“Has not man a hard service on earth, and are not his days like the days of a hired hand?
Job describes the shape of every human life on earth: a set term of service, and a worker longing for the day to end. That picture also shows how he was reading his relationship with God — and God set out to correct it.
The word "hard service"
Behind "hard service" stands the word tzava, an ordinary word for a host or army. One writer traces its force:
J. N. DarbyOverlooking a very ordinary use of the word tzava (host) has made another passage needlessly hard... Job 7:1 seems to open up the force of the word: "Is there not an appointed time to man? His days also as the days of a hired worker?" ... I gather that its force is "an appointed time" of subjection to evil.
Another translation keeps that military sense and adds the worker's own longing:
William KellyHas not man a warfare on earth, and are not his days like the days of a hired worker? Like the slave panting for the shade, and like the hired worker longing for his wages.
The evening that never came
A hired worker endures the heat because evening is coming. Job's day never closed, as one writer shows from an older translation of the next lines:
William Kelly"As a servant longs for the shadow" — the shade of evening, when his work is done — "and as a hired worker looks for the reward of his work; so I must live through months of emptiness, and weary nights are appointed to me." Servants had their daily break from work. The work may be hard, but they still had their night of ease and rest. "But I have nothing, day or night. It is all the same terrible, non-stop suffering."
Working for wages
The comparison Job reaches for shows the assumption under his distress. It is still a common one:
Leslie M. GrantJob's questions in verse 1 show why God's dealings distressed him so much... How many people are like Job in this. They think of their relationship with God as being like that of a hired man working for a righteous employer. If they do right, their pay should be good; if they do wrong, they expect painful pay. But Job was suffering agonising pain. Was this the pay for the good he had done?
God had a different kind of relationship in view:
Leslie M. GrantGod was seeking to teach Job something. His relationship to Him must not be that of a man working for wages. It must be that of one whom God loved and who loved God. He would then do good out of a heart of love, expecting no payment for it. Job did not understand this at the time, and neither did his friends.
Life measured out and running out
Job's endless day made him long for the one thing that would end it:
Samuel RidoutSleepless nights of tossing to and fro, month after month of pain that never lets up, make him long for that "appointed time" set for all flesh. He longs for it the way a hired worker waits for the end of his day's work... Like the swift passing of the shuttle in the weaver's loom, so pass his painful days. Soon they will see him no more, and his life will melt away as the cloud in the blue sky.
God's purpose in the furnace
Job could see only the length of his trial. Behind it stood a purpose:
William KellyBut God was putting him into the furnace in order that he might come out purer than ever.
What his friends owed him
One writer draws a plain lesson for the friends sitting with him:
F. B. HoleYou cannot read the first part of this chapter without being struck by the sadness of his plight... He describes his pitiful state in the most vivid way, and his friends should have been far more full of compassion.
Summary
- Appointed — Job's word points to a time fixed by someone else: "an appointed time" of subjection to evil. Life on earth is a warfare.
- Hired — the second image sets the trap. A hired hand works for wages, so Job expected good work to earn good treatment from God.
- Endless — the length of the trial crushed him, not only its force. A worker gets his evening shade; Job had months of emptiness and no rest, day or night.
- Loved — God wanted to move Job off wages. He wanted a man who loved Him and did good out of love, expecting no payment.
- Purer — the furnace was not an unfair employer at work. God was refining Job, so he would come out purer than he went in.