“A hollow man will be one I ask for answers
when donkeys, wild donkeys are born human” (Job 11.12).
I may have told this story before. When I was a little kid, I wanted to be a magician. I was also a trusting soul. So, my parents and grandparents found it entertaining to have me perform for them. They’d have me close my eyes and say the magic words while someone got up and left the room so that, when I opened them, I’d find I’d made someone vanish.
Eventually, I caught on to what was happening. I learned that magic, as practiced on stage and the street, is about sleight of hand and misdirection. Magic words don’t make things go away.
That isn’t stopping Zophar from trying. His words are meant to be magical. They aren’t an incantation; though, that might explain why they’re a bit cryptic. No, they appear to be a pithy sort of saying whose meaning is lost to us. It’s a phrase that was, likely, said so often that it’s words answered all the questions, ended the discussion. I think of them in the same vein as when someone says that God always has a plan or that everything happens for a reason. They’re words that, when said, make everything go away.
It makes sense. Zophar, throughout, is always waiting to have his say. By the time his turn comes round, he’s fed up. He’s done with all this bellyaching and bemoaning. This is just how things are and you need to own up to it. So, I’m done with this discussion. I’ll waste time listening to people like you when donkeys start having human kids.
Zophar, I don’t think, believes his words will make Job’s problems go away. Not anymore than I do when I try and use my own incantations. Oh, I have learned the impotence of saying things happen for some reason or that God’s always in direct control of every situation, but I still want things to disappear. Maybe there’s facts or case studies I’ll cite as though they’re truth. But the desire is the same. To close my eyes so someone’s problems can leave the room.
Magic—stage magic—requires an agreement between the performer and the audience. The viewer must agree to suspend their disbelief, be willing to accept what they don’t really believe is possible. And the magician agrees to fulfill their wishes: the idea that things can disappear into thin air, off to some unseen other place. Both sides agree to pretend that something has happened when we know, deep down, it really hasn’t.
Job’s troubles will not disappear any more than the adults did from my Grandparent’s living room. No more than the lady in the box or the Statue of Liberty did. But that isn’t the point, is it? I believed it happened. Zophar believes Job’s sorrow and suffering will vanish in a puff of smoke. If he can just close his eyes to it for just a moment, it’ll all go away.
Or, at least, it will leave the room.
Christ forgive me for all the times I’ve tried to wave someone’s heartbreak away.