Curse God and die: reflections on the book of Job :: 3

In chapter 2 Job responds again to all that has befallen him. This time he sits in ashes, scraping at his sores with pottery pieces. This is a vivid and bleak image. Then Job’s wife makes a startling appearance in the story. Her presence reminds us that of course, Job has not lost absolutely everything. For some reason his wife survives the range of supernatural calamities that befell every other aspect of Job’s existence. She urges Job to curse God and die. This is the first and only mention of her in the book of Job. Her part is remarkable in a couple of ways. Firstly, she too has lost much. Her grief is not acknowledged. She has lost her children, her security and social standing. She has lost her husband’s own vitality. These losses take on additional significance when one considers the status of women in OT biblical times. She would have been totally dependent on her husband and his assets for survival.

Job is counseled by his wife to curse God and die. This stands in marked contrast to the resolute acceptance displayed by Job at the end of the previous chapter. The narrator of the story takes pains (again) to ensure that the reader knows Job did not sin in his words. Essentially, Job’s wife urges him to sin and be done with it. If she had been privy to the dialogue between God and the satan, her response might have made more sense - arguably the torture would stop if the satan got to prove his point. Ironically she counsels her husband to engage in the very response the satan desired. Perhaps she herself feels without hope and reason to live. Such an emotional response is entirely understandable. Her response to Job is worded as a command – an imperative. Was it culturally appropriate for her to tell her husband to do something like this? Was this a sign of her declining respect? Perhaps an additional (though possibly unwitting) blow to Job?

Job responds to his wife by highlighting the character of her words “You are talking like a foolish woman. Shall we accept good from God, and not trouble?” His response reads like a proverb. The acceptance of good and bad from God serves to reinforce Job’s theological perspective about God and suffering, and works nicely as a literary device to bring us back to his initial worshipful response in the previous chapter.

I find Job’s wife to be a troubling character in the story. She has a marginal part to play - not unlike the place of women more broadly in her culture. It is easy to judge her harshly, to miss the pain that undoubtedly underpinned her words. She probably responded as many of us would have done. In some ways, it is easier to identify with Job’s wife than with Job himself.