To God be the Glory FOREVER, AMEN AND AMEN! ! !

Job was willing to stake his reputation on a future vindication of a permanent written record of his claims that he was innocent. Job wanted that record chiseled onto the hardest rock and then filled in with lead to lessen the chance that time or defacers would blot out the text.

One thing was sure, Job "knew that his Redeemer lives." The one who would stand up to defend Job was called his go'el, his "kinsman-redeemer" or "vindicator." This kinsman-redeemer basically functioned as the avenger of the blood of someone unjustly killed (2 Sam 14:11). He had the right to preempt all others in redeeming property left by a kinsman (Ruth 4:4-6). He also recovered stolen items (Num 5:8) or vindicated the rights of the oppressed (Prov 23:10-11). He was one who redeemed, delivered and liberated.

In the Psalms, God was cast into this role of kinsman-redeemer (see Ps 19:14). God was that vindicator or redeemer for Job as well.

But when did Job hope to be cleared by God--before or after death? Apparently, as Job debated with his friends, he progressively lost hope in being cleared in this life (Job 17:1, 11-16). But vindication would come one day. Hence the need for a written testimony of his complaint. Job believed that even if a person were cut down in life just as a tree was, the tree and the person would share the same hope--that a "shoot" would sprout out of the stump (Job 14:14). Even though it might take time (see "after" in Job 19:25-26), he hoped in the end for God's vindication.

In what state would Job be when that took place? Would he have a body or only a spirit, or would he be merely a memory? Job believed he would have a body, for only from inside that body (Job 19:26) and with his own eyes (Job 19:27) would he see God. He made the point that the experience would have a direct impact on his own eyeballs, and not on someone else's eyes. Thus Job was expecting a resurrection of his body! It was this which lay at the heart of his hope in God and in his vindication.

If some complain, as they surely will, that this is too advanced a doctrine for such primitive times (probably patriarchal), I would respond that long before this, Enoch had been bodily translated into heaven (Gen 5:24). The fact that this mortal body could inhabit immortal realms should have settled the abstract question forever. Indeed, the whole economy of Egypt was tied to the expectation that bodily resurrection was not only possible but also probable. That expectation had functioned a full millennium and a half before Abraham went down into Egypt. Thus our modern complaints about bodily resurrections say more about modern problems than about ancient culture.