Job 4:12–5:7

¹²A word was brought to me in secret;

my ears caught a whisper of it.^s

¹³Among unsettling thoughts from visions in the night,^t

when deep sleep^u comes over men,

¹⁴fear and trembling came over me^v

and made all my bones shake.

¹⁵I felt a draft^D on my face,

and the hair on my body stood up.

¹⁶A figure stood there,

but I could not recognize its appearance;

a form loomed before my eyes.

I heard a whispering voice:

¹⁷“Can a mortal be righteous before God?

Can a man be more pure than his Maker?”^w

¹⁸If God puts no trust in his servants

and he charges his angels with foolishness,^Ex

¹⁹how much more those who dwell in clay houses,^y

whose foundation is in the dust,

who are crushed like a moth!

²⁰They are smashed to pieces from dawn to dusk;

they perish forever while no one notices.^z

²¹Are their tent cords not pulled up?

They die without wisdom.^aa

5Call out! Will anyone answer you?

Which of the holy ones^ab will you turn to?

²For anger kills a fool,

and jealousy slays the gullible.^ac

³I have seen a fool taking root,

but I immediately pronounced a curse on his home.

⁴His children are far from safety.

They are crushed at the city gate,^ad

with no one to rescue them.

⁵The hungry consume his harvest,

even taking it out of the thorns.^A

The thirsty^B pant for his children’s wealth.

⁶For distress does not grow out of the soil,

and trouble does not sprout from the ground.

⁷But humans are born for trouble^a

as surely as sparks fly upward.