gative, it nevertheless opened the eyes of Job
and his generation to a larger conception of Jehovah and a far broader
interpretation of the universe and of the laws which regulate it. The
second is that he is guilty of no crime commensurate with the calamity
which had overtaken him. Overwhelmed by misfortune and the reiterated
charges of his friends, only through a superhuman struggle did Job
ultimately attain the unshaken conviction that he was indeed innocent in
the sight of God and man. The third line of progress is that, if not in
the present life, in that beyond the grave his reputation would not only
be vindicated but he himself would be fully conscious of that vindication.

As is illustrated by the third chapter, Job in common with his race still
shared the belief that for the ordinary individual life beyond the grave
was a shadowy existence, far removed from Jehovah's presence. This
conception of the life after death was inherited by the Israelites from
their Semitic ancestors, and was held in common by most ancient peoples,
both of the East and of the West. The Babylonians believed, however, that
certain favored mortals, as, for example, the hero of the flood, were
transported to the abode of the gods, there to enjoy blessed individual
immortality. The same belief is the foundation of the Hebrew stories
regarding Enoch and Elijah. This belief was apparently the germ which in
time developed, as in the twelfth chapter of Daniel, into the widespread
conviction that the grave would not hold those who had been loyal to
Jehovah, but that he would surely raise them again to a glorious life. In
the book of Job it is possible to trace the birth-pangs of this broader
hope. Conscious of his innocence and confronted by the grave, Job
repeatedly voices the deep conviction that God, because he is just, will
raise his afflicted servant from the grave and accord to him that justice
which seems excluded from his present life. This solution of the problem
of innocent suffering is not given the central place by the author of the
book of Job. It is safe, however, to conjecture that if the appearance of
Jehovah had not furnished to the author's mind a more satisfactory
conclusion, the vindication after death would have been the solution
offered. At several points Job approaches very close to the belief in
individual immortality which became a commonly accepted tenet in the
trying days of the Maccabean struggle.

The fourth line of