Job’s Second Cycle: Hope against Accusation

Job 15

15:1Then Eliphaz the Temanite answered,

15:2“Should a wise man answer with vain knowledge, and fill himself with the east wind?

15:3Should he reason with unprofitable talk, or with speeches with which he can do no good?

15:4Yes, you do away with fear, and hinder devotion before God.

15:5For your iniquity teaches your mouth, and you choose the language of the crafty.

15:6Your own mouth condemns you, and not I. Yes, your own lips testify against you.

15:7“Are you the first man who was born? Or were you brought out before the hills?

15:8Have you heard the secret counsel of God? Do you limit wisdom to yourself?

15:9What do you know that we don’t know? What do you understand which is not in us?

15:10With us are both the gray-headed and the very aged men, much older than your father.

15:11Are the consolations of God too small for you, even the word that is gentle toward you?

15:12Why does your heart carry you away? Why do your eyes flash,

15:13that you turn your spirit against God, and let such words go out of your mouth?

15:14What is man, that he should be clean? What is he who is born of a woman, that he should be righteous?

15:15Behold, he puts no trust in his holy ones. Yes, the heavens are not clean in his sight;

15:16how much less one who is abominable and corrupt, a man who drinks iniquity like water!

15:17“I will show you, listen to me; that which I have seen I will declare

15:18(which wise men have told by their fathers, and have not hidden it;

15:19to whom alone the land was given, and no stranger passed among them):

15:20the wicked man writhes in pain all his days, even the number of years that are laid up for the oppressor.

15:21A sound of terrors is in his ears. In prosperity the destroyer will come on him.

15:22He doesn’t believe that he will return out of darkness. He is waited for by the sword.

15:23He wanders abroad for bread, saying, ‘Where is it?’ He knows that the day of darkness is ready at his hand.

15:24Distress and anguish make him afraid. They prevail against him, as a king ready to the battle.

15:25Because he has stretched out his hand against God, and behaves himself proudly against the Almighty,

15:26he runs at him with a stiff neck, with the thick shields of his bucklers,

15:27because he has covered his face with his fatness, and gathered fat on his thighs.

15:28He has lived in desolate cities, in houses which no one inhabited, which were ready to become heaps.

15:29He will not be rich, neither will his substance continue, neither will their possessions be extended on the earth.

15:30He will not depart out of darkness. The flame will dry up his branches. He will go away by the breath of God’s mouth.

15:31Let him not trust in emptiness, deceiving himself, for emptiness will be his reward.

15:32It will be accomplished before his time. His branch will not be green.

15:33He will shake off his unripe grape as the vine, and will cast off his flower as the olive tree.

15:34For the company of the godless will be barren, and fire will consume the tents of bribery.

15:35They conceive mischief and produce iniquity. Their heart prepares deceit.”

Job 16

16:1Then Job answered,

16:2“I have heard many such things. You are all miserable comforters!

16:3Shall vain words have an end? Or what provokes you that you answer?

16:4I 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,

16:5but I would strengthen you with my mouth. The solace of my lips would relieve you.

16:6“Though I speak, my grief is not subsided. Though I forbear, what am I eased?

16:7But now, God, you have surely worn me out. You have made all my company desolate.

16:8You have shriveled me up. This is a witness against me. My leanness rises up against me. It testifies to my face.

16:9He has torn me in his wrath and persecuted me. He has gnashed on me with his teeth. My adversary sharpens his eyes on me.

16:10They have gaped on me with their mouth. They have struck me on the cheek reproachfully. They gather themselves together against me.

16:11God delivers me to the ungodly, and casts me into the hands of the wicked.

16:12I 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.

16:13His archers surround me. He splits my kidneys apart, and does not spare. He pours out my bile on the ground.

16:14He breaks me with breach on breach. He runs at me like a giant.

16:15I have sewed sackcloth on my skin, and have thrust my horn in the dust.

16:16My face is red with weeping. Deep darkness is on my eyelids,

16:17although there is no violence in my hands, and my prayer is pure.

16:18“Earth, don’t cover my blood. Let my cry have no place to rest.

16:19Even now, behold, my witness is in heaven. He who vouches for me is on high.

16:20My friends scoff at me. My eyes pour out tears to God,

16:21that he would maintain the right of a man with God, of a son of man with his neighbor!

16:22For when a few years have come, I will go the way of no return.

Job 17

17:1“My spirit is consumed. My days are extinct and the grave is ready for me.

17:2Surely there are mockers with me. My eye dwells on their provocation.

17:3“Now give a pledge. Be collateral for me with yourself. Who is there who will strike hands with me?

17:4For you have hidden their heart from understanding, therefore you will not exalt them.

17:5He who denounces his friends for plunder, even the eyes of his children will fail.

17:6“But he has made me a byword of the people. They spit in my face.

17:7My eye also is dim by reason of sorrow. All my members are as a shadow.

17:8Upright men will be astonished at this. The innocent will stir himself up against the godless.

17:9Yet the righteous will hold to his way. He who has clean hands will grow stronger and stronger.

17:10But as for you all, come back. I will not find a wise man among you.

17:11My days are past. My plans are broken off, as are the thoughts of my heart.

17:12They change the night into day, saying ‘The light is near’ in the presence of darkness.

17:13If I look for Sheol as my house, if I have spread my couch in the darkness,

17:14if I have said to corruption, ‘You are my father,’ and to the worm, ‘My mother,’ and ‘My sister,’

17:15where then is my hope? As for my hope, who will see it?

17:16Shall it go down with me to the gates of Sheol, or descend together into the dust?”

Job 18

18:1Then Bildad the Shuhite answered,

18:2“How long will you hunt for words? Consider, and afterwards we will speak.

18:3Why are we counted as animals, which have become unclean in your sight?

18:4You who tear yourself in your anger, will the earth be forsaken for you? Or will the rock be removed out of its place?

18:5“Yes, the light of the wicked will be put out. The spark of his fire won’t shine.

18:6The light will be dark in his tent. His lamp above him will be put out.

18:7The steps of his strength will be shortened. His own counsel will cast him down.

18:8For he is cast into a net by his own feet, and he wanders into its mesh.

18:9A snare will take him by the heel. A trap will catch him.

18:10A noose is hidden for him in the ground, a trap for him on the path.

18:11Terrors will make him afraid on every side, and will chase him at his heels.

18:12His strength will be famished. Calamity will be ready at his side.

18:13The members of his body will be devoured. The firstborn of death will devour his members.

18:14He will be rooted out of the security of his tent. He will be brought to the king of terrors.

18:15There will dwell in his tent that which is none of his. Sulfur will be scattered on his habitation.

18:16His roots will be dried up beneath. His branch will be cut off above.

18:17His memory will perish from the earth. He will have no name in the street.

18:18He will be driven from light into darkness, and chased out of the world.

18:19He will have neither son nor grandson among his people, nor any remaining where he lived.

18:20Those who come after will be astonished at his day, as those who went before were frightened.

18:21Surely such are the dwellings of the unrighteous. This is the place of him who doesn’t know God.”

Job 19

19:1Then Job answered,

19:2“How long will you torment me, and crush me with words?

19:3You have reproached me ten times. You aren’t ashamed that you attack me.

19:4If it is true that I have erred, my error remains with myself.

19:5If indeed you will magnify yourselves against me, and plead against me my reproach,

19:6know now that God has subverted me, and has surrounded me with his net.

19:7“Behold, I cry out of wrong, but I am not heard. I cry for help, but there is no justice.

19:8He has walled up my way so that I can’t pass, and has set darkness in my paths.

19:9He has stripped me of my glory, and taken the crown from my head.

19:10He has broken me down on every side, and I am gone. He has plucked my hope up like a tree.

19:11He has also kindled his wrath against me. He counts me among his adversaries.

19:12His troops come on together, build a siege ramp against me, and encamp around my tent.

19:13“He has put my brothers far from me. My acquaintances are wholly estranged from me.

19:14My relatives have gone away. My familiar friends have forgotten me.

19:15Those who dwell in my house and my maids consider me a stranger. I am an alien in their sight.

19:16I call to my servant, and he gives me no answer. I beg him with my mouth.

19:17My breath is offensive to my wife. I am loathsome to the children of my own mother.

19:18Even young children despise me. If I arise, they speak against me.

19:19All my familiar friends abhor me. They whom I loved have turned against me.

19:20My bones stick to my skin and to my flesh. I have escaped by the skin of my teeth.

19:21“Have pity on me. Have pity on me, you my friends, for the hand of God has touched me.

19:22Why do you persecute me as God, and are not satisfied with my flesh?

19:23“Oh that my words were now written! Oh that they were inscribed in a book!

19:24That with an iron pen and lead they were engraved in the rock forever!

19:25But as for me, I know that my Redeemer lives. In the end, he will stand upon the earth.

19:26After my skin is destroyed, then I will see God in my flesh,

19:27whom I, even I, will see on my side. My eyes will see, and not as a stranger. “My heart is consumed within me.

19:28If you say, ‘How we will persecute him!’ because the root of the matter is found in me,

19:29be afraid of the sword, for wrath brings the punishments of the sword, that you may know there is a judgment.”

Job 20

20:1Then Zophar the Naamathite answered,

20:2“Therefore my thoughts answer me, even by reason of my haste that is in me.

20:3I have heard the reproof which puts me to shame. The spirit of my understanding answers me.

20:4Don’t you know this from old time, since man was placed on earth,

20:5that the triumphing of the wicked is short, the joy of the godless but for a moment?

20:6Though his height mount up to the heavens, and his head reach to the clouds,

20:7yet he will perish forever like his own dung. Those who have seen him will say, ‘Where is he?’

20:8He will fly away as a dream, and will not be found. Yes, he will be chased away like a vision of the night.

20:9The eye which saw him will see him no more, neither will his place see him any more.

20:10His children will seek the favor of the poor. His hands will give back his wealth.

20:11His bones are full of his youth, but youth will lie down with him in the dust.

20:12“Though wickedness is sweet in his mouth, though he hide it under his tongue,

20:13though he spare it, and will not let it go, but keep it still within his mouth,

20:14yet his food in his bowels is turned. It is cobra venom within him.

20:15He has swallowed down riches, and he will vomit them up again. God will cast them out of his belly.

20:16He will suck cobra venom. The viper’s tongue will kill him.

20:17He will not look at the rivers, the flowing streams of honey and butter.

20:18He 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.

20:19For he has oppressed and forsaken the poor. He has violently taken away a house, and he will not build it up.

20:20“Because he knew no quietness within him, he will not save anything of that in which he delights.

20:21There was nothing left that he didn’t devour, therefore his prosperity will not endure.

20:22In the fullness of his sufficiency, distress will overtake him. The hand of everyone who is in misery will come on him.

20:23When 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.

20:24He will flee from the iron weapon. The bronze arrow will strike him through.

20:25He draws it out, and it comes out of his body. Yes, the glittering point comes out of his liver. Terrors are on him.

20:26All darkness is laid up for his treasures. An unfanned fire will devour him. It will consume that which is left in his tent.

20:27The heavens will reveal his iniquity. The earth will rise up against him.

20:28The increase of his house will depart. They will rush away in the day of his wrath.

20:29This is the portion of a wicked man from God, the heritage appointed to him by God.”

Job 21

21:1Then Job answered,

21:2“Listen diligently to my speech. Let this be your consolation.

21:3Allow me, and I also will speak. After I have spoken, mock on.

21:4As for me, is my complaint to man? Why shouldn’t I be impatient?

21:5Look at me, and be astonished. Lay your hand on your mouth.

21:6When I remember, I am troubled. Horror takes hold of my flesh.

21:7“Why do the wicked live, become old, yes, and grow mighty in power?

21:8Their child is established with them in their sight, their offspring before their eyes.

21:9Their houses are safe from fear, neither is the rod of God upon them.

21:10Their bulls breed without fail. Their cows calve, and don’t miscarry.

21:11They send out their little ones like a flock. Their children dance.

21:12They sing to the tambourine and harp, and rejoice at the sound of the pipe.

21:13They spend their days in prosperity. In an instant they go down to Sheol.

21:14They tell God, ‘Depart from us, for we don’t want to know about your ways.

21:15What is the Almighty, that we should serve him? What profit should we have, if we pray to him?’

21:16Behold, their prosperity is not in their hand. The counsel of the wicked is far from me.

21:17“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?

21:18How often is it that they are as stubble before the wind, as chaff that the storm carries away?

21:19You say, ‘God lays up his iniquity for his children.’ Let him recompense it to himself, that he may know it.

21:20Let his own eyes see his destruction. Let him drink of the wrath of the Almighty.

21:21For what does he care for his house after him, when the number of his months is cut off?

21:22“Shall any teach God knowledge, since he judges those who are high?

21:23One dies in his full strength, being wholly at ease and quiet.

21:24His pails are full of milk. The marrow of his bones is moistened.

21:25Another dies in bitterness of soul, and never tastes of good.

21:26They lie down alike in the dust. The worm covers them.

21:27“Behold, I know your thoughts, the plans with which you would wrong me.

21:28For you say, ‘Where is the house of the prince? Where is the tent in which the wicked lived?’

21:29Haven’t you asked wayfaring men? Don’t you know their evidences,

21:30that the evil man is reserved to the day of calamity, that they are led out to the day of wrath?

21:31Who will declare his way to his face? Who will repay him what he has done?

21:32Yet he will be borne to the grave. Men will keep watch over the tomb.

21:33The clods of the valley will be sweet to him. All men will draw after him, as there were innumerable before him.

21:34So how can you comfort me with nonsense, because in your answers there remains only falsehood?”