Job 4 · a question people ask
Is Eliphaz right that the innocent never perish?
These are Eliphaz's words, and he gives his ground for them: "According to what I have seen" (4:8). The book has already told you about Job: "That man was blameless and upright" (1:1), and the LORD said to Satan, "you incited me against him, to ruin him without cause" (2:3). Later Job says something very different: "he destroys the blameless and the wicked" (9:22), and "he will mock at the trial of the innocent" (9:23), where innocent is the same Hebrew word as in 4:7. Other Scripture speaks of sowing and reaping too: "He who sows wickedness reaps trouble" (Proverbs 22:8), and "whatever a man sows, that he will also reap" (Galatians 6:7). And when Jesus' disciples asked about a man blind from birth, "who sinned, this man or his parents, that he was born blind?" (John 9:2), Jesus answered, "This man didn’t sin, nor did his parents" (John 9:3). So Scripture says that people reap what they sow, and it also tells of suffering that didn't come from the sufferer's own sin. What the book itself says about Job is 2:3's "without cause", and about Eliphaz's words, 42:7.
The verses
““Remember, now, who ever perished, being innocent? Or where were the upright cut off? According to what I have seen, those who plow iniquity and sow trouble, reap the same.”
“There was a man in the land of Uz, whose name was Job. That man was blameless and upright, and one who feared God, and turned away from evil.”
“The LORD said to Satan, “Have you considered my servant Job? For there is no one like him on the earth, a blameless and an upright man, one who fears God, and turns away from evil. He still maintains his integrity, although you incited me against him, to ruin him without cause.””
““It is all the same. Therefore I say he destroys the blameless and the wicked. If the scourge kills suddenly, he will mock at the trial of the innocent.”