, it does not always mean that they have sinned. Then,
in the poem, God speaks out of a storm. He says that Job cannot
understand the sea or the sky or the storm or the winter's cold or the
instincts of the animals. Does he think, then, that he will be able to
understand how God deals with men? He trusts God in the things that
are good. Can he not trust him in the things that seem evil also? Job
is willing to trust God, and the book ends with a picture of a happy,
prosperous old age for this man who has suffered so much.

What is the writer's answer, then, to the question why good men
suffer? His answer is that we cannot tell why such men suffer. But we
know that God is wise and good, and we may trust him, even if we find
it impossible, as we always shall, to answer all the questions of
life.

The book of Job is a great dramatic poem. It is dramatic not because
it was meant to be acted as the Greek and English drama; the Hebrews
knew nothing about drama of this kind. But it consists of dialogue
between various speakers, and has the true dramatic spirit and
intensity of personal feeling. It is the nearest approach to the drama
in the Bible. It is printed here in dramatic form because it was felt
that this would be suggestive and helpful to the reader. It has a
prologue and an epilogue which are in prose, while the speeches are in
poetic form, and are printed like the blank verse of the Greek or
English drama.

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PROLOGUE

There was a man in the land of Uz, whose name was Job; and that man
was perfect and upright, and one that feared God, and shunned evil.
And there were born unto him seven sons and three daughters. His
substance also was seven thousand sheep, and three thousand camels,
and five hundred yoke of oxen, and five hundred she-asses, and a very
great household; so that this man was the greatest of all the children
of the east. And his sons went and held a feast in the house of each
one upon his day; and they sent and called for their three sisters to
eat and to drink with them. And whenever the feast days came round Job
sent and sanctified them, and rose up early in the morning, and
offered burnt offerings according to the number of them all; for Job
said, "It may be that my sons have sinned, and renounced God in their
hearts." Thus did Job continually.

Now there was a day when the sons of God came to present themselves
before the Lord, and Satan came also among them.

And thus they spoke:--