Job 20

¹¹Now when Job’s three friends—Eliphaz the Temanite, Bildad the Shuhite, and Zophar the Naamathite—heard about all this adversity that had come upon him, each of them came from his home, and they met together to go and sympathize with Job and comfort him.

¹Then Zophar the Naamathite replied:

⁹So Eliphaz the Temanite, Bildad the Shuhite, and Zophar the Naamathite went and did as the Lord had told them; and the Lord accepted Job’s prayer.

²²In my alarm I said, “I am cut off from Your sight!” But You heard my plea for mercy when I called to You for help.

²⁹A patient man has great understanding, but a quick-tempered man promotes folly.

⁹If I say, “I will not mention Him or speak any more in His name,” His message becomes a fire burning in my heart, shut up in my bones, and I become weary of holding it in, and I cannot prevail.

¹⁹My beloved brothers, understand this: Everyone should be quick to listen, slow to speak, and slow to anger,

²I was speechless and still; I remained silent, even from speaking good, and my sorrow was stirred.

³My heart grew hot within me; as I mused, the fire burned. Then I spoke with my tongue:

²⁰Do you see a man who speaks in haste? There is more hope for a fool than for him.

³My words are from an upright heart, and my lips speak sincerely what I know.

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

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

³My mouth will impart wisdom, and the meditation of my heart will bring understanding.

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

²I will open my mouth in parables; I will utter things hidden from the beginning,

³that we have heard and known and our fathers have relayed to us.

¹⁰Both the gray-haired and the aged are on our side—men much older than your father.

²⁸God blessed them and said to them, “Be fruitful and multiply, and fill the earth and subdue it; rule over the fish of the sea and the birds of the air and every creature that crawls upon the earth.”

⁷I thought that age should speak, and many years should teach wisdom.

¹⁶The highest heavens belong to the Lord, but the earth He has given to mankind.

¹And God blessed Noah and his sons and said to them, “Be fruitful and multiply and fill the earth.

²The fear and dread of you will fall on every living creature on the earth, every bird of the air, every creature that crawls on the ground, and all the fish of the sea. They are delivered into your hand.

⁸Please inquire of past generations and consider the discoveries of their fathers.

⁹For we were born yesterday and know nothing; our days on earth are but a shadow.

³⁵I have seen a wicked, ruthless man flourishing like a well-rooted native tree,

³⁶yet he passed away and was no more; though I searched, he could not be found.

⁵Indeed, the lamp of the wicked is extinguished; the flame of his fire does not glow.

⁶The light in his tent grows dark, and the lamp beside him goes out.

²²And they began to shout, “This is the voice of a god, not a man!”

²³Immediately, because Herod did not give glory to God, an angel of the Lord struck him down, and he was eaten by worms and died.

⁸For what is the hope of the godless when he is cut off, when God takes away his life?

¹⁸Surely You set them on slick ground; You cast them down into ruin.

¹⁹How suddenly they are laid waste, completely swept away by terrors!

³I have seen a fool taking root, but suddenly his house was cursed.

³The pride of your heart has deceived you, O dwellers in the clefts of the rocks whose habitation is the heights, who say in your heart, ‘Who can bring me down to the ground?’

⁴Though you soar like the eagle and make your nest among the stars, even from there I will bring you down,” declares the Lord.

¹³You said in your heart: “I will ascend to the heavens; I will raise my throne above the stars of God. I will sit on the mount of assembly, in the far reaches of the north.

¹⁴I will ascend above the tops of the clouds; I will make myself like the Most High.”

⁴“Come,” they said, “let us build for ourselves a city with a tower that reaches to the heavens, that we may make a name for ourselves and not be scattered over the face of all the earth.”

²Though they dig down to Sheol, from there My hand will take them; and though they climb up to heaven, from there I will pull them down.

¹¹The tree grew large and strong; its top reached the sky, and it was visible to the ends of the earth.

²²you, O king, are that tree! For you have become great and strong; your greatness has grown to reach the sky, and your dominion extends to the ends of the earth.

¹⁰Because of all this, behold, I am bringing disaster on the house of Jeroboam: I will cut off from Jeroboam every male, both slave and free, in Israel; I will burn up the house of Jeroboam as one burns up dung until it is gone!

²⁰They are smashed to pieces from dawn to dusk; unnoticed, they perish forever.

³⁷And Jezebel’s body will lie like dung in the field on the plot of ground at Jezreel, so that no one can say: This is Jezebel.’”

¹⁰who perished at Endor and became like dung on the ground.

¹⁸If he is uprooted from his place, it will disown him, saying, ‘I never saw you.’

¹⁰But a man dies and is laid low; he breathes his last, and where is he?

⁵You sweep them away in their sleep; they are like the new grass of the morning—

²⁰Like one waking from a dream, so You, O Lord, awaken and despise their form.

¹⁸He is driven from light into darkness and is chased from the inhabited world.

⁷All the many nations going out to battle against Ariel—even all who war against her, laying siege and attacking her—will be like a dream, like a vision in the night,

⁸as when a hungry man dreams he is eating, then awakens still hungry; as when a thirsty man dreams he is drinking, then awakens faint and parched. So will it be for all the many nations who go to battle against Mount Zion.

¹⁰He mounted a cherub and flew; He soared on the wings of the wind.

²¹The east wind carries him away, and he is gone; it sweeps him out of his place.

²²It hurls itself against him without mercy as he flees headlong from its power.

⁸The eye that beholds me will no longer see me. You will look for me, but I will be no more.

¹⁸If he is uprooted from his place, it will disown him, saying, ‘I never saw you.’

¹⁰He never returns to his house; his place remembers him no more.

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

³⁶yet he passed away and was no more; though I searched, he could not be found.

¹⁰Yet a little while, and the wicked will be no more; though you look for them, they will not be found.

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

⁸But Zacchaeus stood up and said to the Lord, “Look, Lord, half of my possessions I give to the poor, and if I have cheated anyone, I will repay it fourfold.”

¹⁶Though he heaps up silver like dust and piles up a wardrobe like clay,

¹⁷what he lays up, the righteous will wear, and his silver will be divided by the innocent.

³But if it happens after sunrise, there is guilt for his bloodshed. A thief must make full restitution; if he has nothing, he himself shall be sold for his theft.

³¹Yet if caught, he must pay sevenfold; he must give up all the wealth of his house.

¹⁰May his children wander as beggars, seeking sustenance far from their ruined homes.

²⁶For You record bitter accusations against me and bequeath to me the iniquities of my youth.

⁷Remember not the sins of my youth, nor my rebellious acts; remember me according to Your loving devotion, because of Your goodness, O Lord.

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

²⁷They do not lie down with the fallen warriors of old, who went down to Sheol with their weapons of war, whose swords were placed under their heads, whose shields rested on their bones, although the terror of the mighty was once in the land of the living.

¹³Because of the indecency of your uncleanness I tried to cleanse you, but you would not be purified from your filthiness. You will not be pure again until My wrath against you has subsided.

²⁴That is why I told you that you would die in your sins. For unless you believe that I am He, you will die in your sins.”

⁷His mouth is full of cursing, deceit, and violence; trouble and malice are under his tongue.

¹⁶how much less man, who is vile and corrupt, who drinks injustice like water?

⁹Rejoice, O young man, while you are young, and let your heart be glad in the days of your youth. Walk in the ways of your heart and in the sight of your eyes, but know that for all these things God will bring you to judgment.

¹⁷“Stolen water is sweet, and bread eaten in secret is tasty!”

¹⁸But they do not know that the dead are there, that her guests are in the depths of Sheol.

¹⁷The cursing that he loved, may it fall on him; the blessing in which he refused to delight, may it be far from him.

¹⁸The cursing that he wore like a coat, may it soak into his body like water, and into his bones like oil.

¹⁷Food gained by fraud is sweet to a man, but later his mouth is full of gravel.

¹³For if you live according to the flesh, you will die; but if by the Spirit you put to death the deeds of the body, you will live.

²⁹If your right eye causes you to sin, gouge it out and throw it away. It is better for you to lose one part of your body than for your whole body to be thrown into hell.

³⁰And if your right hand causes you to sin, cut it off and throw it away. It is better for you to lose one part of your body than for your whole body to depart into hell.

⁴³If your hand causes you to sin, cut it off. It is better for you to enter life crippled than to have two hands and go into hell, into the unquenchable fire.

⁴⁴

¹⁸And say to the people: Consecrate yourselves for tomorrow, and you will eat meat, because you have cried out in the hearing of the Lord, saying: ‘Who will feed us meat? For we were better off in Egypt!’ Therefore the Lord will give you meat, and you will eat.

¹⁹You will eat it not for one or two days, nor for five or ten or twenty days,

¹³“Their throats are open graves; their tongues practice deceit.” “The venom of vipers is on their lips.”

²One evening David got up from his bed and strolled around on the roof of the palace. And from the roof he saw a woman bathing—a very beautiful woman.

³So David sent and inquired about the woman, and he was told, “This is Bathsheba, the daughter of Eliam and the wife of Uriah the Hittite.”

²If you do not listen, and if you do not take it to heart to honor My name,” says the Lord of Hosts, “I will send a curse among you, and I will curse your blessings. Yes, I have already begun to curse them, because you are not taking it to heart.

¹A Psalm of David, for remembrance. O Lord, do not rebuke me in Your anger or discipline me in Your wrath.

²For Your arrows have pierced me deeply, and Your hand has pressed down on me.

²⁴They will be wasted from hunger and ravaged by pestilence and bitter plague; I will send the fangs of wild beasts against them, with the venom of vipers that slither in the dust.

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

⁸You will vomit up what little you have eaten and waste your pleasant words.

³When Judas, who had betrayed Him, saw that Jesus was condemned, he was filled with remorse and returned the thirty pieces of silver to the chief priests and elders.

⁴“I have sinned by betraying innocent blood,” he said. “What is that to us?” they replied. “You bear the responsibility.”

³Paul gathered a bundle of sticks, and as he laid them on the fire, a viper, driven out by the heat, fastened itself to his hand.

⁴When the islanders saw the creature hanging from his hand, they said to one another, “Surely this man is a murderer. Although he was saved from the sea, Justice has not allowed him to live.”

¹³“Their throats are open graves; their tongues practice deceit.” “The venom of vipers is on their lips.”

⁷But when John saw many of the Pharisees and Sadducees coming to his place of baptism, he said to them, “You brood of vipers, who warned you to flee from the coming wrath?

⁶This is the burden against the beasts of the Negev: Through a land of hardship and distress, of lioness and lion, of viper and flying serpent, they carry their wealth on the backs of donkeys and their treasures on the humps of camels, to a people of no profit to them.

²⁴They will be wasted from hunger and ravaged by pestilence and bitter plague; I will send the fangs of wild beasts against them, with the venom of vipers that slither in the dust.

¹³He made him ride on the heights of the land and fed him the produce of the field. He nourished him with honey from the rock and oil from the flinty crag,

¹⁴with curds from the herd and milk from the flock, with the fat of lambs, with rams from Bashan, and goats, with the choicest grains of wheat. From the juice of the finest grapes you drank the wine.

⁶when my steps were bathed in cream and the rock poured out for me streams of oil!

²⁴So he cried out, ‘Father Abraham, have mercy on me and send Lazarus to dip the tip of his finger in water and cool my tongue. For I am in agony in this fire.’

²But the officer on whose arm the king leaned answered the man of God, “Look, even if the Lord were to make windows in heaven, could this really happen?” “You will see it with your own eyes,” replied Elisha, “but you will not eat any of it.”

²²and from the abundance of milk they give, he will eat curds; for all who remain in the land will eat curds and honey.

⁸They feast on the abundance of Your house, and You give them drink from Your river of delights.

⁹For with You is the fountain of life; in Your light we see light.

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

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

¹³“Woe to him who builds his palace by unrighteousness, and his upper rooms without justice, who makes his countrymen serve without pay, and fails to pay their wages,

¹²let us swallow them alive like Sheol, and whole like those descending into the Pit.

⁴⁴I will punish Bel in Babylon. I will make him spew out what he swallowed. The nations will no longer stream to him; even the wall of Babylon will fall.

¹⁵What right has My beloved in My house, having carried out so many evil schemes? Can consecrated meat avert your doom? When you are wicked, then you rejoice.

¹⁶The Lord once called you a flourishing olive tree, beautiful with well-formed fruit. But with a mighty roar He will set it on fire, and its branches will be consumed.

⁹Men cry out under great oppression; they plead for relief from the arm of the mighty.

³¹Whoever oppresses the poor taunts their Maker, but whoever is kind to the needy honors Him.

²⁹The people of the land have practiced extortion and committed robbery. They have oppressed the poor and needy and have exploited the foreign resident without justice.

⁴Look, the wages you withheld from the workmen who mowed your fields are crying out against you. The cries of the harvesters have reached the ears of the Lord of Hosts.

²²Do not rob a poor man because he is poor, and do not crush the afflicted at the gate,

²³for the Lord will take up their case and will plunder those who rob them.

¹³For judgment without mercy will be shown to anyone who has not been merciful. Mercy triumphs over judgment.

¹³There is a grievous evil I have seen under the sun: wealth hoarded to the harm of its owner,

¹⁴or wealth lost in a failed venture, so when that man has a son there is nothing to pass on.

²⁰But the wicked are like the storm-tossed sea, for it cannot be still, and its waves churn up mire and muck.

²¹“There is no peace,” says my God, “for the wicked.”

¹¹Like a partridge hatching eggs it did not lay is the man who makes a fortune unjustly. In the middle of his days his riches will desert him, and in the end he will be the fool.”

¹⁹He has no offspring or posterity among his people, no survivor where he once lived.

²⁹He will no longer be rich; his wealth will not endure. His possessions will not overspread the land.

²⁴So he cried out, ‘Father Abraham, have mercy on me and send Lazarus to dip the tip of his finger in water and cool my tongue. For I am in agony in this fire.’

²⁵But Abraham answered, ‘Child, remember that during your lifetime you received your good things, while Lazarus received bad things. But now he is comforted here, while you are in agony.

⁷As much as she has glorified herself and lived in luxury, give her the same measure of torment and grief. In her heart she says, ‘I sit as queen; I am not a widow and will never see grief.’

²⁹He will no longer be rich; his wealth will not endure. His possessions will not overspread the land.

⁷His vigorous stride is shortened, and his own schemes trip him up.

²And the Lord sent Chaldean, Aramean, Moabite, and Ammonite raiders against Jehoiakim in order to destroy Judah, according to the word that the Lord had spoken through His servants the prophets.

⁵You, indeed, have made my days as handbreadths, and my lifetime as nothing before You. Truly each man at his best exists as but a breath. Selah

¹¹God has delivered me to unjust men; He has thrown me to the clutches of the wicked.

³⁰Yet before they had filled their desire, with the food still in their mouths,

³¹God’s anger flared against them, and He put to death their strongest and subdued the young men of Israel.

³³But while the meat was still between their teeth, before it was chewed, the anger of the Lord burned against the people, and the Lord struck them with a severe plague.

²If you do not listen, and if you do not take it to heart to honor My name,” says the Lord of Hosts, “I will send a curse among you, and I will curse your blessings. Yes, I have already begun to curse them, because you are not taking it to heart.

⁶On the wicked He will rain down fiery coals and sulfur; a scorching wind will be their portion.

⁴My heart falters; fear makes me tremble. The twilight I desired has turned to horror.

¹⁷So he thought to himself, ‘What shall I do, since I have nowhere to store my crops?’

¹⁸Then he said, ‘This is what I will do: I will tear down my barns and will build bigger ones, and there I will store up all my grain and my goods.

¹⁹It will be like a man who flees from a lion, only to encounter a bear, or who enters his house and rests his hand against the wall, only to be bitten by a snake.

¹⁸Whoever flees the sound of panic will fall into the pit, and whoever climbs from the pit will be caught in the snare. For the windows of heaven are open, and the foundations of the earth are shaken.

³⁵He trains my hands for battle; my arms can bend a bow of bronze.

²³until an arrow pierces his liver, like a bird darting into a snare—not knowing it will cost him his life.

¹I saw the Lord standing beside the altar, and He said: “Strike the tops of the pillars so that the thresholds shake. Topple them on the heads of all the people, and I will kill the rest with the sword. None of those who flee will get away; none of the fugitives will escape.

²Though they dig down to Sheol, from there My hand will take them; and though they climb up to heaven, from there I will pull them down.

⁴³Terror and pit and snare await you, O dweller of Moab,” declares the Lord.

⁴⁴“Whoever flees the panic will fall into the pit, and whoever climbs from the pit will be caught in the snare. For I will bring upon Moab the year of their punishment,” declares the Lord.

¹³His archers surround me. He pierces my kidneys without mercy and spills my gall on the ground.

¹¹Terrors frighten him on every side and harass his every step.

²¹Sounds of terror fill his ears; in his prosperity the destroyer attacks him.

⁴¹when I sharpen My flashing sword, and My hand grasps it in judgment, I will take vengeance on My adversaries and repay those who hate Me.

²⁰Terrors overtake him like a flood; a tempest sweeps him away in the night.

¹²If one does not repent, God will sharpen His sword; He has bent and strung His bow.

⁹You will place them in a fiery furnace at the time of Your appearing. In His wrath the Lord will engulf them, and the fire will consume them.

⁴Sharp arrows will come from the warrior, with burning coals of the broom tree!

³³For Topheth has long been prepared; it has been made ready for the king. Its funeral pyre is deep and wide, with plenty of fire and wood. The breath of the Lord, like a torrent of burning sulfur, sets it ablaze.

¹²His winnowing fork is in His hand to clear His threshing floor and to gather His wheat into the barn; but He will burn up the chaff with unquenchable fire.”

²²Then they will look to the earth and see only distress and darkness and the gloom of anguish. And they will be driven into utter darkness.

⁵Indeed, the lamp of the wicked is extinguished; the flame of his fire does not glow.

⁶The light in his tent grows dark, and the lamp beside him goes out.

²¹For behold, the Lord is coming out of His dwelling to punish the inhabitants of the earth for their iniquity. The earth will reveal her bloodshed and will no longer conceal her slain.

²There is nothing concealed that will not be disclosed, and nothing hidden that will not be made known.

³What you have spoken in the dark will be heard in the daylight, and what you have whispered in the inner rooms will be proclaimed from the housetops.

¹⁸O earth, do not cover my blood; may my cry for help never be laid to rest.

¹⁶on the day when God will judge men’s secrets through Christ Jesus, as proclaimed by my gospel.

²⁰If we had forgotten the name of our God or spread out our hands to a foreign god,

²¹would not God have discovered, since He knows the secrets of the heart?

²⁸Assemble before me all the elders of your tribes and all your officers so that I may speak these words in their hearing and call heaven and earth to witness against them.

¹⁴Though his sons are many, they are destined for the sword; and his offspring will never have enough food.

¹⁵His survivors will be buried by the plague, and their widows will not weep for them.

¹⁷For in a single hour such fabulous wealth has been destroyed!” Every shipmaster, passenger, and sailor, and all who make their living from the sea, will stand at a distance

¹Come now, you who are rich, weep and wail over the misery to come upon you.

²Your riches have rotted and moths have eaten your clothes.

¹⁸Neither their silver nor their gold will be able to deliver them on the Day of the Lord’s wrath. The whole earth will be consumed by the fire of His jealousy.” For indeed, He will make a sudden end of all who dwell on the earth.

⁵The hungry consume his harvest, taking it even from the thorns, and the thirsty pant after his wealth.

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

¹³This is the wicked man’s portion from God—the heritage the ruthless receive from the Almighty.

²For what is the allotment of God from above, or the heritage from the Almighty on high?

³Does not disaster come to the unjust and calamity to the workers of iniquity?

⁵The Lord tests the righteous and the wicked; His soul hates the lover of violence.

⁶On the wicked He will rain down fiery coals and sulfur; a scorching wind will be their portion.

²¹Surely such is the dwelling of the wicked and the place of one who does not know God.”

³⁸Do not both adversity and good come from the mouth of the Most High?

⁵¹Then he will cut him to pieces and assign him a place with the hypocrites, where there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth.