Job 15:17–35

¹⁷I will show thee, hear thou me;

And that which I have seen I will declare

¹⁸(Which wise men have told

From their fathers, and have not hid it;

¹⁹Unto whom alone the land was given,

And no stranger passed among them):

²⁰The wicked man travaileth with pain all his days,

Even the number of years that are laid up for the oppressor.

²¹A sound of terrors is in his ears;

In prosperity the destroyer shall come upon him.

²²He believeth not that he shall return out of darkness,

And he is waited for of the sword.

²³He wandereth abroad for bread, saying, Where is it?

He knoweth that the day of darkness is ready at his hand.

²⁴Distress and anguish make him afraid;

They prevail against him, as a king ready to the battle.

²⁵Because he hath stretched out his hand against God,

And behaveth himself proudly against the Almighty;

²⁶He runneth upon him with a stiff neck,

With the thick bosses of his bucklers;

²⁷Because he hath covered his face with his fatness,

And gathered fat upon his loins;

²⁸And he hath dwelt in desolate cities,

In houses which no man inhabited,

Which were ready to become heaps;

²⁹He shall not be rich, neither shall his substance continue,

Neither shall their possessions be extended on the earth.

³⁰He shall not depart out of darkness;

The flame shall dry up his branches,

And by the breath of God’s mouth shall he go away.

³¹Let him not trust in vanity, deceiving himself;

For vanity shall be his recompense.

³²It shall be accomplished before his time,

And his branch shall not be green.

³³He shall shake off his unripe grape as the vine,

And shall cast off his flower as the olive-tree.

³⁴For the company of the godless shall be barren,

And fire shall consume the tents of bribery.

³⁵They conceive mischief, and bring forth iniquity,

And their heart prepareth deceit.