This article investigates how Job 1–3 may be read as a single narrative–dramatic unit shaped by a ritual process of mourning, with particular attention to the transition from the prose tale (Job 1–2) to the poetic imprecation (Job 3). The enquiry proceeds by means of a comparative analysis of the prologues of the Ugaritic epics Keret (KTU 1.14 I:1–II:5) and Aqhat (KTU 1.17 I:1–47), texts frequently invoked for contextualising Job within Ancient West Asia. In a first stage, close reading of these Ugaritic prologues identifies narrative techniques for signalling ritual practices—especially lament and incubatio—while remaining largely allusive rather than descriptive. In a second stage, the study turns to the canonical form of Job 1–3 and re-examines its scene arrangement, pacing, and speech-acts against that epic model, including the function of framing formulae and temporal markers. The analysis is intentionally confined to the present form of the text. The paper thus offers a controlled methodological work in comparative poetics and ritual analysis, asking how far Ugaritic epic conventions can illuminate continuity across genre and register at the opening of Job.
Pedro Zamora García (Fri,) studied this question.