The Patience of J.B.

For a work so celebrated and so concise, the Book of Job seems to be much misunderstood by men in both pew and pulpit. Some think of Job as the paragon of patience; to others, Job appears so impatient that he dares impiety in his insistence that God explain himself. Many Bible scholars see the Book of Job as an attempt to justify God's ways to men; but to another school of thought, the book's enormous thesis means simply that no justification is possible--only revelation, before which the man who cries for justice and understanding must "lay his hand upon his mouth." In his new verse-play, J.B. (Houghton Mifflin; $3.50), Poet Archibald MacLeish, two-time Pulitzer Prizewinner, adds a new emphasis to Job's epic ordeal--a justification of the ways of man to God.

Those Eyes See." The scene is a corner of a vast circus tent, where there is a platform for a sideshow. ("Clothes that have the look of vestments of many churches and times have been left about.") Enter Mr. Zuss and Nickles, actors once, now a couple of old circus vendors in white caps and jackets, Mr. Zuss selling balloons, Nickles selling popcorn.

In a few sharp, character-etching lines, MacLeish gets them onto the platform, which turns out to be "heaven" in a play about Job that is regularly performed there. They find the masks the regular actors use, and turn themselves into God (Mr. Zuss) and Old Nick himself. The familiar words of the Bible begin to issue from their mouths. "Whence comest thou?" asks God. "From going to and fro in the earth," Satan replies, "and from walking up and down in it . . ." But with a roar, Nickles wrenches off his Satan mask and stares at it. "Those eyes see ... They see the world. They do. They see it ... I know what Hell is now--to see."

Below them on the stage, the cast--J.B. and his family--appears ("Well, that's our pigeon," says Mr. Zuss). As the agony of J.B. unfolds before them, Nickles and Zuss constantly break into the action with a double dialectic--Divine Creator v. Destroyer, human hope (flavored with priggishness) v. despair (flavored with compassion). Sings Nickles:

I heard upon his dry dung heap That man cry out who cannot sleep:

"If God is God He is not good, If God is good He is not God . . .

To Be Forgiven? J.B. is a banker, the richest man in town, respected by all and loved by his wife Sarah and their children, David, Mary, Jonathan, Ruth and Rebecca. They eat a Thanksgiving turkey, talk about God and gratitude. Then the disasters strike. Playwright MacLeish stage-manages them deftly with a tabloid editor's eye for sordid shock effect and a flexible poetic line to match. Two drunken soldiers blurt out news of the death of David; a news cameraman snaps a picture of J.B. and Sarah while a reporter is telling them that Mary and Jonathan have been killed in an auto accident; two cops break the news of Ruth's murder by a sex maniac. Rebecca is killed when J.B.'s bank blows up, and Nickles waits expectantly for J.B. to kill himself.

God has forgotten what a man can do Once his body hurts him--once Pain has penned him in where only Pain has room to breathe. He learns! He learns to spit his broken teeth out-- Spit the dirty world out--spit!

Destitute, deserted, covered by rags and sores, J.B. receives the Three Comforters of the Bible. MacLeish makes Zophar a broken-down priest, Eliphaz a wreck of a doctor and Bildad a soapbox-orating Communist. Guilt is their subject, and each tries to explain it away in his own fashion, but J.B. cries:

Guilt matters. Guilt must always matter.

Unless guilt matters the whole world is Meaningless. God too is nothing.

In the final, climactic confrontation of J.B. with God, MacLeish sticks close to Scripture, and the Bible provides the best poetry in the play. But in the scene that follows, MacLeish shifts the emphasis from God's glory to man's heroic acceptance. Says Mr. Zuss:

As though Job's suffering were justified Not by the Will of God but Job's Acceptance of God's Will . . . He understood and he forgave it! . . . Who's the judge in judgment there? Who plays the hero, God or him? Is God to be forgiven?

Nickles may speak for Author MacLeish himself when he answers: "Isn't he? Job was innocent, you may remember."

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