| |
New Living Translation |   | |
 |
| |
| | Job 15:1 | Then Eliphaz the Temanite replied:
| |
| | Job 15:2 | "You are supposed to be a wise man, and yet you give us all this foolish talk. You are nothing but a windbag.
| |
| | Job 15:3 | It isn't right to speak so foolishly. What good do such words do?
| |
| | Job 15:4 | Have you no fear of God, no reverence for him?
| |
| | Job 15:5 | Your sins are telling your mouth what to say. Your words are based on clever deception.
| |
| | Job 15:6 | But why should I condemn you? Your own mouth does!
| |
| | Job 15:7 | "Were you the first person ever born? Were you born before the hills were made?
| |
| | Job 15:8 | Were you listening at God's secret council? Do you have a monopoly on wisdom?
| |
| | Job 15:9 | What do you know that we don't? What do you understand that we don't?
| |
| | Job 15:10 | On our side are aged, gray-haired men much older than your father!
| |
| | Job 15:11 | "Is God's comfort too little for you? Is his gentle word not enough?
| |
| | Job 15:12 | What has captured your reason? What has weakened your vision,
| |
| | Job 15:13 | that you turn against God and say all these evil things?
| |
| | Job 15:14 | Can a mortal be pure? Can a human be just?
| |
| | Job 15:15 | Why, God doesn't even trust the angels! Even the heavens cannot be absolutely pure in his sight.
| |
| | Job 15:16 | How much less pure is a corrupt and sinful person with a thirst for wickedness!
| |
| | Job 15:17 | "If you will listen, I will answer you from my own experience.
| |
| | Job 15:18 | And it is confirmed by the experience of wise men who have heard the same thing from their fathers,
| |
| | Job 15:19 | those to whom the land was given long before any foreigners arrived.
| |
| | Job 15:20 | "Wicked people are in pain throughout their lives.
| |
| | Job 15:21 | They are surrounded by terrors, and even on good days they fear the attack of the destroyer.
| |
| | Job 15:22 | They dare not go out into the darkness for fear they will be murdered.
| |
| | Job 15:23 | They wander abroad for bread, saying, 'Where is it?' They know their ruin is certain.
| |
| | Job 15:24 | That dark day terrifies them. They live in distress and anguish, like a king preparing for an attack.
| |
| | Job 15:25 | For they have clenched their fists against God, defying the Almighty.
| |
| | Job 15:26 | Holding their strong shields, they defiantly charge against him.
| |
| | Job 15:27 | "These wicked people are fat and rich,
| |
| | Job 15:28 | but their cities will be ruined. They will live in abandoned houses that are ready to tumble down.
| |
| | Job 15:29 | They will not continue to be rich. Their wealth will not endure, and their possessions will no longer spread across the horizon.
| |
| | Job 15:30 | "They will not escape the darkness. The flame will burn them up, and the breath of God will destroy everything they have.
| |
| | Job 15:31 | Let them no longer trust in empty riches. They are only fooling themselves, for emptiness will be their only reward.
| |
| | Job 15:32 | They will be cut down in the prime of life, and all they counted on will disappear.
| |
| | Job 15:33 | They will be like a vine whose grapes are harvested before they are ripe, like an olive tree that sheds its blossoms so the fruit cannot form.
| |
| | Job 15:34 | For the godless are barren. Their homes, enriched through bribery, will be consumed by fire.
| |
| | Job 15:35 | They conceive trouble and evil, and their hearts give birth only to deceit."
| |
