Job chapter 18 and 19

After reading chapter 18:

*Bildad is talking. He berates Job for his speech making and for insinuating his friends are stupid. Is Job a special snowflake? Then in verses he goes on to poetically describe horrible things that happen to a wicked person. He gets what he  deserves. Presumably, he is referring to Job as well.

After reading chapter 19

*Job replies. He says he is being tormented and attacked by words. Then he notes that if he has gone astray, that's his business, not anyone else's. Before they keep thinking they are so high and mighty, he wants to say that God has mistreated him. Even though he cries out to God that he has been wronged, he gets no answer. He feels god's anger through the things that are happening to him, but he is powerless to do anything about it.

*Next Job talks about how he has been deserted and detested by the people closest to him, his relatives, guests, servants, wife and friends. He asks for nothing but pity. Why should they pursue him the way God currently is?

*Verses 23-27 have a different feel than the surrounding passages. I'm no expert but they seem to be inserted into the text. I say this because verse 28 naturally appears to continue where 22 left off, with the the idea of Job's friend pursuing him. (In some translations it is  persecute not pursue.) then Job ends with a warning that they may get divine payback themselves.

*I can tell you it is a relief to know that no invisible person has any responsibility for any of the bad things that happen in my life. It's either consequences of living in nature, my own actions, or the actions of others acting in nature. Sometimes stuff just happens and there is nothing anyone can do about it. It is human to want to assign blame somewhere. We rarely look at catastrophic and life changing events as morally neutral, but very often they are. Natural disasters and disease don't care how good a person is.

*Now let us look at those odd verses that appear to be added to the text. They say, "Oh that my words were recorded." Looky there, Job's wish came true! We are supposedly reading his recorded words right now. Next, Job says, "I know that my redeemer lives." This is a statement that has been coopted by christians and used to refer to Jesus. A redeemer would be someone who  might pay another's debt to release that person from bondage, usually a relative. However, this passage sounds suspiciously like the concept of a spiritual redeemer, which we have not encountered before in the Old Testament writings. Then Job supposedly goes on to talk hopefully of being restored to his body and seeing God with his own eyes! This is definitely not a concept that has occurred in our previous readings. In fact Job has been quite pessimistic about his own death and eternal sleep in the grave.