1:1 The first chapter serves as a prose prologue to the dialogue sections that form the core of the book. The focus from the very first word is on the main character. Hebrew word order (lit., “a man there was in the land of Uz”) intentionally emphasizes the man, Job. This word order signals that the reader should pay particularly close attention here to the introduction of this man and his circumstances, for he will play an important role in what follows.

Because the OT elsewhere associates Uz with Edom, the words in the land of Uz do more than locate Job geographically; they associate his story and the book’s wisdom with non-Israelite wisdom. It should not surprise us that Israel included foreign wisdom texts in its Scriptures. Wisdom is a peculiarly universal take on life that frequentl…