May 25 Job 19-21

19Then Job answered:
2‘How long will you torment me,
and break me in pieces with words?
3These ten times you have cast reproach upon me;
are you not ashamed to wrong me?
4And even if it is true that I have erred,
my error remains with me.
5If indeed you magnify yourselves against me,
and make my humiliation an argument against me,
6know then that God has put me in the wrong,
and closed his net around me.
7Even when I cry out, “Violence!” I am not answered;
I call aloud, but there is no justice.
8He has walled up my way so that I cannot pass,
and he has set darkness upon my paths.
9He has stripped my glory from me,
and taken the crown from my head.
10He breaks me down on every side, and I am gone,
he has uprooted my hope like a tree.
11He has kindled his wrath against me,
and counts me as his adversary.
12His troops come on together;
they have thrown up siege-works* against me,
and encamp around my tent.


13‘He has put my family far from me,
and my acquaintances are wholly estranged from me.
14My relatives and my close friends have failed me;
15 the guests in my house have forgotten me;
my serving-girls count me as a stranger;
I have become an alien in their eyes.
16I call to my servant, but he gives me no answer;
I must myself plead with him.
17My breath is repulsive to my wife;
I am loathsome to my own family.
18Even young children despise me;
when I rise, they talk against me.
19All my intimate friends abhor me,
and those whom I loved have turned against me.
20My bones cling to my skin and to my flesh,
and I have escaped by the skin of my teeth.
21Have pity on me, have pity on me, O you my friends,
for the hand of God has touched me!
22Why do you, like God, pursue me,
never satisfied with my flesh?


23‘O that my words were written down!
O that they were inscribed in a book!
24O that with an iron pen and with lead
they were engraved on a rock for ever!
25For I know that my Redeemer* lives,
and that at the last he* will stand upon the earth;*
26and after my skin has been thus destroyed,
then in* my flesh I shall see God,*
27whom I shall see on my side,*
and my eyes shall behold, and not another.
My heart faints within me!
28If you say, “How we will persecute him!”
and, “The root of the matter is found in him”;
29be afraid of the sword,
for wrath brings the punishment of the sword,
so that you may know there is a judgement.’


Zophar Speaks: Wickedness Receives Just Retribution20Then Zophar the Naamathite answered:
2‘Pay attention! My thoughts urge me to answer,
because of the agitation within me.
3I hear censure that insults me,
and a spirit beyond my understanding answers me.
4Do you not know this from of old,
ever since mortals were placed on earth,
5that the exulting of the wicked is short,
and the joy of the godless is but for a moment?
6Even though they mount up high as the heavens,
and their head reaches to the clouds,
7they will perish for ever like their own dung;
those who have seen them will say, “Where are they?”
8They will fly away like a dream, and not be found;
they will be chased away like a vision of the night.
9The eye that saw them will see them no more,
nor will their place behold them any longer.
10Their children will seek the favour of the poor,
and their hands will give back their wealth.
11Their bodies, once full of youth,
will lie down in the dust with them.


12‘Though wickedness is sweet in their mouth,
though they hide it under their tongues,
13though they are loath to let it go,
and hold it in their mouths,
14yet their food is turned in their stomachs;
it is the venom of asps within them.
15They swallow down riches and vomit them up again;
God casts them out of their bellies.
16They will suck the poison of asps;
the tongue of a viper will kill them.
17They will not look on the rivers,
the streams flowing with honey and curds.
18They will give back the fruit of their toil,
and will not swallow it down;
from the profit of their trading
they will get no enjoyment.
19For they have crushed and abandoned the poor,
they have seized a house that they did not build.


20‘They knew no quiet in their bellies;
in their greed they let nothing escape.
21There was nothing left after they had eaten;
therefore their prosperity will not endure.
22In full sufficiency they will be in distress;
all the force of misery will come upon them.
23To fill their belly to the full
God* will send his fierce anger into them,
and rain it upon them as their food.*
24They will flee from an iron weapon;
a bronze arrow will strike them through.
25It is drawn forth and comes out of their body,
and the glittering point comes out of their gall;
terrors come upon them.
26Utter darkness is laid up for their treasures;
a fire fanned by no one will devour them;
what is left in their tent will be consumed.
27The heavens will reveal their iniquity,
and the earth will rise up against them.
28The possessions of their house will be carried away,
dragged off on the day of God’s* wrath.
29This is the portion of the wicked from God,
the heritage decreed for them by God.’


Job Replies: The Wicked Often Go Unpunished21Then Job answered:
2‘Listen carefully to my words,
and let this be your consolation.
3Bear with me, and I will speak;
then after I have spoken, mock on.
4As for me, is my complaint addressed to mortals?
Why should I not be impatient?
5Look at me, and be appalled,
and lay your hand upon your mouth.
6When I think of it I am dismayed,
and shuddering seizes my flesh.
7Why do the wicked live on,
reach old age, and grow mighty in power?
8Their children are established in their presence,
and their offspring before their eyes.
9Their houses are safe from fear,
and no rod of God is upon them.
10Their bull breeds without fail;
their cow calves and never miscarries.
11They send out their little ones like a flock,
and their children dance around.
12They sing to the tambourine and the lyre,
and rejoice to the sound of the pipe.
13They spend their days in prosperity,
and in peace they go down to Sheol.
14They say to God, “Leave us alone!
We do not desire to know your ways.
15What is the Almighty,* that we should serve him?
And what profit do we get if we pray to him?”
16Is not their prosperity indeed their own achievement?*
The plans of the wicked are repugnant to me.


17‘How often is the lamp of the wicked put out?
How often does calamity come upon them?
How often does God* distribute pains in his anger?
18How often are they like straw before the wind,
and like chaff that the storm carries away?
19You say, “God stores up their iniquity for their children.”
Let it be paid back to them, so that they may know it.
20Let their own eyes see their destruction,
and let them drink of the wrath of the Almighty.*
21For what do they care for their household after them,
when the number of their months is cut off?
22Will any teach God knowledge,
seeing that he judges those that are on high?
23One dies in full prosperity,
being wholly at ease and secure,
24his loins full of milk
and the marrow of his bones moist.
25Another dies in bitterness of soul,
never having tasted of good.
26They lie down alike in the dust,
and the worms cover them.


27‘Oh, I know your thoughts,
and your schemes to wrong me.
28For you say, “Where is the house of the prince?
Where is the tent in which the wicked lived?”
29Have you not asked those who travel the roads,
and do you not accept their testimony,
30that the wicked are spared on the day of calamity,
and are rescued on the day of wrath?
31Who declares their way to their face,
and who repays them for what they have done?
32When they are carried to the grave,
a watch is kept over their tomb.
33The clods of the valley are sweet to them;
everyone will follow after,
and those who went before are innumerable.
34How then will you comfort me with empty nothings?
There is nothing left of your answers but falsehood.’