Biblion Bible Commentary
Read the introduction to Job · About this commentary
Does Job Fear God for Nothing?
Job 1:6-12
6 Now on the day when God’s sons came to present themselves before Yahweh, Satan also came among them. · WEB
The accusation is against God rather than Job, and it is of a kind that power cannot answer.
The scene changes without warning to a court where God's sons came to present themselves before Yahweh, Satan also came among them Job 1:6.
He is questioned like anyone else — where have you come from — and answers about ranging over the earth Job 1:7. There is no defiance in the exchange and no independence in his position. He is present because others are present, and he speaks when spoken to.
The subject is raised by God, not by him. Have you considered my servant, Job? For there is no one like him on the earth Job 1:8, followed by the four-part description the narrator had already given. God puts the man forward.
The reply is the question the whole book exists to answer, and it is five words long: does Job fear God for nothing? Job 1:9.
Read it carefully and it is not an attack on Job. It is an attack on God. The argument is that a hedge has been placed around the man and his house and everything he has, and his work has been blessed Job 1:10 — so the devotion is a return on an investment. If that holds for the best man alive, it holds for everyone, and the conclusion is that God is loved by nobody and paid by everybody.
Nothing about power answers that. God could remove the accuser and the charge would stand, because the question is not who is stronger; it is whether anyone would keep faith with him if the account were closed. A charge of that kind can only be met with evidence, and the only possible evidence is a man.
So the hedge comes down. And two features of the permission are exact.
It is granted rather than performed: all that he has is in your power Job 1:12. God does not strike Job, and the narrative is careful about the distinction it will later blur in ordinary speech.
And it is bounded: only on himself don't stretch out your hand. The accuser gets a scope and a limit in the same sentence, which is how this figure appears everywhere in Scripture — asking, permitted, restricted Zechariah 3:1–2 Luke 22:31–32.
One thing is not in the passage, and it governs everything after it. Nobody tells Job. The court adjourns, and the man whose integrity is about to be the sole exhibit is left in the dark about the case.
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