Eucharistic meditation

Job 2:7: So Satan went out from the presence of the LORD, and struck Job with painful boils from the sole of his foot to the crown of his head.

Job is a king. He is the greatest of the men of the east; later he says that he delivers the poor and orphan from oppressors, and that he does not ignore the rights of widows; in his last speech he says that if he could see the indictment against him, he would approach Yahweh like a prince to offer his defense.

The three men who come to comfort him are “friends,” king’s friends, advisors. Together, they form his privy council. They are the cornerstones of his kingdom, Job himself being the chief cornerstone. As Toby has pointed out, they do not give Job sound advice. They are angling for his position, and they are trying to convict him so they can expel him from the kingdom like a pharmakos, a scapegoat, and take his throne.

We can hardly blame them.

After all, Job doesn’t look like a king. Kings are supposed to be crowned with glory, and to have enemies under their feet. Instead, Job is covered from head to toe with boils. The only other place where these phrases are used together – “from the crown of the head to the feet” and “evil boils” – is in Deuteronomy 28:35, where the phrases describe the curses that will fall on Israel if they fail to keep covenant. Job is cursed, and who wants a kind whose very body is decaying before their eyes?

This is a more serious problem for ancient peoples than for us. If President Obama suffered from psoriasis, we’d probably know since we know every detail of his life; but we wouldn’t think he was disqualified from serving as President. We wouldn’t take it as a reason to get rid of him. For ancients, however, a king’s physical condition and the condition of his kingdom are closely linked. A sick king is a sign of a sick kingdom, and if the king is covered with boils, it won’t be long before the king’s “social body” is also breaking out with plagues.

Job doesn’t look at all like a king. But appearances deceive. Job, we know, is a Christ figure, and his body disfigured with boils is part of that figuration. . Like Job, Jesus will suffer the sicknesses of Egypt , the curses of the covenant. Like Job, Jesus will be surrounded and expelled by his friends.

This doesn’t look like kingship, but according to Scripture this is true kingship. Suffering is the path to power and authority; the way is always the way of the cross. If we want to be true kings, we have to follow this king, the king who suffers innocently, the king who takes on the curses of His people, the king covered with boils from head to toe.

That’s the strange politics we enact and commit ourselves to at this table every week: To take up our cross and to follow the one despised and rejected of men, a man of sorrows and acquainted with grief, the King who has no beauty that we should desire Him.