Job 16
1Then Job answered,
2“I have heard many such things.
You are all miserable comforters!
3Shall vain words have an end?
Or what provokes you that you answer?
4I also could speak as you do.
If your soul were in my soul’s place,
I could join words together against you,
and shake my head at you,
5but I would strengthen you with my mouth.
The solace of my lips would relieve you.
“Though I speak, my grief is not subsided.
Though I forbear, what am I eased?
7But now, God, you have surely worn me out.
You have made all my company desolate.
8You have shriveled me up. This is a witness against me.
My leanness rises up against me.
It testifies to my face.
9He has torn me in his wrath and persecuted me.
He has gnashed on me with his teeth.
My adversary sharpens his eyes on me.
10They have gaped on me with their mouth.
They have struck me on the cheek reproachfully.
They gather themselves together against me.
11God delivers me to the ungodly,
and casts me into the hands of the wicked.
12I was at ease, and he broke me apart.
Yes, he has taken me by the neck, and dashed me to pieces.
He has also set me up for his target.
13His archers surround me.
He splits my kidneys apart, and does not spare.
He pours out my bile on the ground.
14He breaks me with breach on breach.
He runs at me like a giant.
15I have sewed sackcloth on my skin,
and have thrust my horn in the dust.
16My face is red with weeping.
Deep darkness is on my eyelids,
17although there is no violence in my hands,
and my prayer is pure.
“Earth, don’t cover my blood.
Let my cry have no place to rest.
19Even now, behold, my witness is in heaven.
He who vouches for me is on high.
20My friends scoff at me.
My eyes pour out tears to God,
21that he would maintain the right of a man with God,
of a son of man with his neighbor!
22For when a few years have come,
I will go the way of no return.
Job 17
1“My spirit is consumed.
My days are extinct
and the grave is ready for me.
2Surely there are mockers with me.
My eye dwells on their provocation.
“Now give a pledge. Be collateral for me with yourself.
Who is there who will strike hands with me?
4For you have hidden their heart from understanding,
therefore you will not exalt them.
5He who denounces his friends for plunder,
even the eyes of his children will fail.
“But he has made me a byword of the people.
They spit in my face.
7My eye also is dim by reason of sorrow.
All my members are as a shadow.
8Upright men will be astonished at this.
The innocent will stir himself up against the godless.
9Yet the righteous will hold to his way.
He who has clean hands will grow stronger and stronger.
10But as for you all, come back.
I will not find a wise man among you.
11My days are past.
My plans are broken off,
as are the thoughts of my heart.
12They change the night into day,
saying ‘The light is near’ in the presence of darkness.
13If I look for Sheol as my house,
if I have spread my couch in the darkness,
14if I have said to corruption, ‘You are my father,’
and to the worm, ‘My mother,’ and ‘My sister,’
15where then is my hope?
As for my hope, who will see it?
16Shall it go down with me to the gates of Sheol,
or descend together into the dust?”
Job 18
1Then Bildad the Shuhite answered,
2“How long will you hunt for words?
Consider, and afterwards we will speak.
3Why are we counted as animals,
which have become unclean in your sight?
4You who tear yourself in your anger,
will the earth be forsaken for you?
Or will the rock be removed out of its place?
“Yes, the light of the wicked will be put out.
The spark of his fire won’t shine.
6The light will be dark in his tent.
His lamp above him will be put out.
7The steps of his strength will be shortened.
His own counsel will cast him down.
8For he is cast into a net by his own feet,
and he wanders into its mesh.
9A snare will take him by the heel.
A trap will catch him.
10A noose is hidden for him in the ground,
a trap for him on the path.
11Terrors will make him afraid on every side,
and will chase him at his heels.
12His strength will be famished.
Calamity will be ready at his side.
13The members of his body will be devoured.
The firstborn of death will devour his members.
14He will be rooted out of the security of his tent.
He will be brought to the king of terrors.
15There will dwell in his tent that which is none of his.
Sulfur will be scattered on his habitation.
16His roots will be dried up beneath.
His branch will be cut off above.
17His memory will perish from the earth.
He will have no name in the street.
18He will be driven from light into darkness,
and chased out of the world.
19He will have neither son nor grandson among his people,
nor any remaining where he lived.
20Those who come after will be astonished at his day,
as those who went before were frightened.
21Surely such are the dwellings of the unrighteous.
This is the place of him who doesn’t know God.”
Job 19
1Then Job answered,
2“How long will you torment me,
and crush me with words?
3You have reproached me ten times.
You aren’t ashamed that you attack me.
4If it is true that I have erred,
my error remains with myself.
5If indeed you will magnify yourselves against me,
and plead against me my reproach,
6know now that God has subverted me,
and has surrounded me with his net.
“Behold, I cry out of wrong, but I am not heard.
I cry for help, but there is no justice.
8He has walled up my way so that I can’t pass,
and has set darkness in my paths.
9He has stripped me of my glory,
and taken the crown from my head.
10He has broken me down on every side, and I am gone.
He has plucked my hope up like a tree.
11He has also kindled his wrath against me.
He counts me among his adversaries.
12His troops come on together,
build a siege ramp against me,
and encamp around my tent.
“He has put my brothers far from me.
My acquaintances are wholly estranged from me.
14My relatives have gone away.
My familiar friends have forgotten me.
15Those who dwell in my house and my maids consider me a stranger.
I am an alien in their sight.
16I call to my servant, and he gives me no answer.
I beg him with my mouth.
17My breath is offensive to my wife.
I am loathsome to the children of my own mother.
18Even young children despise me.
If I arise, they speak against me.
19All my familiar friends abhor me.
They whom I loved have turned against me.
20My bones stick to my skin and to my flesh.
I have escaped by the skin of my teeth.
“Have pity on me. Have pity on me, you my friends,
for the hand of God has touched me.
22Why do you persecute me as God,
and are not satisfied with my flesh?
“Oh that my words were now written!
Oh that they were inscribed in a book!
24That with an iron pen and lead
they were engraved in the rock forever!
25But as for me, I know that my Redeemer lives.
In the end, he will stand upon the earth.
26After my skin is destroyed,
then I will see God in my flesh,
27whom I, even I, will see on my side.
My eyes will see, and not as a stranger.
“My heart is consumed within me.
28If you say, ‘How we will persecute him!’
because the root of the matter is found in me,
29be afraid of the sword,
for wrath brings the punishments of the sword,
that you may know there is a judgment.”
Job 20
1Then Zophar the Naamathite answered,
2“Therefore my thoughts answer me,
even by reason of my haste that is in me.
3I have heard the reproof which puts me to shame.
The spirit of my understanding answers me.
4Don’t you know this from old time,
since man was placed on earth,
5that the triumphing of the wicked is short,
the joy of the godless but for a moment?
6Though his height mount up to the heavens,
and his head reach to the clouds,
7yet he will perish forever like his own dung.
Those who have seen him will say, ‘Where is he?’
8He will fly away as a dream, and will not be found.
Yes, he will be chased away like a vision of the night.
9The eye which saw him will see him no more,
neither will his place see him any more.
10His children will seek the favor of the poor.
His hands will give back his wealth.
11His bones are full of his youth,
but youth will lie down with him in the dust.
“Though wickedness is sweet in his mouth,
though he hide it under his tongue,
13though he spare it, and will not let it go,
but keep it still within his mouth,
14yet his food in his bowels is turned.
It is cobra venom within him.
15He has swallowed down riches, and he will vomit them up again.
God will cast them out of his belly.
16He will suck cobra venom.
The viper’s tongue will kill him.
17He will not look at the rivers,
the flowing streams of honey and butter.
18He will restore that for which he labored, and will not swallow it down.
He will not rejoice according to the substance that he has gotten.
19For he has oppressed and forsaken the poor.
He has violently taken away a house, and he will not build it up.
“Because he knew no quietness within him,
he will not save anything of that in which he delights.
21There was nothing left that he didn’t devour,
therefore his prosperity will not endure.
22In the fullness of his sufficiency, distress will overtake him.
The hand of everyone who is in misery will come on him.
23When he is about to fill his belly, God will cast the fierceness of his wrath on him.
It will rain on him while he is eating.
24He will flee from the iron weapon.
The bronze arrow will strike him through.
25He draws it out, and it comes out of his body.
Yes, the glittering point comes out of his liver.
Terrors are on him.
26All darkness is laid up for his treasures.
An unfanned fire will devour him.
It will consume that which is left in his tent.
27The heavens will reveal his iniquity.
The earth will rise up against him.
28The increase of his house will depart.
They will rush away in the day of his wrath.
29This is the portion of a wicked man from God,
the heritage appointed to him by God.”
Job 21
1Then Job answered,
2“Listen diligently to my speech.
Let this be your consolation.
3Allow me, and I also will speak.
After I have spoken, mock on.
4As for me, is my complaint to man?
Why shouldn’t I be impatient?
5Look at me, and be astonished.
Lay your hand on your mouth.
6When I remember, I am troubled.
Horror takes hold of my flesh.
“Why do the wicked live,
become old, yes, and grow mighty in power?
8Their child is established with them in their sight,
their offspring before their eyes.
9Their houses are safe from fear,
neither is the rod of God upon them.
10Their bulls breed without fail.
Their cows calve, and don’t miscarry.
11They send out their little ones like a flock.
Their children dance.
12They sing to the tambourine and harp,
and rejoice at the sound of the pipe.
13They spend their days in prosperity.
In an instant they go down to Sheol.
14They tell God, ‘Depart from us,
for we don’t want to know about your ways.
15What is the Almighty, that we should serve him?
What profit should we have, if we pray to him?’
16Behold, their prosperity is not in their hand.
The counsel of the wicked is far from me.
“How often is it that the lamp of the wicked is put out,
that their calamity comes on them,
that God distributes sorrows in his anger?
18How often is it that they are as stubble before the wind,
as chaff that the storm carries away?
19You say, ‘God lays up his iniquity for his children.’
Let him recompense it to himself, that he may know it.
20Let his own eyes see his destruction.
Let him drink of the wrath of the Almighty.
21For what does he care for his house after him,
when the number of his months is cut off?
“Shall any teach God knowledge,
since he judges those who are high?
23One dies in his full strength,
being wholly at ease and quiet.
24His pails are full of milk.
The marrow of his bones is moistened.
25Another dies in bitterness of soul,
and never tastes of good.
26They lie down alike in the dust.
The worm covers them.
“Behold, I know your thoughts,
the plans with which you would wrong me.
28For you say, ‘Where is the house of the prince?
Where is the tent in which the wicked lived?’
29Haven’t you asked wayfaring men?
Don’t you know their evidences,
30that the evil man is reserved to the day of calamity,
that they are led out to the day of wrath?
31Who will declare his way to his face?
Who will repay him what he has done?
32Yet he will be borne to the grave.
Men will keep watch over the tomb.
33The clods of the valley will be sweet to him.
All men will draw after him,
as there were innumerable before him.
34So how can you comfort me with nonsense,
because in your answers there remains only falsehood?”
Job 22
1Then Eliphaz the Temanite answered,
2“Can a man be profitable to God?
Surely he who is wise is profitable to himself.
3Is it any pleasure to the Almighty that you are righteous?
Or does it benefit him that you make your ways perfect?
4Is it for your piety that he reproves you,
that he enters with you into judgment?
5Isn’t your wickedness great?
Neither is there any end to your iniquities.
6For you have taken pledges from your brother for nothing,
and stripped the naked of their clothing.
7You haven’t given water to the weary to drink,
and you have withheld bread from the hungry.
8But as for the mighty man, he had the earth.
The honorable man, he lived in it.
9You have sent widows away empty,
and the arms of the fatherless have been broken.
10Therefore snares are around you.
Sudden fear troubles you,
11or darkness, so that you can not see,
and floods of waters cover you.
“Isn’t God in the heights of heaven?
See the height of the stars, how high they are!
13You say, ‘What does God know?
Can he judge through the thick darkness?
14Thick clouds are a covering to him, so that he doesn’t see.
He walks on the vault of the sky.’
15Will you keep the old way,
which wicked men have trodden,
16who were snatched away before their time,
whose foundation was poured out as a stream,
17who said to God, ‘Depart from us!’
and, ‘What can the Almighty do for us?’
18Yet he filled their houses with good things,
but the counsel of the wicked is far from me.
19The righteous see it, and are glad.
The innocent ridicule them,
20saying, ‘Surely those who rose up against us are cut off.
The fire has consumed their remnant.’
“Acquaint yourself with him now, and be at peace.
By it, good will come to you.
22Please receive instruction from his mouth,
and lay up his words in your heart.
23If you return to the Almighty, you will be built up,
if you put away unrighteousness far from your tents.
24Lay your treasure in the dust,
the gold of Ophir among the stones of the brooks.
25The Almighty will be your treasure,
and precious silver to you.
26For then you will delight yourself in the Almighty,
and will lift up your face to God.
27You will make your prayer to him, and he will hear you.
You will pay your vows.
28You will also decree a thing, and it will be established to you.
Light will shine on your ways.
29When they cast down, you will say, ‘be lifted up.’
He will save the humble person.
30He will even deliver him who is not innocent.
Yes, he will be delivered through the cleanness of your hands.”
Job 23
1Then Job answered,
2“Even today my complaint is rebellious.
His hand is heavy in spite of my groaning.
3Oh that I knew where I might find him!
That I might come even to his seat!
4I would set my cause in order before him,
and fill my mouth with arguments.
5I would know the words which he would answer me,
and understand what he would tell me.
6Would he contend with me in the greatness of his power?
No, but he would listen to me.
7There the upright might reason with him,
so I should be delivered forever from my judge.
“If I go east, he is not there.
If I go west, I can’t find him.
9He works to the north, but I can’t see him.
He turns south, but I can’t catch a glimpse of him.
But he knows the way that I take.
When he has tried me, I will come out like gold.
11My foot has held fast to his steps.
I have kept his way, and not turned away.
12I haven’t gone back from the commandment of his lips.
I have treasured up the words of his mouth more than my necessary food.
13But he stands alone, and who can oppose him?
What his soul desires, even that he does.
14For he performs that which is appointed for me.
Many such things are with him.
15Therefore I am terrified at his presence.
When I consider, I am afraid of him.
16For God has made my heart faint.
The Almighty has terrified me.
17Because I was not cut off before the darkness,
neither did he cover the thick darkness from my face.
Job 24
“Why aren’t times laid up by the Almighty?
Why don’t those who know him see his days?
2There are people who remove the landmarks.
They violently take away flocks, and feed them.
3They drive away the donkey of the fatherless,
and they take the widow’s ox for a pledge.
4They turn the needy out of the way.
The poor of the earth all hide themselves.
5Behold, as wild donkeys in the desert,
they go out to their work, seeking diligently for food.
The wilderness yields them bread for their children.
6They cut their food in the field.
They glean the vineyard of the wicked.
7They lie all night naked without clothing,
and have no covering in the cold.
8They are wet with the showers of the mountains,
and embrace the rock for lack of a shelter.
9There are those who pluck the fatherless from the breast,
and take a pledge of the poor,
10so that they go around naked without clothing.
Being hungry, they carry the sheaves.
11They make oil within the walls of these men.
They tread wine presses, and suffer thirst.
12From out of the populous city, men groan.
The soul of the wounded cries out,
yet God doesn’t regard the folly.
“These are of those who rebel against the light.
They don’t know its ways,
nor stay in its paths.
14The murderer rises with the light.
He kills the poor and needy.
In the night he is like a thief.
15The eye also of the adulterer waits for the twilight,
saying, ‘No eye will see me.’
He disguises his face.
16In the dark they dig through houses.
They shut themselves up in the daytime.
They don’t know the light.
17For the morning is to all of them like thick darkness,
for they know the terrors of the thick darkness.
“They are foam on the surface of the waters.
Their portion is cursed on the earth.
They don’t turn into the way of the vineyards.
19Drought and heat consume the snow waters,
so does Sheol those who have sinned.
20The womb will forget him.
The worm will feed sweetly on him.
He will be no more remembered.
Unrighteousness will be broken as a tree.
21He devours the barren who don’t bear.
He shows no kindness to the widow.
22Yet God preserves the mighty by his power.
He rises up who has no assurance of life.
23God gives them security, and they rest in it.
His eyes are on their ways.
24They are exalted; yet a little while, and they are gone.
Yes, they are brought low, they are taken out of the way as all others,
and are cut off as the tops of the ears of grain.
25If it isn’t so now, who will prove me a liar,
and make my speech worth nothing?”
Job 25
1Then Bildad the Shuhite answered,
2“Dominion and fear are with him.
He makes peace in his high places.
3Can his armies be counted?
On whom does his light not arise?
4How then can man be just with God?
Or how can he who is born of a woman be clean?
5Behold, even the moon has no brightness,
and the stars are not pure in his sight;
6How much less man, who is a worm,
and the son of man, who is a worm!”
Job 26
1Then Job answered,
2“How have you helped him who is without power!
How have you saved the arm that has no strength!
3How have you counseled him who has no wisdom,
and plentifully declared sound knowledge!
4To whom have you uttered words?
Whose spirit came out of you?
“The departed spirits tremble,
those beneath the waters and all that live in them.
6Sheol is naked before God,
and Abaddon has no covering.
7He stretches out the north over empty space,
and hangs the earth on nothing.
8He binds up the waters in his thick clouds,
and the cloud is not burst under them.
9He encloses the face of his throne,
and spreads his cloud on it.
10He has described a boundary on the surface of the waters,
and to the confines of light and darkness.
11The pillars of heaven tremble
and are astonished at his rebuke.
12He stirs up the sea with his power,
and by his understanding he strikes through Rahab.
13By his Spirit the heavens are garnished.
His hand has pierced the swift serpent.
14Behold, these are but the outskirts of his ways.
How small a whisper do we hear of him!
But the thunder of his power who can understand?”
Job 27
1Job again took up his parable, and said,
2“As God lives, who has taken away my right,
the Almighty, who has made my soul bitter
3(for the length of my life is still in me,
and the spirit of God is in my nostrils);
4surely my lips will not speak unrighteousness,
neither will my tongue utter deceit.
5Far be it from me that I should justify you.
Until I die I will not put away my integrity from me.
6I hold fast to my righteousness, and will not let it go.
My heart will not reproach me so long as I live.
“Let my enemy be as the wicked.
Let him who rises up against me be as the unrighteous.
For what is the hope of the godless, when he is cut off,
when God takes away his life?
9Will God hear his cry when trouble comes on him?
10Will he delight himself in the Almighty,
and call on God at all times?
11I will teach you about the hand of God.
I will not conceal that which is with the Almighty.
12Behold, all of you have seen it yourselves;
why then have you become altogether vain?
“This is the portion of a wicked man with God,
the heritage of oppressors, which they receive from the Almighty.
14If his children are multiplied, it is for the sword.
His offspring will not be satisfied with bread.
15Those who remain of him will be buried in death.
His widows will make no lamentation.
16Though he heap up silver as the dust,
and prepare clothing as the clay;
17he may prepare it, but the just will put it on,
and the innocent will divide the silver.
18He builds his house as the moth,
as a booth which the watchman makes.
19He lies down rich, but he will not do so again.
He opens his eyes, and he is not.
20Terrors overtake him like waters.
A storm steals him away in the night.
21The east wind carries him away, and he departs.
It sweeps him out of his place.
22For it hurls at him, and does not spare,
as he flees away from his hand.
23Men will clap their hands at him,
and will hiss him out of his place.