Muriel Spark
An Unknown Author Who Put God in His Place
The Book of Job
By Unknown (Translated and introduced by Raymond P Scheindlin)
W W Norton & Co 237pp £15.95 order from our bookshop
‘The patience of Job’ is a popular nineteenth-century concept. I know of no serious or studious reader of Job since, and including, the poet Shelley who ever thought of Job as a patient man. Professor Scheindlin attacks the concept without need. That apart, he has given us a beautiful new translation and a profound commentary which should last a long time in the field of Job studies.
If the Book of Job were a true story, one might be struck by the number of times Job asserts God’s innocence, refusing ever to attribute to God any blame for his agonies. Is this because he is being overheard by God? One wonders what Job might have said had
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