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a prince he will go before the Judge, and bind his indictment like a costly diadem upon his brow. For he is certain that he has not merited his affliction, that neither human nor divine accusation can do anything against him, and that he will remain conqueror - as over men, so over God Himself.
Thus has the poet, in this threefold monologue of Job, prepared the way for the catastrophe, the unravelment of the knot of the drama. But will God enter into a controversy respecting His cause with Job? This is contrary to the honour of God; and that Job desires it, is contrary to the lowliness which becomes him towards God. On this very account God will not at once acknowledge Job as His servant: Job will require first of all to be freed from the sinful presumption concerning God with which he has handled the problem of his sufferings. But he has proved himself to be a servant of God, in spite of the folly into which he has fallen; the design of Satan to tear him away from God is completely frustrated. Thus, therefore, after he has purified himself from his sin into which, both in word and thought, he has allowed himself to be drawn by the conflict of temptation, Job must be proved to be the servant of God in opposition to the friends.
But before God Himself appears in order to bring about the unravelment, there follow still four speeches, Job 32-37, of a speaker, for whose appearance the former part of the drama has in no way prepared us. It is also remarkable that they are marked off from the book of Job, as far as we have hitherto read, by the formula תּמּוּ דּברי איּוב, are ended the words of Job. Carey is of the opinion that these three words may possibly be Job's own closing dixi. According to Hahn, the poet means to imply by them that Job has now said all that he intended to say, so that it would now have been the friends' turn to speak. These views involve a perplexity like that of those who think that Psa 72:20 must be regarded as a constituent part of the Psalm. As in that position