DE Weekly: Mystery, Suffering, & The Book of Job
Below is an archived email originally sent on June 16, 2025.
Mystery, Suffering, & The Book of Job
Like any philosophy, the core tenets of existentialism are solid because they’re true. They are true all the time, and they are true for everyone. This makes it possible when, in reading old (even ancient) texts, one is looking to find something that evokes existentialism, they are likely to find it.
For an example of this, let’s go back thousands of years to The Holy Bible, specifically The Book of Job.
The Book of Job is a book in the Old Testament, one of the more popular and well-known books of the Bible, and for good reason. It’s considered the “wisdom literature” of the Bible, along with Ecclesiastes and Proverbs; each of these books provides ancient wisdom about life and the world.
In The Book of Job, we are introduced to a “righteous” and “upright” man named Job who seemingly has it all. He has a big, loving family, lots of friends, considerable wealth and resources, and loves and worships God.
Satan approaches God and challenges him, saying that Job only worships him because he has it so good in life. If he were to have everything ripped away from him, Satan argues, he would abandon God. God accepts this challenge.
From hereon out, Job suffers severe affliction. All of his slaves die, his livestock dies, his children are killed, and he himself is stricken with disease and deformity.
Despite this hardship, and despite his wife telling him it would be better to curse God and die, Job does not abandon his faith in God. He prays and says, “‘The LORD gave, and the LORD has taken away; blessed be the name of the LORD.” (Job 1:21-22)
Unfortunately for Job, the suffering does not end here. What’s more, his friends tell him he must have done something to deserve all this, or it wouldn’t have happened. His friends and family begin to abandon him.
Through all of this, Job does not abandon his faith in God. Eventually, though, Job does give in to despair.
He says, “‘O that I might have my request, and that God would grant my desire; that it would please God to crush me, that he would let loose his hand and cut me off!” (Job 6:8-9)
Job continues his appeal to God over the next few chapters: “Your hands fashioned and made me, and now you have destroyed me altogether.” (Job 10:8)
What truly leads Job to desperation is that through all of this, he has received nothing but silence from God.
Even in this, the lowest of low places for Job, he declares “With God are wisdom and might; he has counsel and understanding.” (Job 12:13)
He might not understand why this fate has befallen him, or what this might have to do with the bigger picture God has in mind, but he trusts there has to be a meaning to it all.
In reading thus far, the question looming under the story is this: What is the meaning and purpose of the suffering of a just person?
As Job will learn near the end of the book, the truth is that meaning and suffering are sometimes beyond human comprehension.
In the last chapters of the book, Job finally receives a response from God. The Lord answers Job: “Who is this that darkens counsel by words without knowledge? Gird up your loins like a man, I will question you, and you shall declare to me.” (Job 38:2-3)
God presses Job to reflect on his own wisdom, saying, “Where were you when I laid the foundation of the earth? Tell me, if you have understanding. Who determined its measurements––surely you know! Or who stretched the line upon it? On what were its bases sunk, or who laid its cornerstone, when the morning stars sang together and all the sons of God shouted for joy?” (Job 38:4-7)
In short, God is asking Job, “Who are you to question the meaning of suffering? Don’t you trust me?”
God then goes on to tell Job about the whole of the universe––all its beauty, ugliness, simplicity, and complexity.
“Where were you when I did this?,” asks God. “What do you know about this?,” asks God.
Job sees the error of his thinking and admits fault. He concedes he spoke of what he did not know or understand.
For keeping his faith, for not abandoning God, and for admitting what he does not understand, Job is rewarded. After all the suffering he’d been put through, God finally restores his fortunes twofold. He lives a happy life from there, and dies “old and full of days.”
What a story, eh?
So, what’s the point? Why do innocent people suffer? Why is the world full of injustice? What is the purpose of human existence if evil persists?
These questions were Job’s questions. He suffered immensely and posed these questions to God himself. And he received an answer he found sufficient––the same answer life screams at us every day.
The answer is the meaning and purpose of human suffering is beyond our comprehension. There is no specific way to answer the question of why there is suffering in the world.
The same answer God gave is the same answer the existentialists concluded in the twentieth century: it’s part of life.
Just as life includes good things and beauty, so, too, does it include bad things and suffering. Such machinations are beyond our contemplation.
However, as Job saw when his fortunes were rewarded twofold, there is a greater purpose to the suffering that’s allowed.
For Job, he got his life back for sticking through his suffering and staying the course.
For us, well… we’ll have to rise above our suffering and wait and see.
“He who has a why to live for can bear with almost any how.” –– Friedrich Nietzsche
Thanks for reading.
Sincerely,
Brandon J. Seltenrich
P.S.––
Whether in the Bible, in ancient philosophy, or in more recent texts, there are always truths to learn.
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