The Guaranteed Good Life

“Behold this; we have investigated it, and so it is. Hear it, and know for yourself.”  Job 5:27 NASB

Know for yourself – Eliphaz outlines the good life.  Between verses 19 and 27 he tells Job that God won’t let the righteous experience troubles, won’t let famine overtake them, will protect them from the sword, won’t let others ridicule them, will make them unafraid of violence and laugh at hunger, will make them be at peace with nature, will provide them a secure home, and will give them many children and grandchildren.  Sounds terrific!  Who wouldn’t want all this?  Maybe it sounds like religious promises you’ve heard.  Eliphaz is so convinced that the evidence and promises support these claims that he challenges Job to stop resisting and “know for yourself” (daʿlāk’). 

The word has some interesting implications.  It’s constructed of the verb (yādaʿ), the preposition (lĕ), and the pronoun (ʾattâ), dropping some of the letters.  The verb is common enough.  However, it encompasses a very wide range of nuances, from cognitive functions to sexual relations.  Eliphaz challenges Job to more than mental agreement.  He pushes Job to embrace his argument as a living reality not simply a theological doctrine.  Job is to “know” in the sense that the Tree offered something that could only be known by experience.  What Eliphaz suggests is that Job fully accept the horrific conditions in his life as proof that it is he, not God, who is to blame.

We can see this force in Eliphaz’  use of the preposition lĕ.  Usually translated as “to, at, in, of,”  or “by.”  The NASB translation “for” is not usual.  As English readers we think we understand what is communicated, but perhaps we miss a much deeper point.  What does it mean to “know for yourself”?  In our world, that is roughly the equivalent of internal agreement, that is, a mental assent to some statement as true.  It’s like saying, “know for sure.”  But the Hebrew lĕsuggests something else.  Eliphaz asks Job to reorient his entire experience and reassess his circumstances according to this perspective.  It’s not knowing for sure.  It’s discarding a previous paradigm and adopting a new one; one that, by the way, completely changes the interpretation of the data.  You can think of it like the debate between Copernicus and the Church over the geometry of the universe.  The two views are not modifications.  They are utter transformations, incompatible with each other.  “To know for yourself” essentially means to give up everything that you now believe and become someone else.  Eliphaz asks Job to convert!

Do you relate?  Well, reflect on the radical change that you’ve experienced in the process of adopting an Hebraic worldview.  Have you tried to justify, rationalize, explain, substantiate this change to someone who still maintains the Western point of view?  How did that work out?  What you’re trying to communicate is usually received as a threat to the other person’s paradigm.  It’s the equivalent of asking for a conversion—a radical change not just in thinking but in everything about living.  Now, perhaps, you can understand the depth of Eliphaz’ challenge.  How do you suppose Job feels?

Topical Index: yādaʿ, lĕ, ʾattâ, know, yourself, conversion, Job 5:27