Lessons from Elihu: Listening and Wisdom in Job
By Elizabeth Prata
SYNOPSIS
The post discusses Elihu’s perspective in the Book of Job, emphasizing his respectful listening and patience despite being younger than Job’s friends. Elihu criticizes Job’s self-justification and highlights that suffering may serve purposes beyond punishment for sin, as the other 3 friends insisted. Ultimately, Elihu encourages trust in God.
In my Daily Bible we read an OT passage, a NT passage, a Psalm and a Proverb. Recently I was going through Job. If you made it through all the speeches, at the end a man named Elihu weighs in.
Elihu says he waited out of respect to speak because Job, Eliphaz, Bildad, and Zophar are his seniors. Let the elder speak first. We begin with Elihu in chapter 32 of Job.
Elihu knew his place in a group of seniors and he demonstrated patience in waiting to speak. Instead of focusing on what he wanted to say, he attentively listened long enough and well enough to have captured the essence of what the 4 were saying and had developed a conclusion of it. This indicates his humility.
Next, we learn that Elihu was furious. His righteous indignation burned.
Why was he angry?
He felt that Job was justifying himself instead of acknowledging God. He also felt the 3 friends were condemning Job without knowledge.
his anger burned because he justified himself before God. And his anger burned against his three friends because they had found no answer, yet they had condemned Job. (Job 32:2b-3).
Matthew Henry says, “It becomes us to be suspicious of our own judgment in matters of doubtful disputation, to be swift to hear the sentiments of others and slow to speak our own, especially when we go contrary to the judgment of those for whom their learning and piety we respect”.
Elihu listened over many hours or days (duration isn’t given in the Bible) and didn’t like what he heard, but he still listened. It’s important to listen to things we do not like, in order to gain a proper understanding of the full picture. Elihu did that. This is mature, even though he was young. The 3 friends spoke, paused, groped for words, repeated themselves, indicating they spoke with less well-formed judgments than Elihu did.
Think of Proverbs 18:13, One who gives an answer before he hears, It is foolishness and shame to him.
Older men are usually wiser, but not always, as evidenced here with Eliphaz, Bildad, and Zophar. Elihu respected them, listened to them, and then discerned that he had a different point of view, which he humbly offered.
Christopher Ash summed it up: “In short, whereas Eliphaz, Bildad and Zophar argue that Job is suffering because he sinned, Elihu says that Job is sinning because he was suffering.” (Source: Job: The Wisdom of the Cross, Crossway)
Matthew Henry again, “Great men are not always wise…Men should be preferred for their wisdom, and those that are in honour and power have most need of wisdom and have the greatest opportunity of improving in it; and yet it does not follow that great men are always wise, and therefore it is folly to subscribe to the dictates of any with an implicit faith.”
Thus, young(er) Elihu was respectful of the others point of view, but not blindly accepting.
A poor yet wise youth is better than an old and foolish king who no longer knows how to receive instruction— (Ecclesiastes 4:13).
Let no one look down on your youthfulness, but rather in speech, conduct, love, faith, and purity, show yourself an example of those who believe. (1 Timothy 4:12).
Elihu says (or thinks) he has something new to offer. He also says the arguments have been beaten to death and he would not belabor them (v 32:14).
But was Elihu too confident? A bit arrogant? Is Matthew Henry too gushing in his admiration for Elihu? In attempting to get a handle on this man’s character, I also read Franklin Genung in his entry in The International Standard Bible. Genung is less entranced with Elihu,
He is very egotistic, very sure of the value of his ideas; much of his alleged prolixity (long-windedness) is due to that self-deprecation which betrays an inordinate opinion of oneself (cf 32:6–22).
But when I consulted the scriptures again, I concluded Elihu was right though. The 3 friends seemed to be stuck on the idea that suffering is always a penalty for sin. Elihu surmised suffering may be ordained upon the righteous as a protection against an unknown of upcoming greater sin, or to cause greater trust and dependence on a merciful, compassionate God in the midst of personal adversity.
Of course, no one knew the real reason for God’s decree to have Job suffer, but we in these thousands of years later are still interpreting, loving, and pondering the great truths in this monumental book. All that God does is good, always, and it is for His glory and our betterment. In the end, none of the men, even Elihu, prompted Job to understand. It was not man’s words but God Himself who broke through Job’s limited human understanding.
God still didn’t explain himself to Job but rather, asked Job rhetorical questions that highlighted God’s sovereign power, which in turn illustrated that Job’s limited understanding was never going to resolve his questions, except for faith and trust in the infinitely complex Sovereign God.
In the end, it was Elihu’s confidence in God that was well founded. God spoke to the three friends and rebuked them for misrepresenting Job. God did not rebuke Elihu. (Job 42:7). Why? Perhaps because Elihu never presumed to explain WHY Job was suffering, and he simply urged Job to trust the Creator who is always just.
And that is a lesson for us too.
