CHAPTER 2 Dec. 2 
Job’s Health is Taken Away
Again it happened on the day when the sons of God came to present themselves before Yahweh, that Satan came also among them to present himself before Yahweh. 2Yahweh said to Satan, Where have you come from? Satan answered Yahweh and said, From going back and forth in the land, and from walking up and down in it. 3Yahweh said to Satan, Have you considered My servant Job? For there is none like him in the land, 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. 4Satan answered Yahweh and said, Skin for skin. Yes, all that a man has he will give for his life. 5But put forth Your hand now and touch his bone and his flesh, and he will renounce You to Your face. 6Yahweh said to Satan, Behold, he is in your hand. Only spare his life. 7So Satan went forth from the presence of Yahweh, and struck Job with painful sores from the sole of his foot to his head. 8He took for himself a potsherd to scrape himself with, and he sat among the ashes. 9Then his wife said to him, Do you still maintain your integrity? Renounce God, and die. 10But he said to her, You speak as one of the foolish women would speak. What? Shall we receive good at the hand of God, and shall we not receive evil? In all this Job didn’t sin with his lips. 
The Three Friends Arrive
11Now when Job’s three friends heard of all this evil that had come on him, they each came from his own place: Eliphaz the Temanite, Bildad the Shuhite, and Zophar the Naamathite, and they made an appointment together to come to sympathize with him and to comfort him. 12When they lifted up their eyes from a distance and didn’t recognize him, they raised their voices and wept; and they each tore his robe, and sprinkled dust on their heads toward the sky. 13So they sat down with him on the ground seven days and seven nights, and none spoke a word to him, for they saw that his grief was very great.

Commentary

2:3 To ruin him without cause- Clearly enough we learn here that God can bring suffering into the lives of His children for reasons other than because they have sinned. There is no direct relationship between sin and suffering in this life; for the wicked often prosper. The day of judgment and reward for how life has been lived is ultimately at the final day of judgment when Christ returns. As Job struggles with the question of ‘Why suffering?’, he is progressively driven to a clearer understanding of the future day of judgment and resurrection of the dead to get their reward which God’s justice requires. Thus he was driven by experience and reflection on life to the doctrinal truths which are made explicit in the New Testament. Job begins the book presented as a complete spiritual person and he ends the book presented the same way. The reason for suffering isn’t always so that we personally may develop through it; in Job’s case, it was so that others would learn principles, not least the friends and the ‘satan’ character, and us the readers of subsequent generations. Some experiences and sufferings we have are perhaps more for the benefit of others who are observing, rather than for our own development.