the Shunammite boy, and the raising of a dead man
through contact with the bones of Elisha, are all appar-
ently instances of re-awakening rather than recalling from
real death. The bodies had not been buried, and dissolu-
tion had not set in, so that these cannot properly be classed
under the head of resurrection. There was nothing,
therefore, in pre-exilic literature to suggest the hope of
resurrection to the author of Job. On the other hand,
he lived toward the end of the Persian period, and was
certainly influenced by Persian thought in other respects,
so that there is no difficulty in thinking that he borrowed
this doctrine also from Persian sources. The pre-exilic
prophets had taught the lifelessness of Sheol, but also
the perfect righteousness of Yahweh and his almighty
power that extended even to Sheol. It was easy to
correlate the Zoroastrian doctrine of resurrection with
these prophetic doctrines by holding that Yahweh's right-
eousness and almighty power showed themselves by de-
livering men from the "eternal sleep" of Sheol through
restoring them to life on earth in the body. The foreign
doctrine of resurrection thus came as a welcome aid in
solving the problem of retribution which had been left
unsolved by the prophets.

While Job was struggling with the mystery of his
terrible sufferings, loss of wealth, loss of children, and
loss of health, and was unable to find any explanation for
these either as the punishment of the sins of his ancestors,
or as punishment for his own sins; and was tempted to
deny that an all-wise, all-powerful, and all-righteous God
ruled the world; the question suddenly flashed into his
mind, Was it not possible that a vindication of his in-
nocence might come after death? That could not be in
Sheol, since there conscious existence ceased, but might
not God bring him back to life again, so that on earth and
in the flesh he should receive the reward of virtue? The
cut-down tree revives. May not man also awaken from
the sleep of death?

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