- 22Then Eliphaz the Temanite answered and said, 2Can a man be profitable unto God as he that is wise may be profitable unto himself? 3Is it any pleasure to the Almighty that you are righteous? Or is it gain to him that you make your ways perfect? 4Will he reprove you for fear of you? Will he enter with you into judgment?
- 5Is not your wickedness great and your iniquities infinite? 6For you have taken a pledge from your brother for naught, and stripped the naked of their clothing. 7You have not given water to the weary to drink, and you have withheld bread from the hungry. 8But the mighty man, he had the earth, and the honorable man dwelled in it. 9You have sent widows away empty and the arms of the fatherless have been broken. 10Therefore, snares are round about you and sudden fear troubles you, 11or darkness you cannot see and abundance of waters cover you.
- 12Is not God in the height of Heaven? And behold the height of the stars, how high they are. 13And you say, How does God know? Can he judge through the dark cloud? 14Thick clouds are a covering to him that he sees not, and he walks in the circuit of heaven. 15Have you marked the old way which wicked men have trodden, 16who were cut down out of time? Whose foundation was overflowed with a flood, 17who said unto God, Depart from us? And what can the Almighty do for them? 18Yet he filled their houses with good things. But the counsel of the wicked is far from me. 19The righteous see and are glad, and the innocent laugh them to scorn. 20Whereas our substance is not cut down, but the remnant of them the fire consumes.
- 21Acquaint now yourself with him, and be at peace; thereby good shall come unto you. 22Receive, I pray you, the law from his mouth, and lay up his words in your heart. 23If you return to the Almighty, you shall be built up. You shall put away iniquity far from your tabernacles. 24Then shall you lay up gold as dust, and the gold of Ophir as the stones of the brooks. 25Yea, the Almighty shall be your defense, and you shall have plenty of silver. 26For then shall you have your delight in the Almighty, and shall lift up your face unto God. 27You shall make your prayer unto him and he shall hear you, and you shall pay your vows. 28You shall also decree a thing and it shall be established unto you, and the light shall shine upon your ways. 29When men are cast down, then you shall say, There is lifting up; and he shall save the humble person. 30He shall deliver the island of the innocent, and it is delivered by the pureness of your hands.
- 23Then Job answered and said, 2Even today is my complaint bitter. My stroke is heavier than my groaning. 3Oh that I knew where I might find him, that I might come even to his seat. 4I would order my case before him, and fill my mouth with arguments. 5I would know the words which he would answer me, and understand what he would say unto me. 6Will he plead against me with his great power? No, but he would put strength in me. 7There the righteous might dispute with him; so should I be delivered for ever from my judge.
- 8Behold, I go forward, but he is not there; and backward, but I cannot perceive him. 9On the left hand, where he does work, but I cannot behold him. He hides himself on the right hand that I cannot see him, 10but he knows the way that I take. When he has tried me, I shall come forth as gold. 11My foot has held his steps, his way have I kept and not declined, 12neither have I gone back from the commandment of his lips. I have esteemed the words of his mouth more than my necessary food.
- 13But he is in one, and who can turn him? And what his soul desires, even that he does; 14for he performs the thing that is appointed for me, and many such things are with him. 15Therefore am I troubled at his presence; when I consider, I am afraid of him. 16For God makes my heart soft and the Almighty troubles me, 17because I was not cut off before the darkness, neither has he covered the darkness from my face.
- 24Why, seeing times are not hidden from the Almighty, do they that know him not see his days? 2Some remove the landmarks; they violently take away flocks and feed thereof. 3They drive away the ass of the fatherless, they take the widow’s ox for a pledge. 4They turn the needy out of the way. The poor of the earth hide themselves together. 5Behold, as wild asses in the desert go they forth to their work; rising early for a prey, the wilderness yields food for them and for their children. 6They reap everyone his fodder in the field, and they gather the vintage of the wicked. 7They cause the naked to lodge without clothing, that they have no covering in the cold. 8They are wet with the showers of the mountains, and embrace the rock for lack of a shelter. 9They pluck the fatherless from the breast, and take a pledge of the poor. 10They cause him to go naked without clothing, and they take away the sheaf from the hungry 11who make oil within their walls, and tread their winepresses, and suffer thirst. 12Men groan from out of the city, and the soul of the wounded cries out. Yet God lays not folly to them.
- 13They are of those that rebel against the light. They know not the ways thereof, nor abide in the paths thereof. 14The murderer rising with the light kills the poor and needy, and in the night is as a thief. 15The eye also of the adulterer waits for the twilight, saying, No eye shall see me, and disguises his face. 16In the dark they dig through houses which they had marked for themselves in the daytime. They know not the light, 17for the morning is to them even as the shadow of death. If one know them, they are in the terrors of the shadow of death.
- 18He is swift as the waters. Their portion is cursed in the earth. He beholds not the way of the vineyards. 19Drought and heat consume the snow waters, so does the grave those who have sinned. 20The womb shall forget him. The worm shall feed sweetly on him. He shall be no more remembered, and wickedness shall be broken as a tree. 21He treats with evil the barren that bears not, and does not good to the widow. 22He draws also the mighty with his power. He rises up, and no man is sure of life. 23Though it is given him to be in safety, on which he rests, yet his eyes are upon their ways. 24They are exalted for a little while, but have gone and brought low. They are taken out of the way as all other, and cut off as the tops of the ears of grain. 25And if it be not so now, who will make me a liar and make my speech worth nothing?
Chapter 9