“…What of the Night?” Theology of Night in the Book of Job and the Psalter

Abstract

A textual analysis of the book of Job and of the Psalter shows an existential correlation between night and darkness that is naturally characterized by terror, horror, agony, oppression, pain, evil and wicked activities. However, the night, a symbol of uncertainty and fear is also portrayed as a time of revelation, of fellowship, and of divine activities, which neutralizes in a sense the seeming polarity and tension between night and day, between nocturnality and diurnality. The theological analysis of the night in both the book of Job and the Psalter shows Yahweh as absolutely in control of the temporal order and it is argued that this has strong implication for wisdom theology in particular and for the theology of the Hebrew Bible as a whole.

Keywords

• Night
• Job
• Psalter
• Darkness