Job, starting at chapter 19
{19:1} Then Job answered,
{19:2} "How long will you torment me,
and crush me with words?
{19:3} You have reproached me ten times.
You aren't ashamed that you attack me.
{19:4} If it is true that I have erred,
my error remains with myself.
{19:5} If indeed you will magnify yourselves against me,
and plead against me my reproach;
{19:6} know 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.
{19:8} He has walled up my way so that I can't pass,
and has set darkness in my paths.
{19:9} He has stripped me of my glory,
and taken the crown from my head.
{19:10} He has broken me down on every side, and I am gone.
My hope he has plucked up like a tree.
{19:11} He has also kindled his wrath against me.
He counts me among his adversaries.
{19:12} His 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.
{19:14} My relatives have gone away.
My familiar friends have forgotten me.
{19:15} Those who dwell in my house, and my maids, count me for a
stranger.
I am an alien in their sight.
{19:16} I call to my servant, and he gives me no answer.
I beg him with my mouth.
{19:17} My breath is offensive to my wife.
I am loathsome to the children of my own mother.
{19:18} Even young children despise me.
If I arise, they speak against me.
{19:19} All my familiar friends abhor me.
They whom I loved have turned against me.
{19:20} My 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.
{19:22} Why 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!
{19:24} That with an iron pen and lead
they were engraved in the rock forever!
{19:25} But as for me, I know that my Redeemer lives.
In the end, he will stand upon the earth.
{19:26} After my skin is destroyed,
then in my flesh shall I see God,
{19:27} Whom I, even I, shall see on my side.
My eyes shall see, and not as a stranger.
"My heart is consumed within me.
{19:28} If you say, 'How we will persecute him!'
because the root of the matter is found in me,
{19:29} be afraid of the sword,
for wrath brings the punishments of the sword,
that you may know there is a judgment."
{20:1} Then Zophar the Naamathite answered,
{20:2} "Therefore do my thoughts give answer to me,
even by reason of my haste that is in me.
{20:3} I have heard the reproof which puts me to shame.
The spirit of my understanding answers me.
{20:4} Don't you know this from old time,
since man was placed on earth,
{20:5} that the triumphing of the wicked is short,
the joy of the godless but for a moment?
{20:6} Though his height mount up to the heavens,
and his head reach to the clouds,
{20:7} yet he shall perish forever like his own dung.
Those who have seen him shall say, 'Where is he?'
{20:8} He shall fly away as a dream, and shall not be found.
Yes, he shall be chased away like a vision of the night.
{20:9} The eye which saw him shall see him no more,
neither shall his place any more see him.
{20:10} His children shall seek the favor of the poor.
His hands shall give back his wealth.
{20:11} His bones are full of his youth,
but youth shall lie down with him in the dust.
{20:12} "Though wickedness is sweet in his mouth,
though he hide it under his tongue,
{20:13} though he spare it, and will not let it go,
but keep it still within his mouth;
{20:14} yet his food in his bowels is turned.
It is cobra venom within him.
{20:15} He has swallowed down riches, and he shall vomit them up again.
God will cast them out of his belly.
{20:16} He shall suck cobra venom.
The viper's tongue shall kill him.
{20:17} He shall not look at the rivers,
the flowing streams of honey and butter.
{20:18} That for which he labored he shall restore, and shall not
swallow it down.
According to the substance that he has gotten, he shall not rejoice.
{20:19} For he has oppressed and forsaken the poor.
He has violently taken away a house, and he shall not build it up.
{20:20} "Because he knew no quietness within him,
he shall not save anything of that in which he delights.
{20:21} There was nothing left that he didn't devour,
therefore his prosperity shall not endure.
{20:22} In the fullness of his sufficiency, distress shall overtake
him.
The hand of everyone who is in misery shall come on him.
{20:23} When 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.
{20:24} He shall flee from the iron weapon.
The bronze arrow shall strike him through.
{20:25} He draws it forth, and it comes out of his body.
Yes, the glittering point comes out of his liver.
Terrors are on him.
{20:26} All darkness is laid up for his treasures.
An unfanned fire shall devour him.
It shall consume that which is left in his tent.
{20:27} The heavens shall reveal his iniquity.
The earth shall rise up against him.
{20:28} The increase of his house shall depart.
They shall rush away in the day of his wrath.
{20:29} This is the portion of a wicked man from God,
the heritage appointed to him by God."
{21:1} Then Job answered,
{21:2} "Listen diligently to my speech.
Let this be your consolation.
{21:3} Allow me, and I also will speak;
After I have spoken, mock on.
{21:4} As for me, is my complaint to man?
Why shouldn't I be impatient?
{21:5} Look at me, and be astonished.
Lay your hand on your mouth.
{21:6} When 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?
{21:8} Their child is established with them in their sight,
their offspring before their eyes.
{21:9} Their houses are safe from fear,
neither is the rod of God upon them.
{21:10} Their bulls breed without fail.
Their cows calve, and don't miscarry.
{21:11} They send forth their little ones like a flock.
Their children dance.
{21:12} They sing to the tambourine and harp,
and rejoice at the sound of the pipe.
{21:13} They spend their days in prosperity.
In an instant they go down to Sheol.
{21:14} They tell God, 'Depart from us,
for we don't want to know about your ways.
{21:15} What is the Almighty, that we should serve him?
What profit should we have, if we pray to him?'
{21:16} Behold, 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?
{21:18} How often is it that they are as stubble before the wind,
as chaff that the storm carries away?
{21:19} You say, 'God lays up his iniquity for his children.'
Let him recompense it to himself, that he may know it.
{21:20} Let his own eyes see his destruction.
Let him drink of the wrath of the Almighty.
{21:21} For 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,
seeing he judges those who are high?
{21:23} One dies in his full strength,
being wholly at ease and quiet.
{21:24} His pails are full of milk.
The marrow of his bones is moistened.
{21:25} Another dies in bitterness of soul,
and never tastes of good.
{21:26} They lie down alike in the dust.
The worm covers them.
{21:27} "Behold, I know your thoughts,
the devices with which you would wrong me.
{21:28} For you say, 'Where is the house of the prince?
Where is the tent in which the wicked lived?'
{21:29} Haven't you asked wayfaring men?
Don't you know their evidences,
{21:30} that the evil man is reserved to the day of calamity,
That they are led forth to the day of wrath?
{21:31} Who shall declare his way to his face?
Who shall repay him what he has done?
{21:32} Yet he will be borne to the grave.
Men shall keep watch over the tomb.
{21:33} The clods of the valley shall be sweet to him.
All men shall draw after him,
as there were innumerable before him.
{21:34} So how can you comfort me with nonsense,
seeing that in your answers there remains only falsehood?"
___
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