God's first speech "transcends all other descriptions of the wonders of creation or the greatness of the Creator, which are to be found either in the Bible or elsewhere."156
God sometimes made His self-revelations to people in a storm symbolic of the disturbing effects His awesome presence produced (cf. Exod. 19:16-17; 1 Kings 19:11-13; Isa. 6:4; Ezek. 1:4; Zech. 9:14). One wonders if Job's friends thought God was about to strike Job dead with a bolt of lightning.
"Job's troubles began when a great wind killed his children (1:19). The Lord was in that storm, and now He speaks from the tempest (cf. Ezk. 1:4)."157
God began His speech with a challenge to His opponent's understanding, as the five human debaters on earth had done. He accused Job of clouding the truth about Him by saying things that were not true. Job should have defended God's justice rather than denying it since he claimed to be God's friend. His lack of adequate revelation led to this error. Likewise every believer should be slow to affirm that he knows God's will about the affairs of an individual's life, his own or someone else's. We still do not know all the facts concerning why God is allowing what takes place. God then told Job to prepare for a difficult job: to explain His ways in nature. If God had done wrong, Job must have known what was right!
As Job's friends had done, God began to break Job down blow by verbal blow. Finally all his pride was gone. However where Job's friends had failed, God succeeded.
"The function of the questions needs to be properly understood. As a rhetorical device, a question can be another way of making a pronouncement, much favoured by orators. For Job, the questions in the Lord's speeches are not such roundabout statements of fact; they are invitations, suggestions about discoveries he will make as he tries to find his own answers. They are not catechetical, as if Job's knowledge is being tested. They are educative, in the true and original meaning of that term. Job is led out into the world. The questions are rhetorical only in the sense that none of them has any answer ventured by Job. But this is not because the questions have no answers. Their initial effect of driving home to Job his ignorance is not intended to humiliate him. On the contrary the highest nobility of every person is to be thus enrolled by God Himself in His school of Wisdom. And the schoolroom is the world! For Job the exciting discoveries to which God leads him bring a giant advance in knowledge, knowledge of himself and of God, for the two always go together in the Bible."158
God gave Job an oral science examination covering aspects of cosmology, oceanography, meteorology, astronomy, and zoology.
He began with the origin of the earth (38:4-7). God's point was that since Job was absent when He had created the earth he lacked information that God had and that enabled Him to govern the earth better than Job could. The phrase "sons of God"(v. 7) evidently refers to the angels (cf. 1:6; Ps. 148:2-3). The "morning stars"may be stars or planets God created before the earth. Nevertheless it seems more likely that they, too, are angels since there is synonymous parallelism in this verse.
God next asked Job about the origin of the oceans (38:8-11). Obviously Job had nothing to do with this major aspect of God's creative activity, so his knowledge again proved inferior.159
Job had no experience causing the sun to rise and thereby sustaining the earth either (38:12-15). The rising sun shakes the wicked out of the ends of the earth (38:13) in the sense that the wicked love darkness rather than light (cf. John 3:19). The "light"of the wicked (38:15), that element in which they flourish, is darkness. By causing the sun to rise God withholds the darkness, their "light,"and so frustrates (breaks) their work. Another interpretation holds that this verse (38:15) may be an ironic statement saying that God does not break the wicked but only controls them.
Even though "the dawn of every day provides an occasion to punish the wicked . . . this possibility is not in practice realized and is therefore not in the plan of the world."160
"Although a major thrust of the Lord's speeches (38:1-40:2; 40:6-41:34) was to polemicize against all potential rivals to His lordship over the cosmos, there is also a subtle refutation of the dogma of divine retribution. Although granting that the control of chaotic forces of evil (which in some instances is inherent in the design of the universe--38:12-15) is somewhat consistent with the principle of divine retribution, God demonstrates that the universe is not always geared to this principle."161
Job was likewise ignorant of the springs of the sea, the gates of death, and the scope of the earth (38:16-18) none of which he had seen. Nor had he knowledge of where the light (sun) went when it apparently set or where the darkness came from and went at sunset and sunrise (38:19-20). Verse 21 presents Yahweh as a master of sarcasm.
The next subject on God's quiz was the weather (38:22-38). "Light"(38:24) may refer to "lightning."The "channel for the flood"appears to be the "path"through the sky that rain takes on its way to the earth (38:25).
Yahweh referred to the constellations to impress Job's lack of insight and his impotence on the patriarch further (38:31-33; cf. 9:9).
Next God turned to the animal world and pointed out six beasts and four birds only one of which was evidently a domesticated creature in Job's day: the horse (38:39-39:30). They include "the ferocious, the helpless, the shy, the strong, the bizarre, the wild."162They illustrate God's creative genius and his providential care. The animal world exists for partially unknown reasons, not merely to meet the needs of humankind. People cannot explain why animals live as they do. This is another mystery that only God understands fully.
One writer wrote the following about the wild ox (or aurochs, 39:9-12).
"Extinct since 1627, this enormous animal was the most powerful of all hoofed beasts, exceeded in size only by the hippopotamus and elephant."163
God's point in asking Job to consider each of these animals was this. Even upon careful examination there are many things about their individual characteristics, behavior, and life that people simply cannot explain. That is still true today. For reasons unknown to Job God allowed each animal to experience what was His will for that one. Just so, he permits every human being to experience what he or she does for reasons partially unknown to us. Only Yahweh is powerful enough and wise enough to do this.
"A main function of the Lord's speeches is to show the absurdity of Job's attempt to manipulate God by a lawsuit,' which assumed that his relationship to God is a juridical one."164
God rarely used legal metaphors, which Job had employed so often, in His speeches to Job. From now on Job stopped using them. This is an important observation because it shows that the basis of Job and God's relationship was not a legal one, as Job had assumed. A legal relationship requires equal compensation by both parties for what each of them has done to the other. The basis of God's dealings with Job was gracious, not legal (cf. 1 Cor. 6:7).
God's first speech began and ended with a challenge to Job. Job had found fault with God for allowing him to suffer when he was godly. He had said he wished he could meet God in court to face Him with His injustice and to hear His response (13:3, 15). Now God asked Job if he still wanted to contend with Him after God had reminded him of His power and wisdom. "It"(40:2b) may refer to the question in 40:2a, though it could refer to all the evidence God had presented in chapters 38-39.165
"Yahweh ironically challenged Job to teach (or correct) Him in the matters of the universe to prove that he was equal to God and thus capable of arguing with God in court."166
