Why Does Job Say “Though He Slay Me I Will Hope in Him”?

　　Read out of context, it can be one of the Bible’s most terrifying verse. In the book of Job, in chapter 13:15, a man says, “Though he [God] slay me, yet will I hope in Him . . .”

　　What has happened in this man’s life that he would talk about God destroying him?

　　

What Happens in the Book of Job?

While most Christians can identify Job as a man with significant suffering in his life and God restored all that was lost to him, we don’t always know the full story. In the first chapter of Job, he was described as a man who was “blameless and upright; he feared God and shunned evil.” He was also a very wealthy man with many children. From anyone looking from the outside, he would seem to be highly favored by God for his faithfulness.

　　But Satan, the accuser, came before God and said that Job only loved God for all the good things that God gave him; if God were to take the blessings away, Satan was sure that Job would curse God to His face. In His sovereignty, God allowed Satan to destroy his children, animals–basically everything he owned. At first, Job responds with humility.

　　“‘The Lord gave and the Lord has taken away; may the name of the Lord be praised.’ In all this, Job did not sin by charging God with wrongdoing” (Job 1:21)

　　Satan would not win his wager with God and make Him look like a fool with those moves. So he asked God if he could go further and “strike his flesh and bones,” believing that Job would curse God. The Lord gave permission as long as Job’s life was spared, and Satan “afflicted Job with painful sores from head to toe.” From that point, Job’s tone began to change, and he despaired of his life and wished he had never been born. The physical and emotional pain was all too much. His three friends visit and tell him that God would not allow this without reason; Job must be sinful.

　　The friends give bad advice through the next several chapters because they don’t understand what God is doing amid the trial. Meanwhile, Job goes back and forth between depression, rails against his friends, talks of God delivering him or destroying him, and over and over, wants to plead his case to God. He thinks he can get an answer from God and be vindicated.

　　But in the end, God doesn’t tell him why he suffered. He instead spends a few chapters explaining His power, majesty, and sovereignty. In other words, “I am God, and you are not—and for you, that’s the better deal.” Job comes back with appropriate humility, saying, “I know that you can do all things; no plan of yours can be thwarted . . . My ears had heard of you, but now my eyes have seen you” (Job 42:11). And God restores twice what Job had lost.

　　

When Does Job Say, “Though He Slay Me . . .”?

In the thirteenth chapter, Job tells his friends:

　　“Keep silent and let me speak; then let come to me what may. Why do I put myself in jeopardy and take my life in my hands? Though he slay me, yet will I hope in him. I will surely defend my ways to his face. Indeed this will turn out for my deliverance, for no godless man would dare come before him!” (Job 13:13-15)

　　Job sounds like so many of us when we are suffering. In the middle of Job’s words, you can hear the plea, “Why?” He doesn’t understand what is happening and feels he’s being destroyed, but he wants to believe that God will do what is best.

　　

How Does Job’s Response Compare to His Friends’ Criticisms?

Job’s friends believe that bad things only happen to bad people.

　　In his article “5 Important Things to Understand About the Story of Job,” Aaron D’Anthony Brown wrote:

　　“The friends’ attempts to ‘help’ go so poorly that God is ultimately disappointed in them (Job 42:7). God was so upset he had them offer sacrifices as repentance. The reason for this is that the friends blamed Job for his suffering, unbeknownst to them God allowed Job to suffer despite being a righteous man.”

　　

Was Job Correct to Say that God May Slay Us?

There are several components to this question, so let’s break them down:

　　Was Job correct to say . . .

　　In other words, did he have the right to speak with God in this fashion? He obviously had a relationship with God because it said he feared God. He respected God, “shunned evil,” and lived a good life. We don’t know what happened before that, however. Did God make a covenant with Job? He somehow made himself known to Job. But Job’s insistence on making his case before God that he shouldn’t be suffering and that God had left him (or worse, was attacking him) was a problem!

　　But considering God’s answer to Job, He thought Job was very presumptuous and distrustful. God responded with:

　　- “Who is that darkens my counsel with words without knowledge?”(Job 38:2)

　　- “Will the one who contends with the Almighty correct him? Let him who accuses God answer him!” (Job 40:2)

　　- “Who then is able to stand against me? . . . Everything under heaven belongs to me.” (Job 41:10-11)

　　Job wanted answers to why he was suffering, said God had abandoned him, and even accused God of turning on and attacking him (Job 30:21). Job thought he was justified in expecting answers from God. I believe God’s answers were as much toward Satan as to Job: “Can you pull in the leviathan with a fishhook?” (Job 41:1)

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　　This differs from how God responds to Psalmists who cry out to God and ask some of the same questions: “How long, Lord?” Did they have more respect for God than Job? Did they have more experience with God than Job? One thing they did have was praise, as most psalms finally reach a place of acknowledging God’s love and sovereignty through praise and trust.

　　“God May . . .”

　　The phrase implies an important truth: God is good, but also sovereign. God can do anything that pleases Him, though being good by nature, the means we use to determine what is good, we can be sure that He will only do good, not use His power vindictively. Whether we see terrible events as things he causes or as things he allows (the main views that theologians typically use to discuss the problem of evil), we must recognize that He is in control and will do what He sees fit. Amid huge tragedies, It’s difficult to understand that God does things we don’t understand. We only see events from this side of heaven. God see events as the creator of the universe.

　　“. . . Slay Us”

　　To slay means “to kill violently, wantonly, or in great numbers.” God is love and can’t have anything to do with this kind of sin. But, as in the story of Job, he may give Satan some rope to test our faith. Those moments do not make Him an evil, malicious God who enjoys watching His children suffer. Quite the contrary–He “weeps with those who weep.” So, Job was wrong to say that God was slaying Him (enjoying his pain, letting it occur for no reason).

　　

What Does the “Though He Slay Me . . .” Passage Teach Us Today?

This passage teaches us many things about God and ourselves. God is sovereign but with a power combined with kindness that will accomplish what is best for His child. His will for us will not be thwarted, even if it comes with much pain and suffering. The suffering is always for a purpose—to make us more like Christ. It is not meant to destroy (as Paul said, “We are pressed but not crushed”). If we could see it from the perspective of heaven, we wouldn’t want God to end the trial until God saw it as good and perfect for His kingdom.

　　In his book A Grief Observed, C.S. Lewis said, “Suppose that what you are up against is a surgeon whose intentions are wholly good. The kinder and more conscientious he is, the more inexorably he will go on cutting. If he yielded to your entreaties, if he stopped before the operation was complete, all the pain up to that point would have been useless.”

　　We don’t want to waste our suffering, so we pray for patience, perseverance, and peace that only the Holy Spirit living inside us can provide. If we are brave (which can be very difficult), we will ask God to keep cutting away anything that will not serve Him.

　　It also teaches us that we need to look beyond for the other people in the Bible who have gone through a similar experience with the Lord and were never forsaken or forgotten by God. God knew when enough was enough for Abraham waiting for a son; Joseph waiting in prison; Job in his physical pain and grief; the Israelites in captivity and exile; Paul and his series of sufferings, and most importantly, Jesus the Lamb of God who sacrificed His place in heaven for a time to come to earth to die a horrific death for us. He truly was crushed for us.

　　In his Complete Commentary, Matthew Henry says Job is a type of Christ:

　　“Job was a great sufferer, was emptied and humbled, but in order to his greater glory. So Christ abased himself, that we might be exalted.”

　　For Job, his exaltation included understanding:

　　“He knows the way that I take, and when He has tried me I shall come forth as gold.” (Job 23:10)