Job 19-21

1Then Job answered:

2“How long will you torment me and crush me with your words?

3Ten times now you have reproached me; you shamelessly mistreat me.

4Even if I have truly gone astray, my error concerns me alone.

5If indeed you would exalt yourselves above me and use my disgrace against me,

6then understand that it is God who has wronged me and drawn His net around me.

7Though I cry out, ‘Violence!’ I get no response; though I call for help, there is no justice.

8He has blocked my way so I cannot pass; He has veiled my paths with darkness.

9He has stripped me of my honor and removed the crown from my head.

10He tears me down on every side until I am gone; He uproots my hope like a tree.

11His anger burns against me, and He counts me among His enemies.

12His troops advance together; they construct a ramp against me and encamp around my tent.

13He has removed my brothers from me; my acquaintances have abandoned me.

14My kinsmen have failed me, and my friends have forgotten me.

15My guests and maidservants count me as a stranger; I am a foreigner in their sight.

16I call for my servant, but he does not answer, though I implore him with my own mouth.

17My breath is repulsive to my wife, and I am loathsome to my own family.

18Even little boys scorn me; when I appear, they deride me.

19All my best friends despise me, and those I love have turned against me.

20My skin and flesh cling to my bones; I have escaped by the skin of my teeth.

21Have pity on me, my friends, have pity, for the hand of God has struck me.

22Why do you persecute me as God does? Will you never get enough of my flesh?

23I wish that my words were recorded and inscribed in a book,

24by an iron stylus on lead, or chiseled in stone forever.

25But I know that my Redeemer lives, and in the end He will stand upon the earth.

26Even after my skin has been destroyed, yet in my flesh I will see God.

27I will see Him for myself; my eyes will behold Him, and not as a stranger. How my heart yearns within me!

28If you say, ‘Let us persecute him, since the root of the matter lies with him,’

29then you should fear the sword yourselves, because wrath brings punishment by the sword, so that you may know there is a judgment.”

1Then Zophar the Naamathite replied:

2“So my anxious thoughts compel me to answer, because of the turmoil within me.

3I have heard a rebuke that insults me, and my understanding prompts a reply.

4Do you not know that from antiquity, since man was placed on the earth,

5the triumph of the wicked has been brief and the joy of the godless momentary?

6Though his arrogance reaches the heavens, and his head touches the clouds,

7he will perish forever, like his own dung; those who had seen him will ask, ‘Where is he?’

8He will fly away like a dream, never to be found; he will be chased away like a vision in the night.

9The eye that saw him will see him no more, and his place will no longer behold him.

10His sons will seek the favor of the poor, for his own hands must return his wealth.

11The youthful vigor that fills his bones will lie down with him in the dust.

12Though evil is sweet in his mouth and he conceals it under his tongue,

13though he cannot bear to let it go and keeps it in his mouth,

14yet in his stomach his food sours into the venom of cobras within him.

15He swallows wealth but vomits it out; God will force it from his stomach.

16He will suck the poison of cobras; the fangs of a viper will kill him.

17He will not enjoy the streams, the rivers flowing with honey and cream.

18He must return the fruit of his labor without consuming it; he cannot enjoy the profits of his trading.

19For he has oppressed and forsaken the poor; he has seized houses he did not build.

20Because his appetite is never satisfied, he cannot escape with his treasure.

21Nothing is left for him to consume; thus his prosperity will not endure.

22In the midst of his plenty, he will be distressed; the full force of misery will come upon him.

23When he has filled his stomach, God will vent His fury upon him, raining it down on him as he eats.

24Though he flees from an iron weapon, a bronze-tipped arrow will pierce him.

25It is drawn out of his back, the gleaming point from his liver. Terrors come over him.

26Total darkness is reserved for his treasures. A fire unfanned will consume him and devour what is left in his tent.

27The heavens will expose his iniquity, and the earth will rise up against him.

28The possessions of his house will be removed, flowing away on the day of God’s wrath.

29This is the wicked man’s portion from God, the inheritance God has appointed him.”

1Then Job answered:

2“Listen carefully to my words; let this be your consolation to me.

3Bear with me while I speak; then, after I have spoken, you may go on mocking.

4Is my complaint against a man? Then why should I not be impatient?

5Look at me and be appalled; put your hand over your mouth.

6When I remember, terror takes hold, and my body trembles in horror.

7Why do the wicked live on, growing old and increasing in power?

8Their descendants are established around them, and their offspring before their eyes.

9Their homes are safe from fear; no rod of punishment from God is upon them.

10Their bulls breed without fail; their cows bear calves and do not miscarry.

11They send forth their little ones like a flock; their children skip about,

12singing to the tambourine and lyre and making merry at the sound of the flute.

13They spend their days in prosperity and go down to Sheol in peace.

14Yet they say to God: ‘Leave us alone! For we have no desire to know Your ways.

15Who is the Almighty, that we should serve Him, and what would we gain if we pray to Him?’

16Still, their prosperity is not in their own hands, so I stay far from the counsel of the wicked.

17How often is the lamp of the wicked put out? Does disaster come upon them? Does God, in His anger, apportion destruction?

18Are they like straw before the wind, like chaff swept away by a storm?

19It is said that God lays up one’s punishment for his children. Let God repay the man himself, so he will know it.

20Let his eyes see his own destruction; let him drink for himself the wrath of the Almighty.

21For what does he care about his household after him, when the number of his months has run out?

22Can anyone teach knowledge to God, since He judges those on high?

23One man dies full of vigor, completely secure and at ease.

24His body is well nourished, and his bones are rich with marrow.

25Yet another man dies in the bitterness of his soul, having never tasted prosperity.

26But together they lie down in the dust, and worms cover them both.

27Behold, I know your thoughts full well, the schemes by which you would wrong me.

28For you say, ‘Where now is the nobleman’s house, and where are the tents in which the wicked dwell?’

29Have you never asked those who travel the roads? Do you not accept their reports?

30Indeed, the evil man is spared from the day of calamity, delivered from the day of wrath.

31Who denounces his behavior to his face? Who repays him for what he has done?

32He is carried to the grave, and watch is kept over his tomb.

33The clods of the valley are sweet to him; everyone follows behind him, and those before him are without number.

34So how can you comfort me with empty words? For your answers remain full of falsehood.”