Job, as a literary and biblical figure, gives us a lot to think about.

He goes from riches to rags to riches again.

He loses his family, but begins another.

He's at the center of a contest between God and a devilish character.

He relies on his friends, but those same friends accuse him of doing evil works.

What can Latter-day Saints think about when considering Job the book, Job the figure,

and the implications of both man and scripture? We'll discuss that, and much more, in today's

episode of Abide, a Maxwell Institute podcast. My name is Joseph Stewart. I'm a public

communication specialist of the Neely Maxwell Institute for religious scholarship of Brigham Young

University. Christian Heel is a research

fellow at the Institute, and each week we discuss the week's block of reading from the Church of

Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, come follow me curriculum. We aren't here to present a lesson,

but rather to hit on a few key themes from the scripture block so as to help fulfill the Maxwell

Institute's mission to inspire and fortify Latter-day Saints in their testimonies of the restored gospel of Jesus Christ and engage the world of religious ideas. Today we are once again

joined by Derek Baker, one of our research assistants. Derek is an ancient Near Eastern

Studies major focusing in Greek from St. George, Utah. After Derek graduates, he plans to become

a high school history teacher. Welcome back, Derek.

Thanks for having me. Our pleasure. Now, Christian, the Come Follow Me block is chopped up a little bit,

but we are going to be looking at the book of Job in its entirety. What's going on in the book of Job?

So the Jewish Study Bible states boldly that Job is the most difficult book of the

Bible to interpret. The difficulties seem to me to be threefold. First is the difficulty in

explaining the elaborate arguments of the several speakers, including, and perhaps especially

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