The Life and Times of Job (Part 3): When was Job?

When was Job?

Dating Job is a much more difficult affair:

First, outside of the book of Job, no other character named Job appears in scripture.  (There is a possible exception of Jashub, Issachar's son, in Gen 46:13.  The Samaritan Pentateuch (Torah) and some versions of the Septuagint render the name Jashub where the Masoretic records Job or Iob.  Because of the uncertainty and that Issachar appears to have gone with his father and grandfather into Egypt and is counted among the 70, I exclude a priori him from consideration here.)

It is still possible, however, that Job is in fact one of the several Jobabs that is mentioned.  Barry Setterfield makes a case here: http://www.setterfield.org/Jobab.html that this is in particular Eber's grandson, six generations down from Shem, Noah's son.  As a side-note, each of the three Jobabs mentioned in the bible are descendents of Shem, and two are descendants of Isaac and Abraham.

When I read Setterfield's explanation, along with his views on the time of Peleg, I was very intrigued.  However, while the name association (Job-Jobab) may be correct, I'm not convinced that this is the right Jobab, principally considering genealogies.

First, narrowing down Uz:

The two most likely Uz's are either 1) the grandson of Shem, via Aram, and 2) the nephew of Abraham (brother of Lot), via Nahor.  The third Uz mentioned, the Horite comes perhaps several generations after Esau where his grandfather, Seir, appears to be a contemporary of Esau.  If the land of Edom (Esau) is in the land of Uz (Lam 4:21), and Edom displaces/replaces/comingles with the grandfather of Uz, Seir, in the land of Seir, then this is probably not the right Uz and, as is often the case, this Uz is named for an earlier one.  Also possible is that this Uz is a descendant of Nahor's son, Uz, through another Hori (not the uncle of this younger Uz), which would explain how it was that you had the descendants of Esau and Seir mixed together, in the land, where Seir chiefs are listed just after Esau's, and there is a recent blood relation.

Here are the lineages given in scripture for the two most likely candidates.

UZ #1	UZ# 2
Noah	Noah
Shem	Shem
Aram	Arphaxad
Uz	Cainan (?)
	Selah
	Eber
	Peleg
	Reu
	Serug
	Nahor
	Terah
	Nahor
	Uz

So which Uz?

Referring to a Setterfield article above, a few pieces of the puzzle do fit well if the Uz is the earlier one, the grandson of Shem.  This Uz, and was the cousin of Selah (if we accept the OT we are familiar with) or of Selah's father, Cainan, if Luke (in Acts) and the Septuagint are correct.  Uz is therefore two to three generations earlier than Selah's grandson, Peleg so named because "in his days the earth was divided" which has become somewhat a point of discussion between those who imagine that this must refer to nations separating and going their way which happened apparently during the generation of Noah's grand- or great-grandsons, a couple generations before Selah.  We know that Noah's grandson Javan (through his son Japheth) had sons who moved away to their respective coastlands according to their respective languages, indicating that the Babel event had already occurred, either in their lives, or the lifetimes of their father and Noah's grandsons.

The other side of the argument is that, given the time delay between, from two to even four generations, the division mentioned for Peleg must have been different and likely refers to an actual division of the land.  I won't go further into this, except to mention that it would explain a number of unusual passages in the book of Job which until now I consistently glossed over.

If it is the earlier Uz, then the land of Uz is established three generations before Peleg, whose nephew is a certain Jobab.  If the later, he is a distant descendant of Abraham, as below:

JOBAB:1	JOBAB:2
Noah	Noah
Shem	Shem
Arphaxad	Arphaxad
Cainan	Cainan
Selah	Selah
Eber	Eber
Joktan	Peleg
Jobab	Reu
	Serug
	Nahor
	Terah
	Abraham
	Isaac
	Esau
	Reuel
	Zerah
	Jobab

Further, one piece of information that differs from our standard Old Testament version of the book of Job is the dating information at the end.

First, from the familiar, Old Testament (translated based on the Masoretic Hebrew text):

^{Job 42:16-17} After this, Job lived a hundred and forty years; he saw his children and their children to the fourth generation. ¹⁷ And so Job died, an old man and full of years.

Now from the Alexandrian Septuagint:

Job 42:16-17 And Job lived after his affliction a hundred and seventy years: and all the years he lived were two hundred and forty: and Job saw his sons and his sons’ sons, the fourth generation. And Job died, an old man and full of days: and it is written that he will rise again with those whom

the Lord raises up.

Here we apparently have a choice: which Old Testament account is correct?

To make a decision we need to consider how long the patriarchs lived, as well as at what age did they have their first son of significance (presumably their eldest and true firstborn son).

Patriarch	Reference	Masoretic Text		Alexandrine LXX
		Lifespan	Age at Son	Lifespan	Age at Son
Adam	Gen 5:5	930	130	930	230
Seth	Gen 5:8	912	105	912	205
Enos	Gen 5:11	905	90	905	190
Cainaan	Gen 5:14	910	70	910	170
Mahalaleel	Gen 5:17	895	65	895	165
Jared	Gen 5:20	962	162	962	162
Enoch	Gen 5:23	365	65	365	165
Methusaleh	Gen 5:27	969	187	969	187
Lamech	Gen 5:31	777	182	783	188
Noah	Gen 9:29	950	502	950	502
Shem	Gen 11:10-11	600	100	600	100
Arphaxad	Gen 11:12-13	438	35	535	135
Cainan				460	130
Salah	Gen 11:14-15	433	30	460	130
Eber	Gen 11:16-17	464	34	404	134
Peleg	Gen 11:18-19	239	30	339	130
Reu	Gen 11:20-21	239	32	339	132
Serug	Gen 11:22-23	230	30	330	130
Nahor	Gen 11:24-25	148	29	208	179
Terah	Gen 11:32	205	70	205	130
Abraham	Gen 25:7	175	100	175	100
Isaac	Gen 35:29	180		180	60
Jacob	Gen 47:28	147		147	91
Levi	Ex 6:16	137		137
Kohath	Ex 6:18	133		133
Amram	Ex 6:20	137		137
Moses	Deut 34:7	120		120
		120

Examining according to the familiar Masoretic text readings.

If Job is the nephew of Peleg, then he lives 140 years beyond however old he was when his afflictions started, which is compatible with the general lifespans recorded for Peleg, Reu and Serug.  Additionally, assuming the four generations encompasses at least the families of his eldest, when people had their children at 30, that comes to 4x 30 years where 120 years is well within Job's remaining 140 years.  So that works.

If Job is the great-great-grandson of Abraham, he may well have been a contemporary of Moses' father/forefather Amram.  However, by Amram's day the average lifespan had already dipped below 140.  Job might have beaten the curve handily.  Generations back the average child-bearing age was 30, even prior to the journey to Egypt with the peak of civilization, food and for a time even privileged lifestyle.  Job had multiple children after his affliction, seven sons and three daughters, the same as he had had prior.  Assuming he was also 30 when he had the children, as with his forefathers, 10 children requires a minimum of 40 years from his birth to his affliction.  After that he lived another 140 years, putting him at 180 years, a figure that had not been reached in his family since his great-great-grandfather Isaac.  I wonder if that is why the scripture emphasizes that he saw the fourth generation of his progeny.  But then both texts also emphasize that he lived full of days/years.

This is a phrase that is used for Abraham (Gen 25:8), Isaac (Gen 35:29), King David (1 Chron 23:1), King Jehoida (2 Chron 24:15, who lived to a 130 years, the same age as Moses' father), seemingly to confirm that they lived to their generation's full life expectancy.  However, here, Jobab would have clearly exceeded it.

If Job is in fact neither Jobab, then a lifespan of a minimum of 180 years would put him in the generations of Terah, Abraham and Isaac: not much later.

From the Septuagint, analyzing the same:

If Job is Peleg's nephew then we immediately see that this will fit, perhaps not well, but not badly either.  At 248 years, Job would have fallen short of the lifespan of Peleg's son Reu and grandson Serug, but fared much better than his great grandson Nahor (grandfather of Nahor, Abraham's brother).  This is not incompatible.  We further know that he lived 170 years after his affliction, that he lived 240 years in total, and this was considered "full of days".  This puts the start of his affliction at age 70, and assuming still only one wife, no concubines mentioned, etc. puts the birth of his firstborn at age 60 or before.  Probably before since his children were old enough to eat and drink wine (partying) without parental supervision and one of them maintained his own house.  Assuming more than one was of a responsible age, say the eldest was 20 instead of 10, then Job had his firstborn at age 50.  Although the lifespan of Job in this period falls considerably under his (assumed) contemporary, the age at which he began to have children falls would become more common at least six generations past his own.

This is strange, although if Setterfield is right, there may be other factors at work which mitigate these things.  Too, it has been suggested that one verse in the Book of Job, may indicate that his generation did not expect the same lifespan as his predecessors.  More on that later.

As with the Masoretic text before, if Jobab is a descendant of Abraham, then we have an even more significant issue where he outlasts his peers for more than a century, with more than enough time for four generations if not five, maybe six.

If Job is the same as neither Jobab, then his lifespan according to the Septuagint would place him about the lifespan of Serug and Nahor, perhaps before (which is consistent with assuming he's Peleg's nephew anyway).  So as a contemporary of Reu, this may fit well, especially considering the details of what is said throughout the book.  More on that (again) later.

So working theory is that Job is about the generations of Peleg's nephew Jobab, when in the days of his father (and likely him as well) the world was being divided.  High probability, then from the lifespan analysis that he does not live too much after Abraham's time.

Updated: another point. Job lives either 140 (MT) or 170 (LXX) years after his tragedies. He sees his descendants up to the fourth generation. I'm relatively convinced this means he saw four generations, not counting his own/himself. This may yield more data (maybe) in that, assuming Job had children immediately after his tragedies, you have a maximum generational average of 140/3=47 years and 57 years, respectively. Job may have an extended lifespan by God's gifts, but his descendants are likely to mirror the averages of the time. Job may have waited longer to have children, so the generational times may be still shorter. But not longer.

Unfortunately, the earlier table does not yield as much along these lines as would be hoped. If the MT is the better genealogy for numbers, then Arphaxad has children MUCH earlier (at 35 years) than his father had him (100). If the Septuagint is correct, then this suggests very tenuously that he lives at or after the time of Abraham. However, not too much after an he's a contemporary of Moses. This calls into question the common assumption that the book of Job was written of times still ancient to the Hebrews of the Exodus. From the scriptures, Ezekiel considered him ancient but how ancient is the question.

In any case, the LXX gives a much smoother declination of the ages of fathers upon the births of their firstborn (presumed) than the MT.

We can further analyze the time period using the genealogies that can be put together for various players in this story:

1) SHEBA and TEMA (Caravans are coming from Sheba and Tema.)

Sheba has three competing genealogies (a fourth is omitted as being unlikely):

SHEBA:1	SHEBA:2	SHEBA:3
Noah	Noah	Noah
Ham	Shem	Shem
Cush	Arphaxad	Arphaxad
Reemah	Cainan	Cainan
Sheba	Selah	Selah
	Eber	Eber
	Joktan	Peleg
	Sheba	Reu
		Serug
		Nahor
		Terah
		Abraham
		Jokshan
		Sheba

If Job is about the timeframe of Peleg's nephew, then the first Sheba lineage allows plenty of time for a city, perhaps an empire to be developed and trade routes forged by a Sabean/Sheban kingdom.  As a contemporary of the second Sheba, this arrangement seems improbable.

If Job is the contemporary of Moses' father/forefather Amram, then all three Shebas could be valid potentially.

As for Tema, the only Tema mentioned is a grandson of Abraham, through Ishmael, who could well have settled at the site that even today is named Teyma in Saudi Arabia, and sits on ancient trade routes.  But if this is the Tema, that put him well after the days of Peleg.  The makes the later Jobab more probable, but amplifies the question of lifespans whichever text you read.

2) CHALDEANS

No lineage of the Chaldeans is given, though some attempt to link it to Abraham's grand nephew Chesed.  However, since Abraham's brother Haran father Lot in Ur of the Chaldees, the Chaldeans were already an established people by this time.  Little more can be determined for this exercise.

3) ELIPHAZ and ZOPHAR

Zophar is a Namaathite, either from an unknown ancestor, or the city of Namaath which existed.

Eliphaz is a Temanite.  Only one geneology is given for Teman (distinct from Tema).

ELIPHAZ

Noah

Shem

Arphaxad

Cainan

Selah

Eber

Peleg

Reu

Serug

Nahor

Terah

Abraham

Isaac

Esau

Eliphaz

Teman

… (unknown number of intervening generations, perhaps none)

Eliphaz

This Eliphaz appears to be a descendant of Abraham through Teman.  This also may put him in Amram's time frame or later.

4) BILDAD the SHUITE and ELIHU the BUZITE

Their geneologies are as follows:

BILDAD	ELIHU
Noah	Noah
Shem	Shem
Arphaxad	Arphaxad
Cainan	Cainan
Selah	Selah
Eber	Eber
Peleg	Peleg
Reu	Reu
Serug	Serug
Nahor	Nahor
Terah	Terah
Abraham	Nahor
Shua	Buz
…	…
BILDAD	Ram
	…
	Barachel
	Elihu

Both appear to descend from Abraham, and also appear consistent with the time of Moses' father, but slightly or well after the time of Jacob.

So, considering lifespans, the days of Peleg see consistent at the expense of genealogies.  Comparing genealogies, the time of the later Jobab seem possible at the expense of a dramatically increased lifespan for his days.  If Job lived in the days of Peleg, then a good number of the genealogies must be considered inapplicable for use in dating.  That is, Bildad might be a Shuite, but from an earlier Shuite than Abraham's son.  Elihu might be a Buzite from not a descendant of Nahor.  This has the unhappy consequence of rendering useless these genealogies for any sort of validation for Job and having to explain names that occur in the book, without any corresponding counterpart in scripture.  Who was a Buzite if not descended from Nahor's son, Buz?  This brings me some discomfort, perhaps more than having to consider that Job vastly outlived his contemporaries in Moses' day.

If Job lived just before Moses, this would lend some explanation as to how the story came to the Israelites in that Moses, while living in Midian, could well have either received an account of the story or perhaps even come into contact with such an important and Godly man as Job, possibly introduced through his father in law, a priest of Midian.

If Job lived during or after Peleg's days, some other questions internal to the text may have answers.  I'm not convinced a conclusion as to which period Job lived can be resolved here, nor can we determine from the above whether the Septuagint or the Masoretic texts hold a superior reading here.  One interesting side note is that Job's friends are simply introduced in our standard text, where the Septuagint names Eliphaz and king over the Thaemens/Temans, Baldad sovereign over his people, and Zophar is king of the Minaeans (Namaathites?).

Whenever Job did, then, live, I'm presented with a problem where any solution seems to suggest I'm wrong on some point.

The Life and Times of Job (Part 2): Where was Uz?

Where was Uz?

First, we need to nail down about where Job lived.  While it is possible that Job wrote about things he had not seen in an oral tradition, the tenor of the book to me has the ring of people discussing philosophy based on the experience of their own lives.

In moments of extreme tragedy I understand Job's friends who sat with him in silence when they saw him, rather than pontificate.  Despite error in their counsel their is a kinship in their compassion.  In such times, the most profound sympathy and counsel we offer to others doesn't come from the cold reaches of scholarly study, but from the wisdom and observations of our experiences.  When they draw from their observations of the world to counsel him, wrongly or rightly, perhaps because I am older than I was when I first read Job, I'm impressed with the sense that what they say is what they saw personally, rather than drew second- or third- hand from the accounts or stories of their day.

As much as possible, then, I'd like to assume here that contained in much of the philosophy outlined in the book may be clues which capture more of Job's life and times than I have considered to date.  We will see how this assumptions holds up, whether in part or in full.

Here are the clues from the text:

1) The land is called Uz (Job 1:1)

The land of Uz may be named after one of three people named in scripture, or non of the above.  The three are:

a) Uz is the name of a great-grandson of Shem (Gen 10:23; 1Chron 1:17 lists him a Shem’s son, probably meaning a direct descendant). The Arameans settled in what is now Syria, north of Edom (now Jordan).

b) Uz is the name of Nahor's oldest son and like Lot, would be Abraham's nephew as well.  Nahor lived in Haran (northern Syria).  It is suggested that Uz may have moved to pasturelands to the Southeast (while Abraham and Lot moved Southwest), putting him in southern Syria at the border of the great Arabian desert, possibly near the Wadi Sirhan a great plains area following an old river on the border of modern Jordan and Saudi Arabia.  Incidentally, on some maps related to Nabatean trade routes, along the line of the Silk Road between Palmyra (Jordan) and Babylon, there is a city/location, named Uz.

c) Uz is the name of a son of Dishan, the Horite. (Gen 36:28).  The Horites were the predecessors of the Edomites in southern Jordan, in the land of Seir, near present-day Petra.  (Gen 14:6, 32:3).  Lam 4:21 does indicate the Edom (Esau's descendants) was located in the land of Uz, which makes sense since Esaus' sons took over their land. (Gen 36.  It is unclear from this text whether it was a relatively peaceful or conquering displacement since immediately after the listing of the sons of Esau (the Edomite chiefs) we have a listing of the Horite chiefs, the sons of Seir the Horite in Edom.  So perhaps they lived side by side.  This Uz is a son of Dishan, who is the son of Seir who is a Horite.

Figuring out when Uz lived may give us more.  Going from the above, we may be looking at Eastern or Southern Jordan.  But none of this is direct evidence that this is where Uz settled, only of Uz's possible origins.  Further, it is also possible that "the land of Uz" may be a name applied after Job's time, in the same way we refer to Abraham coming from Iraq (a name which did not exist when he lived in the city of "Ur of the Chaldees").

This could confirm other findings, but in and of itself is not conclusive.

2) Uz is located near mountains (Job 9:5-7; 24: 5-8; 28:9)

3) Uz is located near a desert/wilderness/dust (Job 1:19; 4:19-20; 14:18-19; 24:5-8)

4) Uz is located near seas with significant expanse and depth (Job 7:12; 14:11; 37:10; 38:29-30)

5) Uz is within raiding and oxen and donkey range of Sabeans (Job 1:14-15)

The Sabeans are linked Egypt and Cush (in black Africa), and all three groups will be made to serve Israel.  This suggests a southern correspondence of all three areas to Israel. (Is 43:3)

Being raided by the Sabeans indicates that Job is not under the protection and jurisdiction of the Sabeans or Sheban governance, and is therefore outside of their territory.  He is likely outside of any population center that might claim a protective jurisdiction, deterring large groups of armed peoples.  He is therefore fair game for the raiders.

Historically, the Sabeans are a linked with the land of Yemen, in the southwest of the Arabian peninsula.  At some point their population centers also included across the Gulf of Suez, to the west in Ethiopia.  They were a power around 1000 BC and lasted to around 100 BC.

The Sabeans may also be ethnically or closely linked with the Nabateans.

See: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sabaeans

6) Uz is within raiding and (likely) camel range proximity of Chaldeans (Job 1:17)

Chaldeans are historically linked with the south-eastern Iraqi territories (think Babylon).

7) Uz is near wadis (Job 6:15-20)

8) The wadis can have flash flooding/torrents (Job 6:15)

9) The wadis started from heights that sustained ice and snow (Job 6:16)

10) The wadis are also waterless in the heat. (Job 6:17)

11) The proximate terrain about the trade routes must be bleak enough since caravans look and hope for water in the wadis. (Job 6:19)

12) Uz is within working proximity of Tema and Sheba, on trade routes linking those locations to others. (Job 6:19)

Tema is the ninth son of Ishmael (1 Chron 1:28-31).  Tema is associated with the desert  (Jer 25:23-24) Tema is included in the prophecy against Arabia, here referring to people in the country east and south of Canaan (Ez 27:20).  Tema is distinct from Arabia proper. (Jer 25:22-24).  In Is 21:13-17, someone from Tema brought water to those who were thirsty, possibly linking Tema to a thirsty area, and this is further associated with Arabia.

Note that Tema, 9th son of Ishmael, is not the same as Teman, who is the son of Eliphaz, who is Esau's son.  Since one of Job's friends is Eliphaz the Temanite, Esau's son Eliphaz has a grandson (or great-grandson or more) of the same name.

Tema is thought to have been located at the intersection of two important caravan routes - one from the Persian Gulf to the Gulf of Aqaba (near the city of Eilat, Israel), and the other from Damascus to Medina and Mecca, about midway between Babylon and Egypt.  This may well be the same as modern-day Tayma/Teyma in Saudi Arabia, which has been inhabited since the Bronze Age.

Sheba and Dedan are descendants of Noah, through Ham, then Cush, then Raamah.

There are other Sheba's mentioned in the Bible.  One is the son of Joktan, a descendant of Shem, Noah's son.  Another is the son of Jokshan, Abraham's son through Keturah (his third wife).  Confusingly, this Sheba's brother was also named Dedan.  Sheba is also the name of a descendant of Benjamin, Jacob's son.

Sheba has been historically linked to Yemen, in the South of the Arabian penninsula.  Until recently, there was a significant Yemeni Hebrew population which, according to tradition, had left Israel to take up lucrative trade and professional position there around the time of Solomon, and persisted until the modern times when many were repatriated to Israel.

This is linked with the ancient south Arabian kingdom of Saba, which lasted from 1200 BC until 275 AD, with its capital Marib.  This probably further links them with the Sabeans as an ethnic people.

Given that by Job's time, Sheba is an established stop on caravan routes and that the Sabeans are large enough to conduct raiding parties (if this is the right association), probably the earliest link of Sheba through Ham is the correct one.  It would put three similarly Ham-descended peoples (Egyptians, Cushites and Shebans) in roughly the same area.  Note that the sons of Ham were Cush and Mizraim.  Mizraim is still the Hebrew name for the land of Egypt, with the "-im" plural suffix maybe also referring to the two Egypts (upper/southern and lower/northern Egypt).  Ham and many of his descendants are traditionally thought of to have been black, though this isn't explicit in scripture.

See: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sheba

13) Uz is located near enough to papyrus growing marshes, and rushes in the water, for people to know about them. (Job 8:11).

Papyrus is a fresh water plant that primarily grows along the Nile.  It does not grow in the Red Sea.

14) Job was not a nomad.

He had significant animal property which would require significant grazing grounds.  Sheep and camels are compatible with nomadic herding.  Oxen (specifically yokes of oxen) and donkeys are indicative of land cultivation and short distance goods transport.  Job 1:14 says that the Sabeans attacked while the oxen were plowing and the donkeys feeding beside them.

While not impossible, there is no reason to think that his comforting friends were employees, suggesting that they lived near him but were not part of his household, which further suggests a living community nearby, possibly a town, village or city.

15) Uz is near enough to the descendents of Shua (Abraham's son through his third wife, Keturah), Teman (Esau's grandson) and probably the city of Naamah, in Canaan, for Job's friends to hail from those areas.  The Elihu is the son of Barachel, the Buzite, meaning he is a descendant of Nahor's son and Uz's brother, named Buz.  Shuah is the sixth and youngest son of Abraham and Keturah.  The land of Suchu in Syria appears to have been named after him.  Namaah is in the territory conquered by Judah (Josh 15:41), indicating the southern parts of Israel.  It may have been related to another Canaanite city called Makkedah, west of the Dead Sea.

See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shuah

16) Uz is near a desert which can sustain high winds (Job 1:19)



The wind would not be encountering significant wind breaks in its path in the form of mountains or trees.





17) Job is described as the greatest man among all the people of the East (Job 1:4)



Putting it all together:

1) The best we can get from this is some a low probability of Uz being located near East Jordan, North Saudi Arabia.

2) There aren't many mountain ranges Jordan -- at best a lot of hilly areas.  We have significant mountain ranges in Western Iran.  We also have significant mountainous terrain in southwestern Saudi Arabia and Western Yemen.  This doesn't preclude other areas (we have low mountainous or hilly terrain in the Sinai, the Judean hills, and along the western coast of Saudi Arabia as well.

3) Anywhere on the Arabian peninsula and northwest of it puts you in range of desert and wilderness areas.

4) Gulf of Suez/Red Sea, Persian Gulf, Gulf of Aden and the Mediterranean Sea give you waters of any significant depth.

5) Oxen and donkeys aren't typical distance travelers, although given the right provisions, I imagine the they can go distances.  Parties of raiding thieves stealing 500 yoke (pairs) of oxen and 500 female donkeys (no idea if/how many males) aren't looking to eat them, and would lose a lot to attrition traveling long distances.  They will also need to stick with areas in which the oxen and donkeys can graze, which precludes wilderness travel, and suggests travel along the more fertile and cultivated (where oxen would be needed) western coast.  The Sabeans are therefore local and they will need friendly territories in which to sell the oxen.  The pushes the possible area closer to the south western part of the Arabian peninsula.

6) Camels are distance travelers.  This allows for far greater distances for raiding bands of Chaldeans to travel to steal and return.  Wherever they are staging from they don't have to be as close to their traditional homeland in the north east of this map.  The Chaldeans may have been operating at the extent of their range.  Peoples on the eastern side of the mountainous terrain would have been easier to pick off, then those on the western side near the coast.

7) The more hills, the more areas for snow and rain run-off, the more wadis.  This also works with the hilly south western parts of the Arabian peninsula.

8) All you need is hilly areas, so this isn't too helpful.

9) As with Ps 147:17 snow and ice are not foreign to Judea.  There is higher probability of ice and snow feeding wadi streams in mountainous terrain.

10) You need extremes of climate for wadis fed by winter ice to be dry and barren in the summer.  Job 6:15-17 talks about the torrents vanishing.  Possibly referring to quick boiling off (an extreme condition) but probably referring to more generally the hot temperatures drying up all traces of the earlier torrents.  The wadis themselves are considered deceitful, alternatingly carrying much water and then no trace of water.  The wadis have to be able to experience extremes of temperatures.  This is more likely in areas with significant desert, which describes the Arabian peninsula though but is not absolutely indicative of it.

11-12) Assuming we know where Tayma is, and that the land of Sheba is Yemen, and possibly that even by this time Sanaa (one of the oldest cities in the world) or Marib are on the trade routes then as they were in later, then caravans, rather than hugging the fertile coast, would at some points have to travel on the east side of the mountain range of western Yemen.  That puts you in wilderness territory for long stretches.  If Job is familiar with this trade route, this is then specific information that he lives in proximity with it.

(Note: the above shows trade routes probably 1000 years after Job's time, but may still roughly follow the same ancient paths).

13) Job's people are not only familiar with papyrus product for writing (perhaps) but specifically how and where it grows (the rhetorical is asked: can papyrus grow without marshes?).  They have to be very close to Egypt, at the least linked by trade routes where people are familiar enough with the plant to ask and describe how it grows.

14) There are narrow strips of non-wilderness on the west coast, and very fertile areas on the eastern coasts.

15) While not very close to the lands of Shuah and Haran (Syria), Edom (Jordan) and Canaan, the only constraint is that Uz be close enough for migration range over a few generations of people.  In this case, it seems Jobs friends descended from peoples north of Arabia and they or their ancestors moved south.

16) Given the topology map, the flattest, desolate path would be for a wind starting in the South East of the Arabian peninsula moving North West.  I don't know enough about wind over to water to speculate on possible sources of the wind, whether it would be more likely to start in the desert and move or in what is now the Persian Gulf.  It shouldn't come so much Eastward from the Persian Zagrab mountains, though from another source it could deflect off of them, moving North.  Movement over fertile areas with trees would slow wind down, so where-ever the source is it shouldn't spend more time in fertile locations as flat desert.

17) I don't know what the reference point for civilizations is.  Given that much of the Bible seems to consider anything East of Canaan as East, while that wouldn't rule out a Southern Eastern location, it seems to my mind that this would be considered more South.  East would seem to fit a Jordan location better.

Conclusion
The conclusion is that Job lived in the land of Uz, which most likely occupied a space on the west coast of Saudi Arabia, possibly in the North of modern Yemen.  He lived possibly on the fertile west coast, but within range of the eastern side of the neighboring mountains and hills and the trade routes.  He may probably have lived on the eastern side since the winds that destroyed his sons came from the wilderness (i.e. the western mountains would be a barrier for both wilderness winds and the Chaldeans).  He is close enough to Egypt to know about papyrus growing.  The area is near enough for northern peoples to migrate southward to it, but outside of the practical control of neighboring towns or cities.  He is also close enough to both Egypt and Sheba to have practical knowledge of the sea, or at least coastal living near the sea.

Alternate:
If some of the assumptions are in fact wrong, the next likely location would be south eastern Jordan.  This puts heavier emphasis on the lineages of the persons and people surrounding Job's story, and less emphasis on incidentals including the trade routes and knowledge of Egypt.  If the accounts of environmental factors are partially if not fully second hand then we are not constrained so much by them.  As per http://bible.cc/genesis/10-23.htm a number of commentators seem to favor this opinion.  Josephus believed that Uz founded the two cities of Damascus and another called Trachonitis.  Commentator John Gill, references Josephus, and notes that in Lam 4:21 Edom (Jordan) is in fact said to be in the land of Uz.  However Gill notes that he believes this is distinct from Job's land in Arabia and he discounts Josephus' account noting that neither the historian nor his posterity lived near these lands themselves to be very familiar with them.  Gil may be considering that a third Uz mentioned was a descendent of the people (of unknown geneology) who Esau's replaced in the region of Mt. Seir (Jordan).  This would make Jordan a land of Uz, whether or not it is the land Job lived in.

If Jordan is a better site, it does at the least mean that the Sabean raiders are operating very far from their homeland and must have ways to offload stolen domestic cattle in the northern area.  But it also explains why so many Semites are in that territory, near their ancestral territories, distantly related through Abraham's blood.

For further reading see:

http://bible.org/article/introduction-book-job

http://www.cresourcei.org/books/job.html

http://www.truthortradition.com/modules.php?name=News&file=article&sid=643

http://nabataea.net/trader.html

http://www.guidedbiblestudies.com/topics/tribe_of_tema.ht

http://www.heraldmag.org/literature/verse_12.htm