Job's wife – did she bless or curse?

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In the Book of Job, his wife says "Baruch Elokhim, ve mos" which in most Masoretic texts is translated "Curse G-d, and die". The literal translation is "Bless G-d and die". Is this one of the Biblical texts which were later reinterpreted to put women in a poorer light? Is Job's wife pious and where is the allowance for her suffering?
The traditional interpretation is that she is urging Job to curse G-d, that the use of the term "Baruch Elokim" is a colloquial expression for "Curse G-d". This fits with other texts and Job's own response which is to chastise her as "foolish". Even in this version, we need to revisit her role in the story. She has seen her life collapse: she has lost 10 children, seen the family fortune disappear, and at this point in the story her husband has a rather nasty disease and halitosis to boot – but still she stands by him.

The Book of Job, part 5: Job's wife – did she bless or curse?


She may speak from out of anger with G-d or with her husband's piety in the face of this tragedy; but to her credit she stays with her husband in the midst of financial and personal ruin. Her question to Job surely starts his own process of deeper introspection that we get later in the book.
Some have looked at the possibility of using the literal translation "Bless G-d and die". This fits with the Jewish notion that we should bless G-d as we die. The 13th Century Jewish commentator Nachmanides, takes this idea forward stating that she is urging him to blaspheme because death is better than his current situation. Perhaps her own doubts simply prefigure those of Job later when he famously curses the day he was born. Which is worse: to accept your fate and give up hope as she does, or to wish your whole life had never happened as Job himself does?
Nachmanides was not the first to concern himself with the role of Job's wife nor the last. The version we have of Job today like many texts comes from a male point of view. But there have been people all through history who were unhappy with the role assigned to Job's nameless wife, whether in 21st feminist critiques, a 13th Century Nachmanides commentary, a 1st Century Theraputae rewrite, or even the Aggadic version in the Talmud.
Whilst modern commentators have seen Job's wife as a mere adjunct to Job and his property, a much earlier attempt to rewrite the story of Job with a more egalitarian take exists.
The Testament of Job is a rewrite of Job, written in the first person from his viewpoint. It is a post-Biblical Judaic work (written either in the 1st century BCE or CE) lost by the Jews, later rejected as being non-Apocryphal by the Vatican but preserved by Copts. It is widely assumed to have emanated from the Theraputae, an ascetic Jewish sect described by Philo in some detail as egalitarian. The version we have today is in Greek and reads like a Greek tragedy and certainly the narrative is aligned to Aggadic versions of Job present in the Talmud.
Job's first wife is Sitidos (Sitis). Her name may have the same root as the word Satan in Hebrew or Sotah (unfaithful wife). She is a princess and Job a tribal leader. Her response to their destruction is to go out and earn a living. Eventually and unknown to her she sells her hair to Satan in exchange for three loaves of bread for her husband; it is Satan who puts the words "Curse G-d" into her mouth. She later comes back and pleads with Job to be allowed to go into the rubble of the Palace to recover the dead bodies of her children. Job tells her that they must be left and she takes herself off to lie amongst the cattle where she dies.
Only after her death does she receive honour as the city laments her death. Job is restored and in a bizarre twist marries Dinah (a daughter of Jacob) and has 10 children by her.
Yet Sitidos remains a tragic figure in this version, one whose suffering stands independently of her husband's and raises questions of its own.

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