At the same time, I think there is much more going on in the divine speeches than merely telling Job that he doesn’t know what he’s talking about. To be sure, the emphasis on humanity not being the center can be seen as a reaction to Job’s egocentrism (cf. especially ch. 3), but God’s control over Behemoth and Leviathan would seem to imply, if nothing else, both the power of evil and God’s mastery of it.

I read Chesterton’s essay several times while taking a course on Job almost 20 years ago, and his rather distinctive turns of phrase leapt out at me as I read the above quotes, so I checked the relevant pages of Žižek’s book at Amazon.com just now to see if he actually claims these words as his own, and the answer is sort of yes and no: he does acknowledge that he is summarizing Chesterton’s treatment of Job, but his summary includes substantial copy-and-pastes from Chesterton’s essay, even outside the quote marks.

“After Yahweh had spoken these words to Job, Yahweh said to Eliphaz the Temanite: “My wrath is kindled against you [sg] and against your [sg] two friends; for you have not spoken of me what is right, as my servant Job has.” Job 42:7

The context is Yahweh speaking to Eliphaz and saying what he and his friends have spoken is not correct. I’m not sure how it would also apply to what Yahweh said. Or, for that matter, even to what Elihu said (although I think that Elihu’s comments are judged by the fact they are ignored).

I characterize God’s response to Job out of the whirlwind as essentially a non-answer to anything Job has asked about. It is, in a way, an egocentric word. God affirms a God-centered universe (contra Gen 1:26-28!!!). God shows up and responds to Job’s appeals by saying the equivalent–for two chapters–of “I’m God, you’re not . . . buck up and deal with it.”

The most important part of the book, I think, is also often ignored by most interpreters, to the detriment of a proper understanding of the book. In chapter 42, on the heels of the response out of the whirlwind, God affirms that the ONLY person who has spoken rightly in the entire book is . . . Job! Not the friends, not the satan, not God. As I put it to my students, if God is ‘on trial’ in Job, it seems to be a pretty bad defense–surely one doomed to failure–to say that the person accusing you is the only one who has spoken truthfully about the matter!

And so my sense of the book of Job is that it presses us to realize that yes, humans cannot understand God, but what is it about God that we cannot understand? His awesome power, sure. But Job also says that we cannot understand the how or why of many of God’s actions. Or, put another, and better, way, God is not bound by any definitions of reliability that can be counted on at all times; in some instances, relationship with God becomes, inexplicably or not, unsettling.