Testament of Job

The Testament of Job (also referred to as Divrei Lyov, literally meaning "Words of Job") is a book written in the 1st century BC or the 1st century AD. Some Midrashic parallels in the work indicate that it was a production of the pre-Christian era, and belongs to the Jewish apocrypha. Christian scholars refer to such writings as belonging to "intertestamental literature".

The text is not directly dependent on the canonical Book of Job, and presents many differences from it.

The earliest surviving manuscript is in Coptic, of the 5th century; other early surviving manuscripts are in Greek and Old Slavonic.

In 1967, Sebastian Brock published an edition of the Testament using the Greek ms P as his base. Then a bilingual Greek and English edition, edited by Robert A. Kraft, was issued in New York by the Society of Biblical Literature in 1974 with ISBN 0-88414-044-X. It used the Greek mss S-V as the base.

Maria Haralambakis (2012) surveyed as many as nine Slavonic manuscripts, some of which are now lost. The date of these manuscripts is between the 14th and 18th centuries. Also she covers the ongoing publication of the Coptic text, which is unfortunately rather fragmentary.

The Slavonic tradition is not believed to be derived from the two main Greek textual traditions. It seems to be separate from them, and contains the readings characteristic of both of them.

In folktale manner in the style of Jewish aggada, it elaborates upon the Book of Job making Job a king. Like many other Testament of ... works in the Old Testament apocrypha, it gives the narrative a framing-tale of Job's last illness, in which he calls together his sons and daughters to give them his final instructions and exhortations. The Testament of Job contains all the characters familiar in the Book of Job, with a more prominent role for Job's wife, given the name Sitidos, and many parallels to Christian beliefs that Christian readers find, such as intercession with God and forgiveness. In this text, Job's first wife dies and the seven sons and three daughters that he had in the epilogue of the book of Job were from his second wife, whom he married after his trials ended. According to the Testament of Job, his second wife is Dinah, the daughter of Jacob. This would mean that not only was Job joined to the house of Israel, but also that Job lived between the death of Abraham and the birth of Moses.

Unlike the Biblical Book of Job, Satan's vindictiveness towards Job is described in the Testament as being due to Job destroying a non-Jewish temple. Indeed, Satan is described in a far more villainous light, rather than simply being a prosecuting counsel. Job is equally portrayed differently; Satan is shown to directly attack Job, but fails each time due to Job's willingness to be patient, unlike the Biblical narrative where Job falls victim but retains faith.