ence, a handle is fixed by which the stone
is turned. The meal is ground every day. The work, which is very
laborious, is performed by the women of the household. In the
picture this mill is rather more elaborate than usual, the lower
stone being elongated and used as a trough for the meal as it falls
over the edges of the mill. There are two baskets of grain and one
of meal. One of the women is about to put a handful of grain in the
mill. Both are helping to turn the upper stone by the handle
[End illustration]

{177}

SELECTIONS FROM JOB

{178}

PERSONS REPRESENTED.
_Friends of Job_.
_Job, a rich man of the East_.
_Eliphaz, the Temanite_.
_Bildad, the Shuhite_.
_Zophar, the Naamathite_.
_Elihu, son of Barachel, the Buzite_.

_The Wife of Job_.
_The LORD_.
_Satan_.
_Sons of God, Messengers, Friends, Spectators_.

PLACES.
_The Land of Uz, a country east of Palestine_.
_The Court of Heaven_.

TIME.
The Patriarchal Age.

{179}

JOB

There is one question over which men have puzzled for many, many
hundreds of years. It is the question, "Why do good people suffer?"
When wicked people suffered, the reason seemed to be plain. It was
because they had done wrong; and people who do wrong ought to suffer.
But good people as well as wicked people suffer, and it has always
been very hard for many to see how God can be good and this still be
true.

This is the question that a Hebrew poet tried to answer in the book of
Job. He pictured a man named Job who had lived a good life and feared
God, and yet who suffered. He lost the flocks and herds which had made
him rich. A whirlwind swept away the house in which his sons and
daughters were feasting, and killed them all. At last a disease for
which there was no known cure came upon him. Poor and alone, he faced
a certain death of great suffering.

Then three friends came to see him. Finding him suffering so, they
believed that he must have been a great sinner, and that the suffering
was God's punishment for his sin. They tried to make him see that he
had sinned. At first they only hint it, very gently and tenderly, but
when he still insists that he has not sinned in any way which should
bring such suffering, they become more harsh and {180} plainly charge
him with being greedy of gain and cruel to the poor. He says that he
has not been guilty of these things. And so, the poet means to say,
when men suffer