Job's Redeemer

There's a verse that's often quoted at funerals from Job 19.

For I know that my Redeemer lives, and at the last he will stand upon the earth.
And after my skin has been thus destroyed, yet in my flesh I shall see God.

Think about that verse. Job says that his Redeemer will stand upon the earth. Christians understand him to be referencing Christ. But Job wasn't a Christian. Job wasn't even a Jew. So did Job know that he was talking about Christ? Was he expecting a literal physical incarnation of God? If so, what was the basis of his expectation? And if not, what redeemer was he talking about?

The Hebrew in the answer to this question goes way beyond what I can handle. But the implications are fascinating. Job's mentions wanting an arbitrator in chapter 9, when he says no one can stand between man and God. But he doesn't say this arbitrator doesn't exist; he says that the arbitrator isn't present! The implication is that the one who can stand between Job and God exists, and is also Job's redeemer, who he believes is coming.

Job is taking issue with God's treatment of him. He is saying that the one that will settle this dispute will come and stand upon the earth. Job believes that he will see God when justice is given, but that that justice will be given by someone else! Job doesn't want God to save him. Job wants someone to save him from God!

This makes so much sense in the context of the rest of the book. It's full of Job claiming his innocence. Job believes that God has done this to him, that Job himself doesn't deserve it, but also that another force of justice besides God will make things right! Like Abraham and so many others in the Bible, Job serves Yahweh, but he doesn't really get that his god is different than all the others.

So when God arrives at the end of the book, He explains to Job just who he's dealing with; no mere tribal god, but the Creator of all things. Job's knowledge of God was limited. So was Israel's knowledge. So is ours. Job served God the best he understood how. His getting a few details wrong do not diminish this in the slightest. Obedience with imperfect understanding is far from a flaw. If it was, we'd all be in the same position.

So at the end, Job becomes silent, because his whole argument is null. The god he believed in and worshiped and served was vastly bigger than he understood. He now understands that there is no higher power. Job has no appeal, no case to make; all his speeches and arguments have been based on a false premise. He shuts up because he grasps that his god, who he believed to be subservient to some ultimate justice, is Himself that ultimate justice. There is nowhere else to turn.