Job 19–20

Chapter 19

Job’s Sixth Speech: A Response to Bildad

Then Job spoke again:

²“How long will you torture me?

How long will you try to crush me with your words?

³You have already insulted me ten times.

You should be ashamed of treating me so badly.

⁴Even if I have sinned,

that is my concern, not yours.

⁵You think you’re better than I am,

using my humiliation as evidence of my sin.

⁶But it is God who has wronged me,

capturing me in his net.

⁷“I cry out, ‘Help!’ but no one answers me.

I protest, but there is no justice.

⁸God has blocked my way so I cannot move.

He has plunged my path into darkness.

⁹He has stripped me of my honor

and removed the crown from my head.

¹⁰He has demolished me on every side, and I am finished.

He has uprooted my hope like a fallen tree.

¹¹His fury burns against me;

he counts me as an enemy.

¹²His troops advance.

They build up roads to attack me.

They camp all around my tent.

¹³“My relatives stay far away,

and my friends have turned against me.

¹⁴My family is gone,

and my close friends have forgotten me.

¹⁵My servants and maids consider me a stranger.

I am like a foreigner to them.

¹⁶When I call my servant, he doesn’t come;

I have to plead with him!

¹⁷My breath is repulsive to my wife.

I am rejected by my own family.

¹⁸Even young children despise me.

When I stand to speak, they turn their backs on me.

¹⁹My close friends detest me.

Those I loved have turned against me.

²⁰I have been reduced to skin and bones

and have escaped death by the skin of my teeth.

²¹“Have mercy on me, my friends, have mercy,

for the hand of God has struck me.

²²Must you also persecute me, like God does?

Haven’t you chewed me up enough?

²³“Oh, that my words could be recorded.

Oh, that they could be inscribed on a monument,

²⁴carved with an iron chisel and filled with lead,

engraved forever in the rock.

²⁵“But as for me, I know that my Redeemer lives,

and he will stand upon the earth at last.

²⁶And after my body has decayed,

yet in my body I will see God!

²⁷I will see him for myself.

Yes, I will see him with my own eyes.

I am overwhelmed at the thought!

²⁸“How dare you go on persecuting me,

saying, ‘It’s his own fault’?

²⁹You should fear punishment yourselves,

for your attitude deserves punishment.

Then you will know that there is indeed a judgment.”

Chapter 20

Zophar’s Second Response to Job

Then Zophar the Naamathite replied:

²“I must reply

because I am greatly disturbed.

³I’ve had to endure your insults,

but now my spirit prompts me to reply.

⁴“Don’t you realize that from the beginning of time,

ever since people were first placed on the earth,

⁵the triumph of the wicked has been short lived

and the joy of the godless has been only temporary?

⁶Though the pride of the godless reaches to the heavens

and their heads touch the clouds,

⁷yet they will vanish forever,

thrown away like their own dung.

Those who knew them will ask,

‘Where are they?’

⁸They will fade like a dream and not be found.

They will vanish like a vision in the night.

⁹Those who once saw them will see them no more.

Their families will never see them again.

¹⁰Their children will beg from the poor,

for they must give back their stolen riches.

¹¹Though they are young,

their bones will lie in the dust.

¹²“They enjoyed the sweet taste of wickedness,

letting it melt under their tongue.

¹³They savored it,

holding it long in their mouths.

¹⁴But suddenly the food in their bellies turns sour,

a poisonous venom in their stomach.

¹⁵They will vomit the wealth they swallowed.

God won’t let them keep it down.

¹⁶They will suck the poison of cobras.

The viper will kill them.

¹⁷They will never again enjoy streams of olive oil

or rivers of milk and honey.

¹⁸They will give back everything they worked for.

Their wealth will bring them no joy.

¹⁹For they oppressed the poor and left them destitute.

They foreclosed on their homes.

²⁰They were always greedy and never satisfied.

Nothing remains of all the things they dreamed about.

²¹Nothing is left after they finish gorging themselves.

Therefore, their prosperity will not endure.

²²“In the midst of plenty, they will run into trouble

and be overcome by misery.

²³May God give them a bellyful of trouble.

May God rain down his anger upon them.

²⁴When they try to escape an iron weapon,

a bronze-tipped arrow will pierce them.

²⁵The arrow is pulled from their back,

and the arrowhead glistens with blood.

The terrors of death are upon them.

²⁶Their treasures will be thrown into deepest darkness.

A wildfire will devour their goods,

consuming all they have left.

²⁷The heavens will reveal their guilt,

and the earth will testify against them.

²⁸A flood will sweep away their house.

God’s anger will descend on them in torrents.

²⁹This is the reward that God gives the wicked.

It is the inheritance decreed by God.”