9

1Then Job answered,

2“Truly I know that it is so,

but how can man be just with God?

3If he is pleased to contend with him,

he can’t answer him one time in a thousand.

4God is wise in heart, and mighty in strength.

Who has hardened himself against him and prospered?

5He removes the mountains, and they don’t know it,

when he overturns them in his anger.

6He shakes the earth out of its place.

Its pillars tremble.

7He commands the sun and it doesn’t rise,

and seals up the stars.

8He alone stretches out the heavens,

and treads on the waves of the sea.

9He makes the Bear, Orion, and the Pleiades,

and the rooms of the south.

10He does great things past finding out;

yes, marvelous things without number.

11Behold, he goes by me, and I don’t see him.

He passes on also, but I don’t perceive him.

12Behold, he snatches away.

Who can hinder him?

Who will ask him, ‘What are you doing?’

13“God will not withdraw his anger.

The helpers of Rahab stoop under him.

14How much less will I answer him,

and choose my words to argue with him?

15Though I were righteous, yet I wouldn’t answer him.

I would make supplication to my judge.

16If I had called, and he had answered me,

yet I wouldn’t believe that he listened to my voice.

17For he breaks me with a storm,

and multiplies my wounds without cause.

18He will not allow me to catch my breath,

but fills me with bitterness.

19If it is a matter of strength, behold, he is mighty!

If of justice, ‘Who,’ says he, ‘will summon me?’

20Though I am righteous, my own mouth will condemn me.

Though I am blameless, it will prove me perverse.

21I am blameless.

I don’t respect myself.

I despise my life.

22“It is all the same.

Therefore I say he destroys the blameless and the wicked.

23If the scourge kills suddenly,

he will mock at the trial of the innocent.

24The earth is given into the hand of the wicked.

He covers the faces of its judges.

If not he, then who is it?

25“Now my days are swifter than a runner.

They flee away. They see no good.

26They have passed away as the swift ships,

as the eagle that swoops on the prey.

27If I say, ‘I will forget my complaint,

I will put off my sad face, and cheer up,’

28I am afraid of all my sorrows.

I know that you will not hold me innocent.

29I will be condemned.

Why then do I labor in vain?

30If I wash myself with snow,

and cleanse my hands with lye,

31yet you will plunge me in the ditch.

My own clothes will abhor me.

32For he is not a man, as I am, that I should answer him,

that we should come together in judgment.

33There is no umpire between us,

that might lay his hand on us both.

34Let him take his rod away from me.

Let his terror not make me afraid;

35then I would speak, and not fear him,

for I am not so in myself.

10

1“My soul is weary of my life.

I will give free course to my complaint.

I will speak in the bitterness of my soul.

2I will tell God, ‘Do not condemn me.

Show me why you contend with me.

3Is it good to you that you should oppress,

that you should despise the work of your hands,

and smile on the counsel of the wicked?

4Do you have eyes of flesh?

Or do you see as man sees?

5Are your days as the days of mortals,

or your years as man’s years,

6that you inquire after my iniquity,

and search after my sin?

7Although you know that I am not wicked,

there is no one who can deliver out of your hand.

8“‘Your hands have framed me and fashioned me altogether,

yet you destroy me.

9Remember, I beg you, that you have fashioned me as clay.

Will you bring me into dust again?

10Haven’t you poured me out like milk,

and curdled me like cheese?

11You have clothed me with skin and flesh,

and knit me together with bones and sinews.

12You have granted me life and loving kindness.

Your visitation has preserved my spirit.

13Yet you hid these things in your heart.

I know that this is with you:

14if I sin, then you mark me.

You will not acquit me from my iniquity.

15If I am wicked, woe to me.

If I am righteous, I still will not lift up my head,

being filled with disgrace,

and conscious of my affliction.

16If my head is held high, you hunt me like a lion.

Again you show yourself powerful to me.

17You renew your witnesses against me,

and increase your indignation on me.

Changes and warfare are with me.

18“‘Why, then, have you brought me out of the womb?

I wish I had given up the spirit, and no eye had seen me.

19I should have been as though I had not been.

I should have been carried from the womb to the grave.

20Aren’t my days few?

Stop!

Leave me alone, that I may find a little comfort,

21before I go where I will not return from,

to the land of darkness and of the shadow of death;

22the land dark as midnight,

of the shadow of death,

without any order,

where the light is as midnight.’”

11

1Then Zophar, the Naamathite, answered,

2“Shouldn’t the multitude of words be answered?

Should a man full of talk be justified?

3Should your boastings make men hold their peace?

When you mock, will no man make you ashamed?

4For you say, ‘My doctrine is pure.

I am clean in your eyes.’

5But oh that God would speak,

and open his lips against you,

6that he would show you the secrets of wisdom!

For true wisdom has two sides.

Know therefore that God exacts of you less than your iniquity deserves.

7“Can you fathom the mystery of God?

Or can you probe the limits of the Almighty?

8They are high as heaven. What can you do?

They are deeper than Sheol. What can you know?

9Its measure is longer than the earth,

and broader than the sea.

10If he passes by, or confines,

or convenes a court, then who can oppose him?

11For he knows false men.

He sees iniquity also, even though he doesn’t consider it.

12An empty-headed man becomes wise

when a man is born as a wild donkey’s colt.

13“If you set your heart aright,

stretch out your hands toward him.

14If iniquity is in your hand, put it far away.

Don’t let unrighteousness dwell in your tents.

15Surely then you will lift up your face without spot.

Yes, you will be steadfast, and will not fear,

16for you will forget your misery.

You will remember it like waters that have passed away.

17Life will be clearer than the noonday.

Though there is darkness, it will be as the morning.

18You will be secure, because there is hope.

Yes, you will search, and will take your rest in safety.

19Also you will lie down, and no one will make you afraid.

Yes, many will court your favor.

20But the eyes of the wicked will fail.

They will have no way to flee.

Their hope will be the giving up of the spirit.”

12

1Then Job answered,

2“No doubt, but you are the people,

and wisdom will die with you.

3But I have understanding as well as you;

I am not inferior to you.

Yes, who doesn’t know such things as these?

4I am like one who is a joke to his neighbor,

I, who called on God, and he answered.

The just, the blameless man is a joke.

5In the thought of him who is at ease there is contempt for misfortune.

It is ready for them whose foot slips.

6The tents of robbers prosper.

Those who provoke God are secure,

who carry their god in their hands.

7“But ask the animals now, and they will teach you;

the birds of the sky, and they will tell you.

8Or speak to the earth, and it will teach you.

The fish of the sea will declare to you.

9Who doesn’t know that in all these,

Yahweh’s hand has done this,

10in whose hand is the life of every living thing,

and the breath of all mankind?

11Doesn’t the ear try words,

even as the palate tastes its food?

12With aged men is wisdom,

in length of days understanding.

13“With God is wisdom and might.

He has counsel and understanding.

14Behold, he breaks down, and it can’t be built again.

He imprisons a man, and there can be no release.

15Behold, he withholds the waters, and they dry up.

Again, he sends them out, and they overturn the earth.

16With him is strength and wisdom.

The deceived and the deceiver are his.

17He leads counselors away stripped.

He makes judges fools.

18He loosens the bond of kings.

He binds their waist with a belt.

19He leads priests away stripped,

and overthrows the mighty.

20He removes the speech of those who are trusted,

and takes away the understanding of the elders.

21He pours contempt on princes,

and loosens the belt of the strong.

22He uncovers deep things out of darkness,

and brings out to light the shadow of death.

23He increases the nations, and he destroys them.

He enlarges the nations, and he leads them captive.

24He takes away understanding from the chiefs of the people of the earth,

and causes them to wander in a wilderness where there is no way.

25They grope in the dark without light.

He makes them stagger like a drunken man.