Job 15:17–35

¹⁷“Listen to me, and I will tell you about it;

I will tell you what I have seen.

¹⁸These are things wise men have told;

their ancestors told them, and they have hidden nothing.

¹⁹(The land was given to their fathers only,

and no foreigner lived among them.)

²⁰The wicked suffer pain all their lives;

the cruel suffer during all the years saved up for them.

²¹Terrible sounds fill their ears,

and when things seem to be going well, robbers attack them.

²²Evil people give up trying to escape from the darkness;

it has been decided that they will die by the sword.

²³They wander around and will become food for vultures.

They know darkness will soon come.

²⁴Worry and suffering terrify them;

they overwhelm them, like a king ready to attack,

²⁵because they shake their fists at God

and try to get their own way against the Almighty.

²⁶They stubbornly charge at God

with thick, strong shields.

²⁷“Although the faces of the wicked are thick with fat,

and their bellies are fat with flesh,

²⁸they will live in towns that are ruined,

in houses where no one lives,

which are crumbling into ruins.

²⁹The wicked will no longer get rich,

and the riches they have will not last;

the things they own will no longer spread over the land.

³⁰They will not escape the darkness.

A flame will dry up their branches;

God’s breath will carry the wicked away.

³¹The wicked should not fool themselves by trusting what is useless.

If they do, they will get nothing in return.

³²Their branches will dry up before they finish growing

and will never turn green.

³³They will be like a vine whose grapes are pulled off before they are ripe,

like an olive tree that loses its blossoms.

³⁴People without God can produce nothing.

Fire will destroy the tents of those who take money to do evil,

³⁵who plan trouble and give birth to evil,

whose hearts plan ways to trick others.”