The Book Of Job

It is perplexing that The Book of Job has received so little attention from the psychoanalytic critics. Religious and philosophical analyses of Job would seem to rival in quantity the literary analyses of Hamlet, and they simply defy cataloguing. This is appropriate. Job is the sphinx of the Old Testament. By almost universal agreement it is regarded as the greatest literary document of the Old Testament. One can safely assert that the problem of its meaning has appealed to all concerned with the Bible as the problem of Hamlet's delay has appealed to all concerned with Shakespeare. Fortunately, the attempts at solving the problem of Job have been less extravagant than those catalogued by Ernest Jones of nonpsychoanalytic critics who have tried to solve the problem of Hamlet's delay. But they fail as badly. Psychoanalysis can, I believe, provide a solution.

The work, as we have it, consists of three parts. The first, in prose, relates a wager between God and one of the “sons of God,” Satan (i.e., the “Adversary”), concerning the loyalty to God of Job, a man described as “perfect and upright, and one that feared God, and eschewed evil” (1:1*). Satan maintains that it is only because of the favor shown Job by God that Job remains loyal. In order to test Job's loyalty, Satan is permitted to harm him. God wagers that Job will remain loyal throughout his sufferings. First, Satan destroys Job's family and substance. Job does not turn against God. Second, Satan strikes Job with leprosy. Again, Job does not turn against God.

The second part, in verse, consists of three cycles of dialogues between Job and his three friends in which they attempt to unravel