A reader wrote in asking what use was it to Job to have his first 10 children
killed with God's permission and then have them replaced with 10 more children?
How about God not permitting his first 10 children to be killed by Satan in the
first place? Who wants another 10 different children. It is not about replacing
bodies it is about loving characters. Who would say to God: Yer go ahead and
permit Satan to kill my existing family so long as I get the same number of
children back afterwards as I had before! Having children is not about numbers it is about love.
We answered as follows. Here are the relevant verses...
1 There
happened to be a man in the land of Uz whose name was Job; and that man proved
to be blameless and upright, and fearing God and turning aside from bad.
2 And
7 sons and 3 daughters came to be born to him.
3 And
his livestock got to be 7,000 sheep and 3,000 camels and 500 spans of cattle and
500 she-asses, along with a very large body of servants; and that man came to be
the greatest of all the Orientals (Job 1)
12 As
for Jehovah, he blessed the end of Job afterward more than his beginning, so
that he came to have 14,000 sheep and 6,000 camels and 1,000 spans of cattle and
1,000 she-asses.
13 He
also came to have 7 sons and 3 daughters
14 And
he went calling the name of the first Jemimah and the name of the second Keziah
and the name of the 3rd Keren- happuch.
15 And
no women were found as pretty as Job's daughters in all the land, and their
father proceeded to give them an inheritance in among their brothers.
16 And
Job continued living after this 140 years and came to see his sons and his
grandsons - 4 generations.
17 And
gradually Job died, old and satisfied with days (Job
42).
So God did not give him any more children. He got back the precise number that he
had lost. He did get shedloads more cattle however! So God thinks as you do. It
is not the number of kids, it is actually having them to love. The children were
replaced soul for soul. But here is where it gets really interesting.
Look how he names the 3 daughters in verse 14. Now the bible almost never lists
names of daughters. All genealogies are male. Even Jesus' maternal line in Luke
3 has the women referred to by their husbands. All the genealogies in
Genesis are male. So why do we not hear that Job went calling his 7 sons by
their names too?
Well we propose it was because he already knew their names, since they were his
original sons who had been resurrected. This is called omission symbolism. The
bible makes a very obvious omission (the names of the 7 'new' sons). This is not
a mistake! It is a clue!
You do not give new names to resurrected children. Now Job has a famous chapter
referring to the resurrection as follows...
14 For
God speaks once, And twice -- though one does not regard it --
15 In
a dream, a vision of the night, When deep sleep falls upon men, During slumbers
upon the bed.
16 It
is then that he uncovers the ear of men, And on exhortation to them he puts his
seal,
17 To
turn aside a man from his deed, And that he may cover pride itself from an
able-bodied man.
18 He
keeps his soul back from the pit And his life from passing away by a missile.
19 And
he is actually reproved with pain upon his bed, And the quarreling of his bones
is continual.
20 And
his life certainly makes bread loathsome, And his own soul desirable food.
21 His
flesh wastes away from sight, And his bones that were not seen certainly grow
bare.
22 And
his soul draws near to the pit, And his life to those inflicting death.
23 If there exists for him a messenger, A spokesman, one out of 1,000, To tell to man
his uprightness,
24 Then
he favors him and says, 'Let him off from going down into the pit! I have found
a ransom!
25 Let
his flesh become fresher than in youth; Let him return to the days of his
youthful vigor
26 He
will make entreaty to God that he may take pleasure in him, And he will see his
face with joyful shouting, And He will restore His righteousness to mortal man.
27 He
will sing to men and say, 'I have sinned; and what is upright I have perverted,
And it certainly was not the proper thing for me.
28 He has redeemed my
soul from passing into the pit, And my life itself will see the light.'
29 Look!
All these things God performs, 2 times, 3 times, in the case of an able-bodied
man (Job 33)
So having told Job about the ransom and redemption and a resurrection in which ones
flesh becomes fresher than youth, he might well have implemented that promise in
the case of Job's 7 sons. He certainly had the salvation covenants in place to
do it at that time.
So why did he resurrect the 7 sons and not the 3 daughters? Well the clues are
in the scripture. Job gave his 3 new daughters a land inheritance amongst their
brothers. So he would also have given his 3 original daughters a land
inheritance. So they would have had house which they could have used to invite
their 7 brothers around. But only the 7 brothers invited their other brothers
and sisters around on their birthdays....
4 And
his sons went and held a banquet at the house of each one on his own day; and
they sent and invited their 3 sisters to eat and drink with them.
5 And
it would occur that when the banquet days had gone round the circuit, Job would
send and sanctify them; and he got up early in the morning and offered up burnt
sacrifices according to the number of all of them; for, said Job, maybe my sons
have sinned and have cursed God in their heart. That is the way Job would do
always (Job 1).
So Job who was blameless and upright (Job 1:1 above) would make these sacrifices
for his 7 sons but not said to be for his 3 daughters every year. So his sons
would have been in a saved condition but the account does not say that his
daughters were.
So really the account makes it quite clear that God resurrected the 7 original
sons but not the 3 daughters. Whether the daughters missed out because they were
inhospitable cows who did not return the hospitality of their 7 brothers when it
came to be their birthdays or whether they were unworthy or unable to be
resurrected for some other technical reason we do not know. But your original instinct about your family appears to be true in
the cases of the 7 sons at least.
And that is how the bible is written!