Job 4–5

Chapter 4

Then Eliphaz, the Themanite, answered, and said:

²If we begin to speak to thee, perhaps thou wilt take it ill; but who can withhold the words he hath conceived?

³Behold thou hast taught many, and thou hast strengthened the weary hands:

⁴Thy words have confirmed them that were staggering, and thou hast strengthened the trembling knees:

⁵But now the scourge is come upon thee, and thou faintest: It hath touched thee, and thou art troubled.

⁶Where is thy fear, thy fortitude, thy patience, and the perfection of thy ways?

⁷Remember, I pray thee, who ever perished being innocent? or when were the just destroyed?

⁸On the contrary, I have seen those who work iniquity, and sow sorrows, and reap them,

⁹Perishing by the blast of God, and consumed by the spirit of his wrath.

¹⁰The roaring of the lion, and the voice of the lioness, and the teeth of the whelps of lions, are broken:

¹¹The tiger hath perished for want of prey, and the young lions are scattered abroad.

¹²Now there was a word spoken to me in private, and my ears by stealth, as it were, received the veins of its whisper.

¹³In the horror of a vision by night, when deep sleep is wont to hold men,

¹⁴Fear seized upon me, and trembling, and all my bones were affrighted:

¹⁵And when a spirit passed before me, the hair of my flesh stood up.

¹⁶There stood one whose countenance I knew not, an image before my eyes, and I heard the voice, as it were, of a gentle wind.

¹⁷Shall man be justified in comparison of God, or shall a man be more pure than his maker?

¹⁸Behold, they that serve him are not steadfast, and in his angels he found wickedness:

¹⁹How much more shall they that dwell in houses of clay, who have an earthly foundation, be consumed as with the moth?

²⁰From morning till evening they shall be cut down: and because no one understandeth, they shall perish for ever.

²¹And they that shall be left, shall be taken away from them: they shall die, and not in wisdom.

Chapter 5

Call now, if there be any that will answer thee, and turn to some of the saints.

²Anger indeed killeth the foolish, and envy slayeth the little one.

³I have seen a fool with a strong root, and I cursed his beauty immediately.

⁴His children shall be far from safety, and shall be destroyed in the gate, and there shall be none to deliver them.

⁵Whose harvest the hungry shall eat, and the armed man shall take him by violence, and the thirsty shall drink up his riches.

⁶Nothing upon earth is done without a cause, and sorrow doth not spring out of the ground.

⁷Man is born to labour, and the bird to fly.

⁸Wherefore I will pray to the Lord, and address my speech to God:

⁹Who doth great things, and unsearchable and wonderful things without number:

¹⁰Who giveth rain upon the face of the earth, and watereth all things with waters:

¹¹Who setteth up the humble on high, and comforteth with health those that mourn.

¹²Who bringeth to nought the designs of the malignant, so that their hands cannot accomplish what they had begun:

¹³Who catcheth the wise in their craftiness, and disappointeth the counsel of the wicked:

¹⁴They shall meet with darkness in the day, and grope at noonday as in the night.

¹⁵But he shall save the needy from the sword of their mouth, and the poor from the hand of the violent.

¹⁶And to the needy there shall be hope, but iniquity shall draw in her mouth.

¹⁷Blessed is the man whom God correcteth: refuse not, therefore, the chastising of the Lord.

¹⁸For he woundeth, and cureth: he striketh, and his hands shall heal.

¹⁹In six troubles he shall deliver thee, and in the seventh, evil shall not touch thee.

²⁰In famine he shall deliver thee from death; and in battle, from the hand of the sword.

²¹Thou shalt be hidden from the scourge of the tongue: and thou shalt not fear calamity when it cometh.

²²In destruction and famine thou shalt laugh: and thou shalt not be afraid of the beasts of the earth.

²³But thou shalt have a covenant with the stones of the lands, and the beasts of the earth shall be at peace with thee.

²⁴And thou shalt know that thy tabernacle is in peace, and visiting thy beauty, thou shalt not sin.

²⁵Thou shalt know also that thy seed shall be multiplied, and thy offspring like the grass of the earth.

²⁶Thou shalt enter into the grave in abundance, as a heap of wheat is brought in in its season.

²⁷Behold, this is even so, as we have searched out: which thou having heard, consider it thoroughly in thy mind.