.

9. Assyria which is in Iraq conquered the ten tribes of Israel.

10. Amos cried out in Iraq.

11. Babylon which is in Iraq destroyed Jerusalem.


12. Daniel was in the lion's den in Iraq.

13. The 3 Hebrew children were in the fire in Iraq.

14. Belshazzar, the King of Babylon saw the "writing on the wall" in

Iraq.

15. �ebuchadnezzar, King of Babylon, carried the Jews captive into

Iraq.

16. Ezekiel preached in Iraq.

17. The wise men were from Iraq.

18. Peter preached in Iraq.

19. The "Empire of Man" described in Revelation is called Babylon,

which was a city in Iraq.

Israel is the nation most often mentioned in the Bible. But do you know

which nation

is second? It is Iraq! However, that is not the name that is used in the

Bible. The

names used in the Bible are Babylon, Land of Shinar, and Mesopotamia.

The word Mesopotamia means between the two rivers, more exactly

between

the Tigris and Euphrates Rivers. The name Iraq, means country with

deep

roots. Indeed, Iraq is a country with deep roots and is a very

significant country in the Bible.

�o other nation, except Israel, has more history and prophecy


associated in it than Iraq

Job was one of the famous Gentiles of the Bible. Some Jews want to claim

him as one of their own,

but the vast majority of commentators, even Jewish ones, agree that he

was likely an Arabian gentile.

There is humor in this even in that many of the greatest people in the

Jewish Bible are gentiles.

Judaism started with a Gentile by the name of Abraham, and here we

have the description of the

most righteous man in the Old Testament, and he is a Gentile.

His suffering is not chastisement to get him back on the right track, for he

never left the right track. His experience does not represent the

typical man, but rather, the suffering of the very righteous. Ezek. 14:14,

20 make clear he was one of the best. The description of Job, that

God agrees with a little later, proves that his suffering has nothing to do

with punishment, for he did nothing worthy of punishment. It also had

nothing to do with discipline and chastisement, for he was blameless and

did not deserve any such thing. His character is such that it destroys

the arguments of his friends that he is suffering because of some secret sin

in his life. It also destroys most other theories as to why the

innocent suffer. The book of Job does not give many answers as to why

the innocent suffer, but it does eliminate most all guesses and theories

that men have come up with. Job ranks next to Jesus in his sinlessness

and in his suffering. Job is the most innocent sufferer that was totally


man. Only two other men in all of the Bible are on his level of perfection.

In Ezekiel 14 we read these words from the mouth of God himself:

12 The word of the LORD came to me: 13 "Son of man, if a country sins

against me by being unfaithful and I stretch out my hand against it

to cut off its food supply and send famine upon it and kill its men and

their animals, 14 even if these three men—�oah, Daniel [a] and Job—

were in it, they could save only themselves by their righteousness,

declares the Sovereign LORD. 17 "Or if I bring a sword against that

country and say, 'Let the sword pass throughout the land,' and I kill its

men and their animals, 18 as surely as I live, declares the Sovereign

LORD, even if these three men were in it, they could not save their own

sons or daughters. They alone would be saved.

�ote that 2 of the 3 are Gentiles, and the third became a leader in a

Gentile nation, and spent his life among the Gentiles. One of the most

interesting things about the Jewish Bible, or what we call the Old

Testament, is the role that Gentiles play in God's plan and revelation.

One

of the most common misconceptions is that God chose the Jews because

he loved them more than all other people. The fact is, God chose the

Jews because he needed a particular people to be a tool by which he could

reach all people with the good news of salvation. God has always

been one who so loved the world, that is all people. The purpose of the

Jews was to become a godly nation who could be a blessing to all


nations because they would bring to all nations the good news of the one

true God.

Job 1:6 One view of Satan is that he was created to do a job that other

angels would not do. His task was to investigate and report back to

God all signs of sin in God's creation due to man's free willed decisions.

The occupational hazard of this kind of job is that in dealing only with

the negative you tend to become negative. Satan got so carried away with

his job of finding bad things that he started to promote the bad

things he was looking for. Power corrupts and we see it in Satan. He

became cruel like the secret police who have the power to abuse. I

Chron. 21:1. Power even in the hands of good people has danger-I Tim.

3:6.

One aspect of humor is being on the inside of what is going on, and

having the privilege of knowing why the person who is going through

something is doing so. We have inside information and so we know the

reason, but Job knows nothing about this meeting in heaven. We

already know that God considers him righteous and not in any way

worthy of judgment. The friends do not know this scene either and so

they

come up with their own theories that condemn Job. But we already know

Job is what he says, innocent and not worthy of such judgement,

and so it is funny to see the friends coming up with their nonsense. We


can laugh at them for we know where God stands from the beginning.

They look foolish in the light of what we know.

CHAPTER THREE

Swift used to go into his closet every year on his birthday and read this

chapter, and sob as he applied it to himself."

Cursing has been an age old tradition, and even today yet there are curses

that deal with contemporary situations. People call down upon

others bad things. Why do bad things happen to good people? That is the

question of the ages, and one of the answers is that people have

cursed them. Some modern curses are not quite as severe as the old time

witches curses, but they are still bad enough to spoil your day. Some

examples are:

May ketchup always find your shirt

May all the windows you jump through be closed

May all your friends eat beans constantly

May all the water you dive into be a mirage

May all your sandwiches have mold on them

May you have a close encounter with an insane dentist

May a rabbit mistake your nose for a carrot


May you be the recipient of the south end of a north-facing camel

As ridiculous as these sound they do not compare with the curse of Job on

the day of his birth. This is probably the most radical curse on a

particular day that exists in all of human literature. It is funny because it

is so extreme that it is overkill. �o matter how you curse that day you

were born it does not change anything, and so it is meaningless. It does

reveal the depth of Job’s despair and how he hates being alive with all

he has suffered, but it is a strange way of dealing with his pain. If it could

actually be eliminated as he desires then all others born on that day

would not exist, and he would be destroying the lives of how many

thousands who are happy for that day of their birth? There is no humor

in

what Job had suffered, and yet there is because of it being so extreme that

it is ridiculous. Concider this record-Job began the day as a

millionaire but in a series of unfortunate circumstances he would lose all

his wealth.

If that wasn’t enough, a tornado hit the house where his ten children were

and they all died. Then the Bible tells us that Job’s health broke.

Chuck Swindoll gives a summary of Job’s physical pain. He suffered:

• Inflamed ulcerous sores (Job 2:7)

• Persistent itching (Job 2:8)

• Facial disfiguration (Job 2:12)

• Loss of appetite (Job 3:24)


• Fears and depression (Job 3:25)

• Sores that burst open, scab over, crack and

ooze with pus (Job 7:5)

• Worms that form in the sores themselves

(Job 7:5)

• Difficulty in breathing (Job 9:18)

• A darkening of the eyelid (Job 16:16)

• Loss of weight (Job 19:20)

• Continual pain (Job 30:27)

• High fever with chills and diarrhea

(Job 30:30)

On top of that Job says, “my breath is offensive to my wife” (19:17). After

reading that list it is funny that he would add his bad breath as

part of his terrible suffering.

Job was so disfigured and disgusting that nearly everyone including his

servants rejected him. He was so poor and despised that eventually he

had to go live in the city garbage dump. Warren Wiersbe describes what

living there was like. “In this place the city garbage was deposited

and burned and the city’s rejects lived, begging money from whomever

passed by. Dogs fought over something to eat and city’s dung was

brought and burned. Job, who was once the greatest of all men in the

East was now living in abject poverty and shame.”

[1] 1:5 The Hebrew word bless is used euphemistically for curse in 1:5,

11; 2:5, 9


HUMOR A�D TRAGEDY

Worst Day Of 'My' Life

There was a guy in a bar, just looking at his drink. He stayed like that for

half an hour. Then, this big trouble-making truck driver stepped up

next to him, took the drink from the guy, and drank it all down. The poor

man started crying. The truck driver said, “Come on man, I was just

joking. Here, I'll buy you another drink. I just can't see a man crying.”

“�o, it's not that. This day is the worst of my life. First, I was late

getting to my office. My boss was outrageous, and fired me. When I left

the building to go to my car, I found out it was stolen. The police say

they can do nothing. I got a cab to return home, and when I left it, I

remembered I left my wallet and credit cards there. The cab driver just

drove away. When I got home, I found my wife in bed with the gardener.

I left home and came to this bar. And just when I was thinking about

putting an end to my life, you show up and drink my poison.”

3:1

You might think things can't get worse,

But you'd be wrong, just hear this curse.

May that day on which I was born

Be forever treated with scorn.

May there never be any joy

On that day they said,"It's a boy."

May God in heaven to my voice give hark

And keep that day forever in dark.


May it never see again the dawn of light,

But remain overshadowed in endless night.

May it be cut from the calender of time

And be totally barren of laughter and rhyme.

May it ever be as dark as the tomb

Because it did not shut the door of the womb.

Let the curse of it be more than double

Because it let me be born to this trouble.

Why oh why did I not die?

Why did my mother have to hear my first cry?

Why did she nurse me and give me my life?

I could have been aborted and escaped all this strife.

Had I been born dead at my birth

I could be lying in peace in the earth.

This thing called living is a vicious pest,

I would rather be in the grave and at rest.

This would have been my choices goal

And thus escape this bitterness of soul.

I long for death like a hidden treasure,

And to be in the grave would be my pleasure.

My tears flow out like streams of water,

For all my hopes have met with slaughter.

There is nothing left and so I cry,

Take my life and let me die.

We have in this chapter the humor of excessive pessimism and cursing.

Anything that is done to such an excess that it becomes ridiculous is a

form of humor. We know because of future chapters that Job had a sense

of humor, but he has completely lost it at this point. He has gone

bonkers over his fate and demonstrates excessive pessimism like no one


else in history.

After 7 days of sitting in silence and feeling the pain of all he had lost and

all his body was suffering, he opens up and the first thing that comes

out is a curse on the day of his birth. He has had 7 days to brood over all

he had suffered and now he is ready to explode with eloquent anger

that he is alive. It is safe to assume that Job did not want his friends to

sing happy birthday to him anytime soon. He would have cherished a

happy death day, however, but there are few to no tunes for that

occasion. It is understandable why Job is miserable, but why he takes it

out

on the day he was born is hard to understand. The day of his birth is

innocent, and yet he curses it to the greatest extent of language for

cursing. Thank heavens the actual date of his birth is not revealed, for

that would be a very negative date for people to be born. Even though

this curse did not have any effect on the day, it would not be a good omen

to have your day of birth labeled with such a famous curse. So the

good new is, nobody knows the day which Job cursed. Those who fear the

number 13 are no doubt persuaded it was Friday the 13th, but this

is pure speculation.

Job was not alone in cursing the day of his birth, for Jeremiah does the

same thing. Woe is me, my mother, that thou hast borne me!Jer.

15:10. Cursed be the day wherein I was born, Jer. 20:13. Both of these


men had many years in which they gave thanks to God for being born,

and like everyone else they celebrated the day of their birth. It is a form

of folly to be cursing the day of your birth after you have already

celebrated it many times. That is why we have to assume that this sort of

thing is just a way of expressing how miserable life has become.

Solomon also had his bad days when he thought dying was better than

being born. He was not happy with his birthday. "A good name is

better than precious ointment; and the day of death than the day of one’s

birth." Eccl, 7:1 So we have in the Bible three stooges who get so

caught up in the negatives of life that they foolishly deny the value of

being born and having life.

Another great man of God, Elijah, had the same pessimistic attitude, but

he did not curse his day of birth, but just said, "kill me."

"I have had enough, Lord," Elijah prayed, "Take my life…" (1 Kings

19:4).

Matthew Henry writes, “It was Job's folly and weakness to curse his day.

We must say of it, This was his infirmity; but good men have

sometimes failed in the exercise of those graces which they have been

most eminent for, that we may understand that when they are said to

be perfect it is meant that they were upright, not that they were sinless.”

Others have felt they wish they could die and be done with this life,

but they never dreamed of cursing the day of their birth. Stedman said, “I

do not know if you have ever felt that way, but I think there have


been times when I wished I could have dropped out of the scene entirely

and gone home to heaven.”

Martin Luther was typical of the great men of God who found

themselves in the dumps. Chapter 3 of Job could well have been one of his

own songs of the blues. He sounded so much like Job when he wrote, "I

am sick of life, if this life can be called life. Implacable hatred and

strife amongst the great-no hopes of any improvement-the age is Satan's

own; gladly would I see myself and all my people quickly snatched

from it." He could not see the future and how his writing would influence

millions all over the world. Tim LaHaye has written some of the

finest books, and one is, How To Win Over Depression. He wrote this

book because back in 1969 it hit him, and for two and a half years he

went through five periods of depression. The awfulness of it motivated

him to seek answers, and to help others to gain victory. Vance

Havner went through great depression when his wife died, and he wrote,

Though I Walk Through The Valley, to help others who go that same

way.

History is filled with words of pessimism about life and the wish that they

were dead, but as we read them we will notice that Job's is different

in that he was not content to wish he was dead, but he wished that the day

of his birth was dead, and that it never existed. Some just want to


be dead because they are too lazy to live. Such is the idea behind this little

verse:

Things get so much harder

When we have to leave our bed

Wouldn't life be easier

If we were just dead?

From the desk of Mindles H. Dreck:

Some folk like music, some folk like tea, Some folk like women, they're

not for me. Here is my motto, simple and terse: Everything;s lousy,

and going to get worse! Oh, I wish Oh, I wish Man had never evolved

from a fish. Oh, I wish I were dead, Wish I'd been dropped on my head,

Broken my neck, lost the toss with a bull, Parachute jumped and

forgotten to pull, Oh, I long to be dead, Wrapped in a casket of lead, Wish

I'd been drowned in a barrel of trout, Dived off the pier when the tide

was still out.

The grave, the grave,

Is a fine and private place,

The grave, the grave,

And who the devil wants to embrace?

I wish, I wish I were dead,

Laid out with a lilly in bed,

Wish that I'd drunk some carbolic for fun,

Tested the trigger while cleaning my gun,

Or just shrivelled up in the heat of the sun,

Oh, I wish I were dead, dead, dead,

Oh, I wish I were,

Oh, I wish I were,


Oh, I wish I were,

I wish I was dead.

The fact is, millions really feel this way, but they do not curse the day of

their birth. It is strange to do such a thing, and strange is funny. It is

funny to think that one whole chapter of the Bible is about cursing of

one's birthday. Is God joking with us, to give us a whole chapter of his

revelation dealing with cursing the day of birth? We need to see the

psychology of this to understand its value. Satan said Job would curse

God to his face if he lost all. Job had to have feelings of unbelievable

anger at God and the mystery of why he was suffering all this tragedy.

He was ready to explode, but he found an outlet for his anger and

depression. Instead of cursing God, he cursed the day of his birth, and he

went on and on to excess because he was so filled with negative emotions

and he needed to release them or Satan would win the battle, for he

would curse God. This chapter is about releasing pent up emotions that

can lead to damaging sin by finding an object to hurl them at that

does not hurt man or God. It is really quite clever of Job, for it is wisdom

in action. It is like taking out your frustration by hitting a pillow

rather than the neighbor that is driving you batty. Couples in conflict are

encouraged to have pillow fights to release their anger. As they

batter one another they will end up laughing and release all the emotions

that makes them want to strangle each other. Anytime an inanimate


object can be the focus for releasing your anger you have won a major

battle, and that is what we see Job doing in this chapter. Job goes the

final step and chooses to release his anger at what is not even an object,

but a day, and not a soul in all the world will be injured or even

affected by this curse. It is the most violent curse of a day ever, and yet it

is less hurtful to anyone than striking the side of a steel building with

a feather. It is horrible in its expression, but harmless in it effect.

"Life does not cease to be funny when people die any more than it ceases

to be serious when people laugh."- George Bernard Shaw

VERSE 3

Job, why don't you tell us how you really feel. This is sarcasm that I have

heard when expressing emotions.

C.S. Lewis once said, “We must lay before God what is in us, not what is

not in us.” If you are upset with God, don’t fake it. IT IS �OT

ILLEGAL TO EXPRESS YOUR HO�EST EMOTIO�S A�D

FEELI�GS TO GOD.

VERSE 4

Here we have a good example of unanswered prayer, for he wanted God

to not care about this day, and to make sure the sun would never

shine on it. Such a weird request with no value is not taken seriously by

God. He ignores all such curses just as he does all of those who every

day are asking him to damn somebody. People are always wanting God to

do some stupid thing or other, and thank God he does not pay


attention to such nonsense. Job’s parents and family members are still

happy about that day a son was born. They are not happy about what

that son is now going through, but they certainly do not regret having this

son brought into the world and their lives. This is just very personal

bitterness being expressed, and nobody would expect God to honor such a

neurotic request.

VERSE 7

Come on Job, there are babies born on that very day every year, and the

families want to shout for joy. You cannot rob the rest of mankind

of the joy at the birth of children just because your life is in misery. This

is really a picture of ultimate selfishness where Job wants the whole

universe to revolve around his feelings. The fact is, when people are

suffering deeply they do become self-centered, for it is hard to be

concerned with anyone or anything but yourself when pain demands your

full attention.

CHAPTER 6:14-23

Job is now responding to the lack of encouragement he is receiving from

his friends. He does not feel they have helped him at all. In fact, he is

worse off with their presence because they add one more pain to his

misery. He thought it could not get worse, and then his friends start to

speak and he realizes he was wrong. It is not right that they should add to

his pain and he lets them know in not so subtle language.


The Message puts this verse this way: ""When desperate people give up

on God Almighty, their friends, at least, should stick with them." He

was not getting any good vibes from God, but he expected that his friends

would at least support him."

The humor is in Job's criticism of their worthless comfort.

CHAPTER 12

1-12 in verse:

One thing is for sure, there is no doubt,

When you die, the lights of wisdom will go out.

You guys need to face it, I too have a mind,

And you do not leave me behind.

In pride you make it big show,

But everything you say I also know.

My friends now just laugh at me,

Though once, only my good they did see.

When all goes well men hate to see

The pain of those in agony.

Even foolish men with homemade gods

Are able to beat the suffering odds.

They live a life that is secure

And have no tragedy to endure.

All of nature can show and tell

The very things on which you dwell.

They all know God's hand did this,

For by his hand come pain and bliss.

By his hand all things have breath.

He is the Lord of life and death.

The ear can taste if words are good

Just as the tongue can taste of food.

Is not wisdom among the aged found,


For long life makes them quite profound.

Today we would use sarcasm like this by saying, okey Einstein, I guess

you know all and the rest of us are mere dunces who must bow to your

every word or live like ignorant idiots. Oh wise ones, what fools we are to

not see you have grasped all the wisdom of the world. Job is saying

you are full of it, with all your conceited arrogance that pretends to have

a monopoly on the truth. This is severe sarcasm and it shows Job's

contempt for their commonplace platitudes they are using to scold him.

CHAPTER 13

1 "My eyes have seen all this,

my ears have heard and understood it.

2 What you know, I also know;

I am not inferior to you.

3 But I desire to speak to the Almighty

and to argue my case with God.

4 You, however, smear me with lies;

you are worthless physicians, all of you!

5 If only you would be altogether silent!

For you, that would be wisdom.

CHAPTER 15 ELIPHAS CRITICISM

CHAPTER 16

Job is saying I have had an ample supply of this kind of advice. You have

been saying the same things over and over and I am sufficiently

filled with your miserable so-called wisdom. I am sick of you acting so


self-righteous and wise. You are making me sicker instead of soothing

my misery. I did not think it possible to be more miserable than I already

was, but you clever friends found a way to push me to a new low.

Congradulations on being successful in adding another oxymoron to

human language- miserable comforters.

You repeat and repeat over and over the same old cliches that have no

relevance to the issue of my suffering. You are spouting the same old

boring proverbs of the ancients that everyone has heard a million times,

and they carry no weight in giving comfort. In fact, they add to the

misery rather than detract from it. You are multiplying misery with your

meaningless mouthings of speeches without compassion.

16:4

You think that you are something special because you can throw out

advice and counsel to a suffering man that makes you look so superior

to him. Let me assure you that it does not take great talent and wisdom,

for I could make you just as miserable as you are making me if you

were going through the tragic circumstances that I am going through. I

could easily come up with a mean speech like your, and then shake

my head at you for being so pathetic. �ote that I said it would be a

speech, not to comfort you, but against you. That is the kind of speeches

you are making, for they are not for me, but against me. You are my

critics and not my comforters.

Job is trying to make it clear that they are not helping the situation. He is


going to be as mean as they are in hopes they will see how foolish it

is to try and comfort someone with criticism and arguing. I could put

together some long winded boring speeches that insult your intelligence

if our positions were reversed, and I could shake my head at you, which is

an expression of scorn, but lets face it, that is not the way of

friendship.

There is more comedy to come, but this is as far as I get for now.

Humor in connection with job

Spiritual

Transcript of Humor in connection with job