Reading the Bible again for the First Time
Page 45
6 They reap in a field not their own and they glean in the vineyard of the wicked.
7 They lie all night naked, without clothing, and have no covering in the cold.
8 They are wet with the rain of the mountains, and cling to the rock for want of shelter.
9 “There are those who snatch the orphan child from the breast, and take as a pledge the infant of the poor.”
10 They go about naked, without clothing; though hungry, they carry the sheaves;
11 between their terraces they press out oil; they tread the wine presses, but suffer thirst.
12 From the city the dying groan, and the throat of the wounded cries for help; yet God pays no attention to their prayer.
13 “There are those who rebel against the light, who are not acquainted with its ways, and do not stay in its paths.
14 The murderer rises at dusk, to kill the poor and needy, and in the night he is like a thief.
15 The eye of the adulterer also waits for the twilight, saying, ‘No eye will see me’; and he disguises his face.
16 In the dark they dig through houses; by day they shut themselves up; they do not know the light.
17 For deep darkness is morning to all of them; for they are friends with the terrors of deep darkness.
18 “Swift are they on the face of the waters; their portion in the land is cursed; no treader turns toward their vineyards.
19 Drought and heat snatch away the snow waters; so does Sheol those who have sinned.
20 The womb forgets them; the worm finds them sweet; they are no longer remembered; so wickedness is broken like a tree.
21 “They harm the childless woman, and do no good to the widow.
22 Yet God prolongs the life of the mighty by his power; they rise up when they despair of life.
23 He gives them security, and they are supported; his eyes are upon their ways.
24 They are exalted a little while, and then are gone; they wither and fade like the mallow; they are cut off like the heads of grain.
25 If it is not so, who will prove me a liar, and show that there is nothing in what I say?”
Job 25
Bildad Speaks: How Can a Mortal Be Righteous Before God?
25 Then Bildad the Shuhite answered:
2 “Dominion and fear are with God; he makes peace in his high heaven.
3 Is there any number to his armies? Upon whom does his light not arise?
4 How then can a mortal be righteous before God? How can one born of woman be pure?
5 If even the moon is not bright and the stars are not pure in his sight,
6 how much less a mortal, who is a maggot, and a human being, who is a worm!”
Job 26
Job Replies: God’s Majesty is Unsearchable
26 Then Job answered:
2 “How you have helped one who has no power! How you have assisted the arm that has no strength!
3 How you have counseled one who has no wisdom, and given much good advice!
4 With whose help have you uttered words, and whose spirit has come forth from you?
5 The shades below tremble, the waters and their inhabitants.
6 Sheol is naked before God, and Abaddon has no covering.
7 He stretches out Zaphon over the void, and hangs the earth upon nothing.
8 He binds up the waters in his thick clouds, and the cloud is not torn open by them.
9 He covers the face of the full moon, and spreads over it his cloud.
10 He has described a circle on the face of the waters, at the boundary between light and darkness.
11 The pillars of heaven tremble, and are astounded at his rebuke.
12 By his power he stilled the Sea; by his understanding he struck down Rahab.
13 By his wind the heavens were made fair; his hand pierced the fleeing serpent.
14 These are indeed but the outskirts of his ways; and how small a whisper do we hear of him! But the thunder of his power who can understand?”
Job 27
Job Maintains His Integrity
27 Job again took up his discourse and said:
2 “As God lives, who has taken away my right, and the Almighty, who has made my soul bitter;
3 as long as my breath is in me, and the spirit of God is in my nostrils;
4 my lips will not speak falsehood, and my tongue will not utter deceit.
5 Far be it from me to say that you are right; until I die I will not put away my integrity from me.
6 I hold fast my righteousness, and will not let it go; my heart does not reproach me for any of my days.
7 “May my enemy be like the wicked, and may my opponent be like the unrighteous.
8 For what is the hope of the godless when God cuts them off, when God takes away their lives?
9 Will God hear their cry when trouble comes upon them?
10 Will they take delight in the Almighty? Will they call upon God at all times?
11 I will teach you concerning the hand of God; that which is with the Almighty I will not conceal.
12 All of you have seen it yourselves; why then have you become altogether vain?
13 “This is the portion of the wicked with God, and the heritage that oppressors receive from the Almighty:
14 If their children are multiplied, it is for the sword; and their offspring have not enough to eat.
15 Those who survive them the pestilence buries, and their widows make no lamentation.
16 Though they heap up silver like dust, and pile up clothing like clay —
17 they may pile it up, but the just will wear it, and the innocent will divide the silver.
18 They build their houses like nests, like booths made by sentinels of the vineyard.
19 They go to bed with wealth, but will do so no more; they opens their eyes, and it is gone.
20 Terrors overtake them like a flood; in the night a whirlwind carries them off.
21 The east wind lifts them up and they are gone; it sweeps them out of their place.
22 It hurls at them without pity; they flee from its power in headlong flight.
23 It claps its hands at them, and hisses at them from its place.
Job 28
28 “Surely there is a mine for silver, and a place for gold to be refined.
2 Iron is taken out of the earth, and copper is smelted from ore.
3 Miners put an end to darkness, and search out to the farthest bound the ore in gloom and deep darkness.
4 They open shafts in a valley away from human habitation; they are forgotten by travelers, they sway suspended, remote from people.
5 As for the earth, out of it comes bread; but underneath it is turned up as by fire.
6 Its stones are the place of sapphires, and its dust contains gold.
7 “That path no bird of prey knows, and the falcon’s eye has not seen it.
8 The proud wild animals have not trodden it; the lion has not passed over it.
9 “They put their hand to the flinty rock, and overturn mountains by the roots.
10 They cuts out channels in the rocks, and thier eyes see every precious thing.
11 The sources of the rivers they probe; hidden things they bring to light.
12 “But where shall wisdom be found? And where is the place of understanding?
13 Mortals do not know the way to it, and it is not found in the land of the living.
14 The deep says, ‘It is not in me,’ and the sea says, ‘It is not with me.’
15 It cannot be gotten for gold, and silver cannot be weighed out as its price.
16 It cannot be valued in the gold of Ophir, in precious onyx or sapphire.
17 Gold and glass cannot equal it, nor can it be exchanged for jewels of fine gold.
18 No mention shall be made of coral or of crystal; the price of wisdom is above pearls.
19 The chrysolite of Ethiopia cannot compare with it, nor can it be valued in pure gold.
20 “Where then does come wisdom from? And where is the place of und
erstanding?
21 It is hidden from the eyes of all living, and concealed from the birds of the air.
22 Abaddon and Death say, ‘We have heard a rumor of it with our ears.’
23 “God understands the way to it, and he knows its place.
24 For he looks to the ends of the earth, and sees everything under the heavens.
25 When he gave to the wind its weight, and apportioned out the waters by measure;
26 when he made a decree for the rain, and a way for the thunderbolt;
27 then he saw it and declared it; he established it, and searched it out.
28 And he said to humankind, ‘Truly, the fear of the Lord, that is wisdom; and to depart from evil is understanding.’”
Job 29
29 Job again took up his discourse and said:
2 “O that I were as in the months of old, as in the days when God watched over me;
3 when his lamp shone over my head, and by his light I walked through darkness;
4 when I was in my prime, when the friendship of God was upon my tent;
5 when the Almighty was still with me, when my children were around me;
6 when my steps were washed with milk, and the rock poured out for me streams of oil!
7 When I went out to the gate of the city, when I took my seat in the square,
8 the young men saw me and withdrew, and the aged rose up and stood;
9 the nobles refrained from talking, and laid their hands on their mouths;
10 the voices of princes were hushed, and their tongues stuck to the roof of their mouths.
11 When the ear heard, it commended me, and when the eye saw, it approved;
12 because I delivered the poor who cried, and the orphan who had no helper.
13 The blessing of the wretched came upon me, and I caused the widow’s heart to sing for joy.
14 I put on righteousness, and it clothed me; my justice was like a robe and a turban.
15 I was eyes to the blind, and feet to the lame.
16 I was a father to the needy, and I championed the cause of the stranger.
17 I broke the fangs of the unrighteous, and made them drop their prey from their teeth.
18 Then I thought, ‘I shall die in my nest, and I shall multiply my days like the phoenix,
19 my roots spread out to the waters, with the dew all night on my branches;
20 my glory fresh with me, and my bow ever new in my hand.’
21 “They listened to me, and waited, and kept silence for my counsel.
22 After I spoke they did not speak again, and my word dropped upon them like dew.
23 They waited for me as for the rain; and they opened their mouths as for the spring rain.
24 I smiled on them when they had no confidence; and the light of my countenance they did not extinguish.
25 I chose their way, and sat as chief, and I lived like a king among his troops, like one who comforts mourners.
Job 30
30 “But now they make sport of me, those who are younger than I, whose fathers I would have disdained to set with the dogs of my flock.
2 What could I gain from the strength of their hands? All their vigor is gone.
3 Through want and hard hunger they gnaw the dry and desolate ground;
4 they pick mallow and the leaves of bushes, and to warm themselves the roots of broom.
5 They are driven out from society; people shout after them as after a thief.
6 In the gullies of wadis they must live, in holes in the ground and in the rocks.
7 Among the bushes they bray; under the nettles they huddle together.
8 A senseless, a disreputable brood, they have been whipped out of the land.
9 “And now they mock me in song; I am a byword to them.
10 They abhor me, they keep aloof from me; they do not hesitate to spit at the sight of me.
11 Because God has loosed my cord and humbled me, they have cast off restraint in my presence.
12 On my right hand the rabble rise up, they send me sprawling, and build roads for my ruin.
13 They break up my path, they promote my calamity; no one restrains them.
14 As through a wide breach they come; amid the crash they roll on.
15 Terrors are turned upon me; my honor is pursued as by the wind, and my prosperity has passed away like a cloud.
16 “And now my soul is poured out within me; days of affliction have taken hold of me.
17 The night racks my bones, and the pain that gnaws me takes no rest.
18 With violence he seizes my garment; he grasps me by the collar of my tunic.
19 He has cast me into the mire, and I have become like dust and ashes.
20 I cry to you and you do not answer me; I stand, and you merely look at me.
21 You have turned cruel to me; with the might of your hand you persecute me.
22 You lift me up on the wind, you make me ride on it, and you toss me about in the roar of the storm.
23 I know that you will bring me to death, and to the house appointed for all living.
24 “Surely one does not turn against the needy, when in disaster they cry for help.
25 Did not I weep for those whose day was hard? Was not my soul grieved for the poor?
26 But when I looked for good, evil came; and when I waited for light, darkness came.
27 My inward parts are in turmoil, and are never still; days of affliction come to meet me.
28 I go about in sunless gloom; I stand up in the assembly, and cry for help.
29 I am a brother of jackals, and a companion of ostriches.
30 My skin turns black and falls from me, and my bones burn with heat.
31 My lyre is turned to mourning, and my pipe to the voice of those who weep.
Job 31
31 “I have made a covenant with my eyes; how then could I look upon a virgin?
2 What would be my portion from God above, and my heritage from the Almighty on high?
3 Does not calamity befall the unrighteous, and disaster the workers of iniquity?
4 Does not he see my ways, and number all my steps?
5 “If I have walked with falsehood, and my foot has hurried to deceit—
6 let me be weighed in a just balance, and let God know my integrity!—
7 if my step has turned aside from the way, and my heart has followed my eyes, and if any spot has clung to my hands;
8 then let me sow, and another eat; and let what grows for me be rooted out.
9 “If my heart has been enticed to a woman, and I have lain in wait at my neighbor’s door;
10 then let my wife grind for another, and let other men kneel over her.
11 For that would be a heinous crime; that would be a criminal offense;
12 for that would be a fire consuming down to Abaddon, and it would burn to the root all my harvest.
13 “If I have rejected the cause of my male or female slaves, when they brought a complaint against me;
14 what then shall I do when God rises up? When he makes inquiry, what shall I answer him?
15 Did not he who made me in the womb make them? And did not one fashion us in the womb?
16 “If I have withheld anything that the poor desired, or have caused the eyes of the widow to fail,
17 or have eaten my morsel alone, and the orphan has not eaten from it—
18 for from his youth I reared the orphan like a father, and from my mother’s womb I guided the widow—
19 if I have seen anyone perish for lack of clothing, or a poor person without covering;
20 whose loins have not blessed me, and who was not warmed with the fleece of my sheep;