Job 5

Job Is Corrected by God

⁵“Call now; is there anyone who will answer you?

To which of the holy ones will you turn?^*

²Surely vexation kills the fool,

and jealousy slays the simple.^*

³I have seen fools taking root,

but suddenly I cursed their dwelling.^*

⁴Their children are far from safety,

they are crushed in the gate,

and there is no one to deliver them.^*

⁵The hungry eat their harvest,

and they take it even out of the thorns,^x

and the thirsty^y pant after their wealth.^*

⁶For misery does not come from the earth,

nor does trouble sprout from the ground,

⁷but humans are born to trouble

just as sparks^z fly upward.^*

⁸“As for me, I would seek God,

and to God I would commit my cause.^*

⁹He does great things and unsearchable,

marvelous things without number.^*

¹⁰He gives rain on the earth

and sends waters on the fields;^*

¹¹he sets on high those who are lowly,

and those who mourn are lifted to safety.^*

¹²He frustrates the devices of the crafty,

so that their hands achieve no success.^*

¹³He takes the wise in their own craftiness,

and the schemes of the wily are brought to a quick end.

¹⁴They meet with darkness in the daytime

and grope at noonday as in the night.^*

¹⁵But he saves the needy from the sword of their mouth,

from the hand of the mighty.^*

¹⁶So the poor have hope,

and injustice shuts its mouth.^*

¹⁷“How happy is the one whom God reproves;

therefore do not despise the discipline of the Almighty.^a*

¹⁸For he wounds, but he binds up;

he strikes, but his hands heal.^*

¹⁹He will deliver you from six troubles;

in seven no harm shall touch you.^*

²⁰In famine he will redeem you from death

and in war from the power of the sword.^*

²¹You shall be hidden from the scourge of the tongue

and shall not fear destruction when it comes.^*

²²At destruction and famine you shall laugh

and shall not fear the wild animals of the earth.^*

²³For you shall be in league with the stones of the field,

and the wild animals shall be at peace with you.^*

²⁴You shall know that your tent is safe;

you shall inspect your fold and miss nothing.^*

²⁵You shall know that your descendants will be many

and your offspring like the grass of the earth.^*

²⁶You shall come to your grave in ripe old age,

as a shock of grain comes up to the threshing floor in its season.^*

²⁷See, we have searched this out; it is true.

Hear, and know it for yourself.”