Job 15 / 42
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(Eliphaz Accuses: Job Does Not Fear God)
Then Eliphaz the Temanite answered and said:
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"Should a wise man answer with windy knowledge,
and fill his belly with the east wind?
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Should he argue in unprofitable talk,
or in words with which he can do no good?
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But you are doing away with the fear of God
and hindering meditation before God.
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For your iniquity teaches your mouth,
and you choose the tongue of the crafty.
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Your own mouth condemns you, and not I;
your own lips testify against you.
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"Are you the first man who was born?
Or were you brought forth before the hills?
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Have you listened in the council of God?
And do you limit wisdom to yourself?
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What do you know that we do not know?
What do you understand that is not clear to us?
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Both the gray-haired and the aged are among us,
older than your father.
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Are the comforts of God too small for you,
or the word that deals gently with you?
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Why does your heart carry you away,
and why do your eyes flash,
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that you turn your spirit against God
and bring such words out of your mouth?
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What is man, that he can be pure?
Or he who is born of a woman, that he can be righteous?
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Behold, God puts no trust in his holy ones,
and the heavens are not pure in his sight;
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how much less one who is abominable and corrupt,
a man who drinks injustice like water!
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"I will show you; hear me,
and what I have seen I will declare
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(what wise men have told,
without hiding it from their fathers,
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to whom alone the land was given,
and no stranger passed among them).
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The wicked man writhes in pain all his days,
through all the years that are laid up for the ruthless.
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Dreadful sounds are in his ears;
in prosperity the destroyer will come upon him.
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He does not believe that he will return out of darkness,
and he is marked for the sword.
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He wanders abroad for bread, saying, 'Where is it?'
He knows that a day of darkness is ready at his hand;
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distress and anguish terrify him;
they prevail against him, like a king ready for battle.
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Because he has stretched out his hand against God
and defies the Almighty,
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running stubbornly against him
with a thickly bossed shield;
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because he has covered his face with his fat
and gathered fat upon his waist
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and has lived in desolate cities,
in houses that none should inhabit,
which were ready to become heaps of ruins;
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he will not be rich, and his wealth will not endure,
nor will his possessions spread over the earth;
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he will not depart from darkness;
the flame will dry up his shoots,
and by the breath of his mouth he will depart.
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Let him not trust in emptiness, deceiving himself,
for emptiness will be his payment.
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It will be paid in full before his time,
and his branch will not be green.
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He will shake off his unripe grape like the vine,
and cast off his blossom like the olive tree.
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For the company of the godless is barren,
and fire consumes the tents of bribery.
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They conceive trouble and give birth to evil,
and their womb prepares deceit."