Long before the reader arrives at the Book of Job, he or she has been conditioned to view the God of Israel through a lens of a righteous deity who rewards the righteous and punishes the wicked. Perhaps the reader has been lulled into a simplistic way of thinking about the actions of God. When arriving at the Book of Job, one encounters one of three main works that are termed Wisdom Literature by text critics. Among the questions one may be tempted to ask is whether the book is quaint or forward-looking, whether Job is deserving of all that has happened to him, whether he is just a spoiled cry-baby who refuses to accept his miserable lot in life, whether he has been betrayed by his deity in a mean-spirited debate and wager with Satan about which Job has no knowledge, and even whether his deity is to be trusted or to be suspected of divine caprice. While several of these issues are raised elsewhere in biblical literature, nowhere are they raised to such a fever pitch and with such indignant outcry. Moreover, the opinions of his so-called friends and comforters spur Job on to doubt himself less and to suspect caprice more. The Book of Job describes the human condition and raises through colloquy fundamental questions of both the actions and expectations of humans and deities, and asks whether a clear understanding can be reached between them. The contributing essays to this anthology help advance and sharpen both the questions and the responses to that question.

Cover: Job, oil on canvas, Léon Bonnat, 1880.