I cry unto thee, and thou dost not hear me: I stand up, and thou regardest me not.
The book to which the cry belongs is the oldest of the poetical books that have come down. It opens with a prose prologue in chapters 1 and 2, continues with the speeches of Elihu in chapters 32 through 37, then gives the speeches of the Lord out of the storm-cloud, and closes with a prose epilogue in chapter 42:7-17. Within that fourfold shape the cry stands in the second part, the debate in chapters 4 through 31 between Job and his three friends on the subject of his afflictions. That debate is arranged as three circles of speeches on the part of each disputant.
The utterance itself is an anguished appeal to God, a crying out that finds no hearing and a standing up that finds no regard. It lays bare the distress of a righteous person who cannot understand God's dealings while suffering. Affliction in such a case proves nothing of God's displeasure against the sufferer.
The book to which the cry belongs is the oldest of the poetical books that have come down. It opens with a prose prologue in chapters 1 and 2, continues with the speeches of Elihu in chapters 32 through 37, then gives the speeches of the Lord out of the storm-cloud, and closes with a prose epilogue in chapter 42:7-17. Within that fourfold shape the cry stands in the second part, the debate in chapters 4 through 31 between Job and his three friends on the subject of his afflictions. That debate is arranged as three circles of speeches on the part of each disputant.
The utterance itself is an anguished appeal to God, a crying out that finds no hearing and a standing up that finds no regard. It lays bare the distress of a righteous person who cannot understand God's dealings while suffering. Affliction in such a case proves nothing of God's displeasure against the sufferer.