Job - Chapter 21 | New International Version

  • 1. Then Job replied:
  • 2. Listen carefully to my words; let this be the consolation you give me.
  • 3. Bear with me while I speak, and after I have spoken, mock on.
  • 4. Is my complaint directed to man? Why should I not be impatient?
  • 5. Look at me and be astonished; clap your hand over your mouth.
  • 6. When I think about this, I am terrified; trembling seizes my body.
  • 7. Why do the wicked live on, growing old and increasing in power?
  • 8. They see their children established around them, their offspring before their eyes.
  • 9. Their homes are safe and free from fear; the rod of God is not upon them.
  • 10. Their bulls never fail to breed; their cows calve and do not miscarry.
  • 11. They send forth their children as a flock; their little ones dance about.
  • 12. They sing to the music of tambourine and harp; they make merry to the sound of the flute.
  • 13. They spend their years in prosperity and go down to the grave in peace.
  • 14. Yet they say to God, 'Leave us alone! We have no desire to know your ways.
  • 15. Who is the Almighty, that we should serve him? What would we gain by praying to him?'
  • 16. But their prosperity is not in their own hands, so I stand aloof from the counsel of the wicked.
  • 17. Yet how often is the lamp of the wicked snuffed out? How often does calamity come upon them, the fate God allots in his anger?
  • 18. How often are they like straw before the wind, like chaff swept away by a gale?
  • 19. It is said, 'God stores up a man's punishment for his sons.' Let him repay the man himself, so that he will know it!
  • 20. Let his own eyes see his destruction; let him drink of the wrath of the Almighty.
  • 21. For what does he care about the family he leaves behind when his allotted months come to an end?
  • 22. Can anyone teach knowledge to God, since he judges even the highest?
  • 23. One man dies in full vigor, completely secure and at ease,
  • 24. his body well nourished, his bones rich with marrow.
  • 25. Another man dies in bitterness of soul, never having enjoyed anything good.
  • 26. Side by side they lie in the dust, and worms cover them both.
  • 27. I know full well what you are thinking, the schemes by which you would wrong me.
  • 28. You say, 'Where now is the great man's house, the tents where wicked men lived?'
  • 29. Have you never questioned those who travel? Have you paid no regard to their accounts--
  • 30. that the evil man is spared from the day of calamity, that he is delivered from the day of wrath?
  • 31. Who denounces his conduct to his face? Who repays him for what he has done?
  • 32. He is carried to the grave, and watch is kept over his tomb.
  • 33. The soil in the valley is sweet to him; all men follow after him, and a countless throng goes before him.
  • 34. So how can you console me with your nonsense? Nothing is left of your answers but falsehood!
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