The lectionary spends the last three days of September in Job — the book that takes the whole wisdom tradition of the past week and puts it on trial. Today is the opening scene, and everything that follows depends on the reader having watched it while Job never does.
What happens
"One day, when the sons of Theos came to present themselves before Yahweh, Satan also came among them… And Yahweh said to Satan, 'Have you noticed my servant Job, and that there is no one on earth like him, blameless and upright?' But Satan answered, 'Is it for nothing that Job is Theos-fearing? Have you not surrounded him and his family and all that he has with your protection?… But now put forth your hand and touch anything that he has, and surely he will blaspheme you to your face.'" Four messengers arrive in succession — Sabean raiders, fire from heaven, Chaldeans, a great wind — each "while he was yet speaking." Job tears his cloak, shaves his head, falls to the ground and worships: "Naked I came forth from my mother's womb, and naked shall I go back again. Yahweh gave and Yahweh has taken away; blessed be the name of Yahweh!"
What to notice
Ha-satan carries the definite article in Hebrew — "the satan," a title, not a name. It means the adversary or accuser, and describes a prosecutor in a court; he is among the bene ha-elohim as a matter of routine. This is not yet the devil of later theology; it is an office. And the detail that unsettles every reader who notices it: the accuser does not raise Job's name. Yahweh does. Then the question, the whole book compressed into one word. Ha-chinnamyare Iyyov Elohim? — "Is it for chinnam that Job fears Theos?"Chinnam means gratis, for nothing, without payment. The accuser does not attack Job's conduct, which he concedes. He proposes that disinterested piety does not exist. Watch the word return: in Job 2:3 Yahweh says the accuser incited him against Job chinnam, without cause. And note what Job does before he speaks — the full mourning rites, torn robe and shaved head, and then he falls down and worships. The grief is not suppressed to make room for the worship. Both are done.
A plea for a hearing from someone who believes the case will hold up. It appeared here ten days ago; today the lectionary takes its opening verses, which read like Job's own brief.
The selected verses
Psalm 17:1."Hear, Yahweh, a just suit; attend to my outcry; hearken to my prayer from lips without deceit." Psalm 17:2–3."From you let my judgment come; your eyes behold what is right. Though you test my heart, searching it in the night, though you try me with fire, you will find no malice in me." Psalm 17:6–7."I call upon you, for you will answer me, Theos; incline your ear to me; hear my word. Show your wondrous hesed, Rescuer of those who take refuge at your right hand."
What to notice
Psalm 17:3 is uncannily exact for the day. Bachanta libbi, paqadta laylah, tzeraftani — you have tested my heart, you have visited by night, you have refined me — tzarafbeing the smelting verb, the assaying of metal. And the conclusion: bal timtza, you will find nothing. That is precisely the claim Job's first chapter makes on his behalf, and precisely what the accuser says cannot be verified while the man is protected. The psalm volunteers for the test the accuser demands. The difference is that the psalmist knows he is being examined, and Job does not.
Immediately after Saturday's Gospel. Jesus has just told them the Son of Man is to be handed over; Luke reported that they did not understand it and were afraid to ask. This is the next thing that happens.
What happens
"An argument arose among the disciples about which of them was the greatest. Jesus realized the intention of their hearts and took a child and placed it by his side and said to them, 'Whoever receives this child in my name receives me… For the one who is least among all of you is the one who is the greatest.' Then John said in reply, 'Master, we saw someone casting out demons in your name and we tried to prevent him because he does not follow in our company.' Jesus said to him, 'Do not prevent him, for whoever is not against you is for you.'"
What to notice
The juxtaposition is the sermon. They could not take in a sentence about being handed over, and within a paragraph they are ranking themselves. Luke sets the two side by side without comment. Then the gesture, and Luke's version differs from Mark's in a way worth catching: Mark 9:36 puts the child en mesō autōn, in the middle of them; Luke writes estēsen auto par' heautō — he stood the child beside himself. In a culture that read position as rank, the place at a person's side is the place of honour. Jesus answers a question about precedence by giving the top position to a child, who could neither claim it nor benefit from it socially. And then John changes the subject, which is its own small revelation: having just been told the least is the greatest, his immediate concern is a man outside the group doing the group's work. "He does not follow in our company" — the complaint is entirely about membership, raised seconds after a lesson about status.
Disciples arguing about rank; an outsider casting out demons with no standing at all
The accuser's question is one of the best questions in the Bible, and it is worth admitting that it is a fair one. He does not dispute a single fact about Job. The record is exemplary and he concedes it in full. What he proposes is an explanation: that the piety is a return on investment, and that Job has been generously insured. Have you not surrounded him with a hedge? Remove the hedge, and you will discover what the devotion was actually for. And there is no way to answer that by argument — which is why the book is long and why the first chapter is unbearable.
Job's answer, when it comes, is not a defence of his motives. Naked I came, naked I return; Yahweh gave and Yahweh has taken away.He does not claim to be serving for nothing; he simply keeps serving with nothing. And the narrator's verdict uses a word worth having: velo natan tiflah le-Elohim, he did not attribute tiflah — insipidity, tastelessness, something unsavoury — to Theos. He did not call it unworthy.
Then Luke, in five verses, shows the accuser's thesis in its ordinary daytime form. The disciples have just been told the worst news of the gospel and cannot hold it; what they can hold is the question of who ranks highest. That is a religious life with the hedge intact — the returns are real, and the argument is about how they will be divided. And Jesus's answer is less a rebuke of ambition than a redefinition of the prize. He stands a child at his own side, in the honoured position, and says the least among you is the great one. A child in that setting has no standing to lose, no credit to accumulate, and nothing to trade — which makes it the exact image of chinnam, service for nothing.
Then John supplies the day's last twist without knowing it. Somebody outside the company is casting out demons in the name, and the disciples have tried to stop him. He is doing the work with no membership, no credential, and no share in the rank they were just arguing about — and Jesus tells them to leave him alone. The accuser asked whether anyone serves for nothing. The Gospel's answer is a stranger nobody could identify, working without a title, whom the insiders wanted to shut down.
A Question to Sit With
"Is it for nothing that Job fears Theos?" I have never been able to dismiss that question, because I cannot verify the answer from the inside. My own devotion has been conducted, so far, behind a substantial hedge — health, work, people who love me — and I genuinely do not know how much of it is response and how much is retainer. The accuser's proposal is not that I am a hypocrite; it is that nobody has ever been tested enough to know. What would I still be doing next week if the returns stopped, and is there anything I already do that has no return at all?