I have written research essay years ago about The Book of Job, so I will place the part about author as a comment:
The Book of Job – Epiphany
THE WRITER
Knowing now that the prime author of The Book of Job was the One who made the stars, the question still reminds, who did God inspired to pen this book for future generations?
The book does not identify its writer. Scholarly opinion holds that the Book of Job was probably written by at least two authors, one who wrote a prose prologue and epilogue, and one who wrote a poetic middle section. There were later additions and revision of the poetry, perhaps as late as the 4th century BC.
Consequently many different scholars have made guesses as to who the writer was. From the patriarchal period Job himself is the favored candidate, though some scholars have nominated Elihu. These men seem to be the most likely of the chief characters to have preserved the record of Job’s trials because the book reads as though an eyewitness of the events recorded wrote it.
Jewish tradition favored Moses as the writer; they based their statements on the idea that Moses recorded other events during the patriarchal period in Genesis, he was familiar with desert life, and he had enough ability to write such a book as this one.
Some modern scholars tent to attribute the authorship to Isaiah basing their opinion on similarities in Job and prophetic writings of Isaiah.
The dating of the events from the Book of Job can provide some light on the authorship of the book.
The conditions depicted in the book are similar to those in patriarchal era; like Abraham, Job wealth consisted of animals and servants; he offers sacrifices in behalf of his family without the meditation of priesthood.
The monetary unit “kesitah” (Job 42:11), occurs only in Genesis 33:19 which is time of patriarchs.
Job lived 140 years after his restoration (Job 42:16), an age exceeding that of the patriarchs (Abraham lived 175 years, Isaac 180 years).
The divine name off God “Shaddai” (“The Almighty”) occurs 31 times in Job, as against its 16 occurrences in the rest of the Old Testament, mostly in Genesis. In Exodus 6:3, the Lord declares it was the name by which He reveled himself to the patriarchs.
Although deeply spiritual the book is not a religious one; there is no mention made of institution of Israel, whether temple, monarchy, prophets or priesthood, what indicates again the time of the patriarchs.
The three friends who visited Job are related in the Bible to the time of patriarch; Eliphaz is an Edomite name; he is Esau’s oldest son. This name is only mentioned in (Gen. 36:4; 1 Chr.1:35) In the Book of Job he is called the king of Themanites; Theman is capitol Edom (Am. 1:12). In Job 32:2 Elihu is called “…the son of Barachiel the Buzite, of the line of Ram.” Gen. 22:21 states that Buz was the second son of Abraham’s brother Nahor.
All this indicates that the time frame for the events of The Book of Job reflects the time of the patriarchs 1900 – 1600 B.C.
Who then penned this book? We will consider each of the authors separately beginning with the last one – Isaiah.
The detailed recounting of the conversations that took place certainly suggests a composition date fairly close to that of the actual events; that has been the position of Jewish and Christian scholars until destructive criticism became popular in the last few centuries.
It is very unlikely that Isaiah, who has lived in the seventh century B.C., one thousand years after the time of patriarchs, would use for his writing non Israelite events from seventeen century B.C.; numerous and identical verses which occurs in Job and Isaiah i.e. : “35 They conceive mischief, and bring forth vanity, and their belly prepareth deceit.” (Job 15:35) – “4 None calleth for justice, nor any pleadeth for truth: they trust in vanity, and speak lies; they conceive mischief, and bring forth iniquity.” (Isa. 59:4); “11 As the waters fail from the sea, and the flood decayeth and drieth up:” (Job 14:11); – “5 And the waters shall fail from the sea, and the river shall be wasted and dried up.” (Isa. 19:5); “8 Which alone spreadeth out the heavens,” (Job 9:8); – “that stretcheth forth the heavens alone;” (Isa. 44:24); and in: (Job 16:17 – Isa.53:9); (Job 26:12 – Isa.51:15); shows only that the Book of Job was well known in the time of Isaiah and was used for his prophetical writings.
Considering this similarities and the patriarchal time frame Isaiah can be excluded as the prime author of the poetic division of Job.
There is not much support for considering Elihu as the author of the Book of Job. All what is known about Elihu comes from the Book of Job where Elihu was a youth bystanders during the trial of Job. In Job Ch. 37 Elihu joined the discussion assuring Job of God’s wisdom and has prepared him for epiphany. Except of the Book of Job, Elihu is unknown from any other Biblical or outside Biblical sources.
Considering Moses or Job as the authors of the book has some solid background. Moses is the author of the Pentateuch, the first five books of the Bible; he wrote Genesis giving detailed account of the time of patriarchs. However, the language of the poetic part of Job which is important evidence in identifying the author of this book suggests different author then Moses.
Job appears to be written in a dialect distinct from the Jerusalemdialect use for most of the Old Testament; no Northwest Semitic text found to date is identical to this dialect.
Languages that possibly influenced the language of Job and are displayed in the Job are: Aramaic, Akkadian, Egyptians, Ugaritic, Arabic and Phoenician; there are more than 250 parallels between Job and Ugaritic literature. In fact the language is Hebrew but differing from the normal Hebrew dialect used in other Old Testament books.
In addition, over one hundred words in the Book of Job are not found elsewhere in the Hebrew Bible; most of the rarer words and forms appear in the poetic material of the dialogues, while the prose prologue and epilogue are written in the more classical style of the Hebrew Old Testament.
Some linguist scholars use this as the evidence to argue for different origin of the two sections. In addition the style of poetry division of Job is not really Mosaic; Moses uses the name of “Yahweh” often, whereas Job in the poetry part uses the name “Shaddai” (The Almighty).
Most of the futures mentioned above are reconcilable with the idea that the poetry part of the Book of Job was composed by a non-Israelite author on non-Israelite soil.
Jacques Bolduc suggested in his commentary of 1637, that the Book of Job may have been authored in a secondary way by Moses who found it in its original Aramaic form. His opinion is in partial agreement with the belief of Sir John William Dawson, Canadian scientist of worldwide reputation and long time principle of McGill, who wrote in The Expositor:
“It would now seem that the language and theology of the Book of Job can be better explained by supposing it to be a portion of Minean [Southern Arabia] literature obtained by Moses in Midian than in any other way. This view also agrees better than any other with its references to natural objects, the art of mining, and other matters.”
Possibility that Job himself was the author of the book is supported by the date of the events in the book which leans toward a patriarchal age; the foreign tone of the book also allows for it to have been written by Job, (Arabic words, nomadic habits, illustrations from sandy plains, awareness of nature and the arts).
It was also Job’s desire to preserve the story of his trial; in Ch.19:23-24 Job says:
“23 Oh that my words were now written! oh that they were printed in a book!
24 That they were graven with an iron pen and lead in the rock for ever!”"
