Eliphaz Says Job Presumes Much

1Then Eliphaz the Temanite responded,

2“Should a wise man answer with windy knowledge

And fill himself with the east wind?

3Should he argue with useless talk,

Or with words which are not profitable?

4Indeed, you do away with reverence

And hinder meditation before God.

5For your guilt teaches your mouth,

And you choose the language of the crafty.

6Your own mouth condemns you, and not I;

And your own lips testify against you.

7“Were you the first man to be born,

Or were you brought forth before the hills?

8Do you hear the secret counsel of God,

And limit wisdom to yourself?

9What do you know that we do not know?

What do you understand that we do not?

10Both the gray-haired and the aged are among us,

Older than your father.

11Are the consolations of God too small for you,

Even the word spoken gently with you?

12Why does your heart carry you away?

And why do your eyes flash,

13That you should turn your spirit against God

And allow such words to go out of your mouth?

14What is man, that he should be pure,

Or he who is born of a woman, that he should be righteous?

15Behold, He puts no trust in His holy ones,

And the heavens are not pure in His sight;

16How much less one who is detestable and corrupt,

Man, who drinks iniquity like water!

What Eliphaz Has Seen of Life

17“I will tell you, listen to me;

And what I have seen I will also declare;

18What wise men have told,

And have not concealed from their fathers,

19To whom alone the land was given,

And no alien passed among them.

20The wicked man writhes in pain all his days,

And numbered are the years stored up for the ruthless.

21Sounds of terror are in his ears;

While at peace the destroyer comes upon him.

22He does not believe that he will return from darkness,

And he is destined for the sword.

23He wanders about for food, saying, ‘Where is it?’

He knows that a day of darkness is at hand.

24Distress and anguish terrify him,

They overpower him like a king ready for the attack,

25Because he has stretched out his hand against God

And conducts himself arrogantly against the Almighty.

26He rushes headlong at Him

With his massive shield.

27For he has covered his face with his fat

And made his thighs heavy with flesh.

28He has lived in desolate cities,

In houses no one would inhabit,

Which are destined to become ruins.

29He will not become rich, nor will his wealth endure;

And his grain will not bend down to the ground.

30He will not escape from darkness;

The flame will wither his shoots,

And by the breath of His mouth he will go away.

31Let him not trust in emptiness, deceiving himself;

For emptiness will be his reward.

32It will be accomplished before his time,

And his palm branch will not be green.

33He will drop off his unripe grape like the vine,

And will cast off his flower like the olive tree.

34For the company of the godless is barren,

And fire consumes the tents of the corrupt.

35They conceive mischief and bring forth iniquity,

And their mind prepares deception.”

Job Says Friends Are Sorry Comforters

1Then Job answered,

2“I have heard many such things;

Sorry comforters are you all.

3Is there no limit to windy words?

Or what plagues you that you answer?

4I too could speak like you,

If I were in your place.

I could compose words against you

And shake my head at you.

5I could strengthen you with my mouth,

And the solace of my lips could lessen your pain.

Job Says God Shattered Him

6“If I speak, my pain is not lessened,

And if I hold back, what has left me?

7But now He has exhausted me;

You have laid waste all my company.

8You have shriveled me up,

It has become a witness;

And my leanness rises up against me,

It testifies to my face.

9His anger has torn me and hunted me down,

He has gnashed at me with His teeth;

My adversary glares at me.

10They have gaped at me with their mouth,

They have slapped me on the cheek with contempt;

They have massed themselves against me.

11God hands me over to ruffians

And tosses me into the hands of the wicked.

12I was at ease, but He shattered me,

And He has grasped me by the neck and shaken me to pieces;

He has also set me up as His target.

13His arrows surround me.

Without mercy He splits my kidneys open;

He pours out my gall on the ground.

14He breaks through me with breach after breach;

He runs at me like a warrior.

15I have sewed sackcloth over my skin

And thrust my horn in the dust.

16My face is flushed from weeping,

And deep darkness is on my eyelids,

17Although there is no violence in my hands,

And my prayer is pure.

18“O earth, do not cover my blood,

And let there be no resting place for my cry.

19Even now, behold, my witness is in heaven,

And my advocate is on high.

20My friends are my scoffers;

My eye weeps to God.

21O that a man might plead with God

As a man with his neighbor!

22For when a few years are past,

I shall go the way of no return.

Job Says He Has Become a Byword

1“My spirit is broken, my days are extinguished,

The grave is ready for me.

2Surely mockers are with me,

And my eye gazes on their provocation.

3“Lay down, now, a pledge for me with Yourself;

Who is there that will be my guarantor?

4For You have kept their heart from understanding,

Therefore You will not exalt them.

5He who informs against friends for a share of the spoil,

The eyes of his children also will languish.

6“But He has made me a byword of the people,

And I am one at whom men spit.

7My eye has also grown dim because of grief,

And all my members are as a shadow.

8The upright will be appalled at this,

And the innocent will stir up himself against the godless.

9Nevertheless the righteous will hold to his way,

And he who has clean hands will grow stronger and stronger.

10But come again all of you now,

For I do not find a wise man among you.

11My days are past, my plans are torn apart,

Even the wishes of my heart.

12They make night into day, saying,

‘The light is near,’ in the presence of darkness.

13If I look for Sheol as my home,

I make my bed in the darkness;

14If I call to the pit, ‘You are my father’;

To the worm, ‘my mother and my sister’;

15Where now is my hope?

And who regards my hope?

16Will it go down with me to Sheol?

Shall we together go down into the dust?”