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Thomas Carlyle once said of the Book of Job: “There is nothing written, I think, of equal literary merit.”

Victor Hugo once wrote, “The Book of Job is perhaps the greatest masterpiece of the human mind.”

Alfred Lord Tennyson called Job the “greatest poem of ancient and modern times.”

William Safire pontificated in his syndicated column with the New York Times:

“Forget the so-called ‘patience of Job’; that legend is blown away by the shockingly irreverent biblical narrative . . . Indeed, Job's demand that his unseen adversary show up at a trial with a written indictment gets an unexpected reaction: in a thunderous theophany, God appears before the startled man with the longest and most beautifully poetic speech attributed directly to him in Scripture . . . Frankly, God's voice ‘out of the whirlwind’ carries a message not all that satisfying to those wondering about moral mismanagement. Virginia Woolf wrote in her journal ‘I read the Book of Job last night -- I don't think God comes well out of it.’ ”

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Preacher Richard Jordan says not only does the Book of Job “represent an unrivaled textbook in human psychology; it’s full of humor.”

He explains, “The conversation Job has with his so-called friends from chapter four on down to chapter 35, along in there, is hilarious; I mean, it's a hoot. They go back and forth at each other and they don't leave any dig undone.

“Just look at the discourse Job has in Job 11. They're called his friends but he calls them ‘miserable comforters, forgers of lies.’ That's what friends get to be some times when they're trying to explain life to you.

“Zopher is actually trying to talk Job into not appearing as if to try and justify himself. He says in verse 2, ‘Should not the multitude of words be answered? and should a man full of talk be justified?’

“Zopher’s saying, ‘Job, you're just a big talker.’ Later he comes back at him and says, "You're just full of the east wind.’ That's a way of saying, ‘You're just full of hot air. You're a windbag.’

“In Job 11:3, Zopher goes on to say, ‘Should thy lies make men hold their peace and when thou mockest, shall no man make thee ashamed?’

“He’s saying, ‘Job, you're a liar. You're just a fast-talking liar.’ Drop down to verse 6 and he says, ‘And that he would shew thee the secrets of wisdom, that they are double to that which is! Know therefore that God exacteth of thee less than thine iniquity deserveth. 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?’

“Really, that's pretty good counsel. When you think you know everything, well, the Queen of Sheba said it to Solomon: ‘The half hasn't been told.’ There's twice as much as you're ever going to know out there to know, and when it comes to your sin, and you trying to justify yourself—and Job, he certainly was doing that. . .

“The problem with Job is he was the most righteous man you'll ever meet. You look at the way he describes his conduct. There's not a person, man or woman in this room, who could live up to the kind of conduct that Job could publicly stand up and say, ‘This is the way I've lived; the covenant I've made with my eyes and my mind about what to think about, what to look upon, where my hand's are to go, the way I've treated people.’ And he's saying that in a public forum where anybody could contradict him!

“Even so, Zopher tells him, ‘God exacteth of thee less than thine iniquity deserves.’ You know, man even in his best state is altogether vanity.

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“Now, the problem with what Zopher's doing here is not that it isn't good advice, but he's saying, ‘The reason this is happening to Job is because he’s a sinner,’ and that wasn't why it was happening. There was an angelic conflict going on that Zopher didn’t know about. Zopher doesn't take his own advice!

“When Zopher says, ‘Canst thou by searching find out God?’ the answer is ‘No.’ Job, on his own, just like you and me on our own, could never find God.

“Zopher says, “It is as high as heaven, deeper than hell." In other words, God is so big and so vast and this issue is so much, you can't find it out. You can't search Him out by your own intellect; by your own wisdom, by your own seeking.

“People say, ‘God's so vast you can't know Him. God's so high you can't get up there. It's so deep you can't get down there. It's so long you'd never be able to get around it. It's so broad you'd never be able to fathom it. You'd just never find God.’

“The problem with that is that's the first book in the Bible. That isn't all the Bible has to say.

“Verse 7 says, ‘Canst thou find out the Almighty unto perfection?’, but do you remember what II Timothy 3:16-17 says? ‘All scripture 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, throughly furnished unto all good works.’

“God's Word gives you the capacity to search something out and to find it out unto perfection. As the Apostle Paul makes clear, without God revealing Himself, you'd never know Him, but the good thing is God has revealed Himself! That's the point!”