The Book of Job (35.6-7; 36.22-23; 41.11) contains some of the Bible's most exalted teaching regarding divine perfection. So great is God's perfection that no creature can increase it or diminish it. God plus the world is not greater than God without the world (Sokolowski).
It's interesting to ponder why we have such radical statements regarding divine perfection in the context of a book that deals with such a radical example of human suffering. Why do divine perfection in extremis and human suffering in extremis go together?
One possibility is this: No one needs the consolation of radical divine perfection more than the one undergoing radical suffering. In the midst of suffering, we need to know that our suffering is not somehow essential to contributing to the divine self-improvement.
And we need to know that our suffering is not somehow about God getting us back for something we have done to contribute to divine self diminishment.
Whatever the burdens of suffering that the sufferer must bear, such a burden--the burden of being responsible for the Godness of God--would be too great.
Last observation: It's interesting that Job's teaching comes back into play in one of Paul's greatest expressions of wonder before God's redemptive work in history, Rom 11.33-36. Radical divine perfection thus comes into play in the human existential extremes of lament and praise
Gloria in excelsis Deo
