Iyov perek 22

Welcome to NachDaily with Iyov, Perek 22. This begins the 3rd round of debates between Iyov and his friends. We still have two unanswered questions of Tzaddik v’ra lo and Rasha v’tov lo - why do the righteous suffer and the wicked prosper? The Malbim explains that Eliphaz comes up with a new response to these questions. Hashem purposely does not usually reward the righteous or punish the wicked in this world per se because He wants us to serve Him for His own sake, and not for reward and punishment. If people would be rewarded in this world, their motivation for serving God would only be to attain more reward. The Malbim explains that when you serve God for a reward, you’re just serving yourself. We are supposed to keep the mitzvos for their own sake, to fulfill the word of the Creator. Hashem doesn't want our behavior to be motivated by reward and punishment. It goes without saying that if we would be immediately punished or rewarded every time we did something good or bad, we would cease to have free choice. God thus purposely hides His providence to allow for free choice and reward and punishment. The ability to deny Divine providence is built into the world so that we can say that the world is static and there is no Hashgacha Pratis. Hashem purposely hid Himself to weed out who’s really serving Him with truth, sincerity, and honesty, versus who’s not. The Malbim continues to explain that this bolsters Elifaz’s initial assertion that the righteous will receive reward in th