Job 16–18

JOB’S REPLY TO ELIPHAZ

16Then Job answered:

²I have heard many things like these.

You are all miserable comforters.^q

³Is there no end to your empty^r words?

What provokes you that you continue testifying?

⁴If you were in my place I could also talk like you.

I could string words together against you

and shake my head at you.

⁵Instead, I would encourage you with my mouth,

and the consolation from my lips would bring relief.^s

⁶If I speak, my suffering is not relieved,

and if I hold back, does any of it leave me?

⁷Surely he^C has now exhausted me.

You have devastated my entire family.

⁸You have shriveled me up^D—it has become a witness;

my frailty rises up against me and testifies to my face.

⁹His anger tears at me, and he harasses^a me.

He gnashes his teeth at me.

My enemy pierces me with his eyes.

¹⁰They open their mouths against me

and strike my cheeks with contempt;^b

they join themselves together against me.

¹¹God hands me over to the unjust;^E

he throws me to the wicked.

¹²I was at ease, but he shattered me;

he seized me by the scruff of the neck

and smashed me to pieces.

He set me up as his target;^c

¹³his archers^A surround me.

He pierces my kidneys without mercy

and pours my bile on the ground.

¹⁴He breaks through my defenses again and again;^B

he charges at me like a warrior.^d

¹⁵I have sewn sackcloth over my skin;

I have buried my strength^C in the dust.^e

¹⁶My face has grown red with weeping,

and darkness^f covers my eyes,

¹⁷although my hands are free from violence^g

and my prayer is pure.

¹⁸Earth, do not cover my blood;

may my cry for help find no resting place.^h

¹⁹Even now my witness is in heaven,

and my advocate is in the heights!ⁱ

²⁰My friends scoff at me

as I weep before God.

²¹I wish that someone might argue for a man with God^j

just as anyone^D would for a friend.

²²For only a few years will pass

before I go the way of no return.

17My spirit is broken.

My days are extinguished.

A graveyard^k awaits me.

²Surely mockers surround^E me,

and my eyes must gaze at their rebellion.^l

³Accept my pledge! Put up security for me.^m

Who else will be my sponsor?^F

⁴You have closed their minds to understanding,

therefore you will not honor them.

⁵If a man denounces his friends for a price,

the eyes of his children will fail.

⁶He has made me an object of scorn to the people;

I have become a man people spit at.^Gn

⁷My eyes have grown dim from grief,

and my whole body has become but a shadow.

⁸The upright are appalled^o at this,

and the innocent are roused against the godless.

⁹Yet the righteous person will hold to his way,

and the one whose hands are clean^p will grow stronger.

¹⁰But come back and try again, all of you.^H

I will not find a wise man among you.

¹¹My days have slipped by;

my plans have been ruined,

even the things dear to my heart.

¹²They turned night into day

and made light seem near in the face of darkness.^q

¹³If I await Sheol as my home,

spread out my bed in darkness,

¹⁴and say to corruption, “You are my father,”

and to the maggot, “My mother” or “My sister,”^r

¹⁵where then is my hope?^s

Who can see any hope for me?

¹⁶Will it go down to the gates of Sheol,^t

or will we descend together to the dust?

BILDAD SPEAKS

18Then Bildad the Shuhite^u replied:

²How long until you stop talking?

Show some sense, and then we can talk.

³Why are we regarded as cattle,

as stupid in your sight?

⁴You who tear yourself in anger^A—

should the earth be abandoned on your account,

or a rock be removed from its place?

⁵Yes, the light^a of the wicked^b is extinguished;

the flame of his fire does not glow.

⁶The light in his tent grows dark,^c

and the lamp beside him is put out.

⁷His powerful stride is shortened,

and his own schemes trip him up.^d

⁸For his own feet lead him into a net,

and he strays into its mesh.

⁹A trap catches him by the heel;

a noose seizes him.

¹⁰A rope lies hidden for him on the ground,

and a snare waits for him along the path.

¹¹Terrors frighten him on every side^e

and harass him at every step.

¹²His strength is depleted;

disaster lies ready for him to stumble.^B

¹³Parts of his skin are eaten away;

death’s firstborn consumes his limbs.

¹⁴He is ripped from the security of his tent

and marched away to the king of terrors.

¹⁵Nothing he owned remains in his tent.

Burning sulfur^f is scattered over his home.

¹⁶His roots below dry up,

and his branches above wither away.^g

¹⁷All memory^h of him perishes from the earth;

he has no name anywhere.^C

¹⁸He is driven from light to darkness

and chased from the inhabited world.

¹⁹He has no children or descendants among his people,

no survivor where he used to live.ⁱ

²⁰Those in the west are appalled^j at his fate,

while those in the east tremble in horror.

²¹Indeed, such is the dwelling of the unjust man,

and this is the place of the one who does not know God.^k