2:1 Again the day came when the sons of God came to present themselves before the Lord, and Satan also arrived among them to present himself before the Lord.

 

The created intelligences made their regular report again. 

 

2:2 And the Lord said to Satan, “Where do you come from?” Satan answered the Lord, “From roving about on the earth, and from walking back and forth across it.”

 

Satan was still roving the earth, looking o see whom he could devour. 

 

2:3 Then the Lord said to Satan, “Have you considered my servant Job? For there is no one like him on the earth, a pure and upright man, one who fears God and turns away from evil. And he still holds firmly to his integrity, so that you stirred me up to destroy him without reason.”

 

When a believer suffers, sometimes other believers see it as a disciplinary spanking from God. In this instance, Job was innocent. God allowed him to suffer “without reason” so it could bring Job and the angelic beings closer to the mind of God.

 

2:4 But Satan answered the Lord, “Skin for skin! Indeed, a man will give up all that he has to save his life!

 

Satan desired to send terrible diseases upon Job.

 

2:5 But extend your hand and strike his bone and his flesh, and he will no doubt curse you to your face!” 

 

Satan wanted to do another science experiment on Job. Satan’s hypothesis was that disease would cause Job to blaspheme God.

 

2:6 So the Lord said to Satan, “All right, he is in your power; only preserve his life.”

 

Satan was attacking God’s character in front of the entire angelic world. God gave permission for Satan to afflict Job with deadly and painful diseases, but Satan was not allowed to take his life.

 

2:7 So Satan went out from the presence of the Lord, and he afflicted Job with a malignant ulcer from the sole of his feet to the top of his head.

 

The angelic world watched as Satan sent a terrible disease upon a man of God who had just lost ten of his children. The two Hebrew words for “painful sores” were used of the plagues of “festering boils” in Egypt and of Hezekiah’s illness.

 

2:8 Job took a shard of broken pottery to scrape himself with while he was sitting among the ashes.

 

Job was in such a physically poor health condition from this satanic attack, that he was removed from the city as a leper. He had to scrape himself with broken pottery in the city garbage dump. 

 

2:9 Then his wife said to him, “Are you still holding firmly to your integrity? Curse God, and die!”

 

Satan removed everything that Job had, except for his wife. Satan wanted to use Job’s wife against him to break him down. Job’s wife was sending Job the same message of Satan, “curse God.”

 

2:10 But he replied, “You’re talking like one of the godless women would do! Should we receive what is good from God, and not also receive what is evil?” In all this Job did not sin by what he said.

 

Despite the godless comments from his wife, Job did not blaspheme God. Satan would now send Job’s “friends” to break him down.

 

2:11 When Job’s three friends heard about all this calamity that had happened to him, each of them came from his own country—Eliphaz the Temanite, Bildad the Shuhite, and Zophar the Naamathite. They met together to come to show sympathy for him and to console him.

 

Job was a judge and a very famous man. The news concerning his calamity spread rapidly, reaching three nearby tribal kingdoms.

 

Three friends were sent to comfort Job, but Satan will actually use Job’s own friends against him. Job’s friends did not possess very strong bible doctrine. Satan will often use unbelievers or carnal Christians who are not grounded in bible doctrine to do his bidding. They are both easy to manipulate.

 

Eliphaz was a Temanite. According to Genesis 36:10-11, Teman was a grandson of Esau. Since he spoke first, he was the elder and the leader of the group.

 

Bildad was a Shuhite. According to Genesis 25:2, Shuah was a son of Abraham. 

 

Zophar was a Naamathite. Naamah was somewhere in northern Arabia. 

 

These names and places are very important, because it gives internal evidence of the time and location of this book. The time of this writing was at the time of the patriarchs (Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob). The general location has already been given as east of Israel.

 

These men were real friends to Job until they found out that Job was a man of God. This experience alienated them from Job, because they did not know God. They will give Job many unbiblical reasons for his suffering.

 

2:12 But when they gazed intently from a distance but did not recognize him, they began to weep loudly. Each of them tore his robes, and they threw dust into the air over their heads.

 

Notice that Job was so disfigured, that his friends did not even recognize him. They expected to find a healthy man with a large family in a large house with many servants. Instead, they found an unrecognizable man living in a garbage dump outside of the city scraping his sores with a broken piece of pottery.

 

What kind of gaze did these men give Job “from a distance?” This was the gaze of the human philosopher. These men did not know God, Job, or themselves, but they gazed at Job with a smirk. They were all different types of human philosophers, but they all came up with the same reason for Job’s suffering. Job had committed some kind of great and terrible sin. 

 

2:13 Then they sat down with him on the ground for seven days and seven nights, yet no one spoke a word to him, for they saw that his pain was very great.

 

These three friends of Job heard that he was in trouble, but they had no idea how severe it was. The last time they had seen Job, he was living with a prosperous family and business. They waited for Job to speak first.