Retribution or Reality?

“A scholarly tour de force! Michael Moore brings together insights from a wide range of ancient literary sources, assesses the contributions of various critical methodologies (textual and social science), and explores accounts of suffering from both his personal and pastoral experience. Experts on Job will be grateful for the bibliographical density of his discussion; lay readers are offered many diverse avenues of assessing the theological challenges of reading Job in a world of suffering.”


—James T. Butler, senior associate professor of Old Testament, Fuller Theological Seminary





“Michael Moore states that disinterested piety as motivation for righteous living is the theme of the book of Job. He maintains that most studies of this biblical book focus on some aspect of what he calls ‘incomplete divine justice.’ Hence his focus is primarily on Job, rather than on God. His analysis includes interaction with countless other commentators as he argues his point. Thus, this book includes an interesting survey of Joban interpretation.”


—Dianne Bergant, CSA, professor emerita of Old Testament studies, Catholic Theological Union