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¹Then Job answered:

²Yes, I know what you’ve said is true, but how can a person be justified before God?

³If one wanted to take him to court, he could not answer God once in a thousand times.

⁴God is wise and all-powerful. Who has opposed him and come out unharmed?

⁵He removes mountains without their knowledge, overturning them in his anger.

⁶He shakes the earth from its place so that its pillars tremble.

⁷He commands the sun not to shine and seals off the stars.

⁸He alone stretches out the heavens and treads on the waves of the sea.

⁹He makes the stars: the Bear, Orion, the Pleiades, and the constellations of the southern sky.

¹⁰He does great and unsearchable things, wonders without number.

¹¹If he passed by me, I wouldn’t see him; if he went by, I wouldn’t recognize him.

¹²If he snatches something, who can stop him? Who can ask him, “What are you doing?”

¹³God does not hold back his anger; Rahab’s assistants cringe in fear beneath him!

¹⁴How then can I answer him or choose my arguments against him?

¹⁵Even if I were in the right, I could not answer. I could only beg my Judge for mercy.

¹⁶If I summoned him and he answered me, I do not believe he would pay attention to what I said.

¹⁷He batters me with a whirlwind and multiplies my wounds without cause.

¹⁸He doesn’t let me catch my breath but fills me with bitter experiences.

¹⁹If it is a matter of strength, look, he is the powerful one! If it is a matter of justice, who can summon him?

²⁰Even if I were in the right, my own mouth would condemn me; if I were blameless, my mouth would declare me guilty.

²¹Though I am blameless, I no longer care about myself; I renounce my life.

²²It is all the same. Therefore I say, “He destroys both the blameless and the wicked.”

²³When catastrophe brings sudden death, he mocks the despair of the innocent.

²⁴The earth is handed over to the wicked; he blindfolds its judges. If it isn’t he, then who is it?

²⁵My days fly by faster than a runner; they flee without seeing any good.

²⁶They sweep by like boats made of papyrus, like an eagle swooping down on its prey.

²⁷If I said, “I will forget my complaint, change my expression, and smile,”

²⁸I would still live in terror of all my pains. I know you will not acquit me.

²⁹Since I will be found guilty, why should I struggle in vain?

³⁰If I wash myself with snow, and cleanse my hands with lye,

³¹then you dip me in a pit of mud, and my own clothes despise me!

³²For he is not a man like me, that I can answer him, that we can take each other to court.

³³There is no mediator between us, to lay his hand on both of us.

³⁴Let him take his rod away from me so his terror will no longer frighten me.

³⁵Then I would speak and not fear him. But that is not the case; I am on my own.

¹I am disgusted with my life. I will give vent to my complaint and speak in the bitterness of my soul.

²I will say to God, “Do not declare me guilty! Let me know why you prosecute me.

³Is it good for you to oppress, to reject the work of your hands, and favor the plans of the wicked?

⁴Do you have eyes of flesh, or do you see as a human sees?

⁵Are your days like those of a human, or your years like those of a man,

⁶that you look for my iniquity and search for my sin,

⁷even though you know that I am not wicked and that there is no one who can rescue from your power?

⁸“Your hands shaped me and formed me. Will you now turn and destroy me?

⁹Please remember that you formed me like clay. Will you now return me to dust?

¹⁰Did you not pour me out like milk and curdle me like cheese?

¹¹You clothed me with skin and flesh, and wove me together with bones and tendons.

¹²You gave me life and faithful love, and your care has guarded my life.

¹³“Yet you concealed these thoughts in your heart; I know that this was your hidden plan:

¹⁴if I sin, you would notice, and would not acquit me of my iniquity.

¹⁵If I am wicked, woe to me! And even if I am righteous, I cannot lift up my head. I am filled with shame and have drunk deeply of my affliction.

¹⁶If I am proud, you hunt me like a lion and again display your miraculous power against me.

¹⁷You produce new witnesses against me and multiply your anger toward me. Hardships assault me, wave after wave.

¹⁸“Why did you bring me out of the womb? I should have died and never been seen.

¹⁹I wish I had never existed but had been carried from the womb to the grave.

²⁰Are my days not few? Stop it! Leave me alone, so that I can smile a little

²¹before I go to a land of darkness and gloom, never to return.

²²It is a land of blackness like the deepest darkness, gloomy and chaotic, where even the light is like the darkness.”

¹Then Zophar the Naamathite replied:

²Should this abundance of words go unanswered and such a talker be acquitted?

³Should your babbling put others to silence, so that you can keep on ridiculing with no one to humiliate you?

⁴You have said, “My teaching is sound, and I am pure in your sight.”

⁵But if only God would speak and open his lips against you!

⁶He would show you the secrets of wisdom, for true wisdom has two sides. Know then that God has chosen to overlook some of your iniquity.

⁷Can you fathom the depths of God or discover the limits of the Almighty?

⁸They are higher than the heavens — what can you do? They are deeper than Sheol — what can you know?

⁹Their measure is longer than the earth and wider than the sea.

¹⁰If he passes by and throws someone in prison or convenes a court, who can stop him?

¹¹Surely he knows which people are worthless. If he sees iniquity, will he not take note of it?

¹²But a stupid person will gain understanding as soon as a wild donkey is born a human!

¹³As for you, if you redirect your heart and spread out your hands to him in prayer —

¹⁴if there is iniquity in your hand, remove it, and don’t allow injustice to dwell in your tents —

¹⁵then you will hold your head high, free from fault. You will be firmly established and unafraid.

¹⁶For you will forget your suffering, recalling it only as water that has flowed by.

¹⁷Your life will be brighter than noonday; its darkness will be like the morning.

¹⁸You will be confident, because there is hope. You will look carefully about and lie down in safety.

¹⁹You will lie down with no one to frighten you, and many will seek your favor.

²⁰But the sight of the wicked will fail. Their way of escape will be cut off, and their only hope is their last breath.

¹Then Job answered:

²No doubt you are the people, and wisdom will die with you!

³But I also have a mind like you; I am not inferior to you. Who doesn’t know the things you are talking about?

⁴I am a laughingstock to my friends, by calling on God, who answers me. The righteous and upright man is a laughingstock.

⁵The one who is at ease holds calamity in contempt and thinks it is prepared for those whose feet are slipping.

⁶The tents of robbers are safe, and those who trouble God are secure; God holds them in his hands.

⁷But ask the animals, and they will instruct you; ask the birds of the sky, and they will tell you.

⁸Or speak to the earth, and it will instruct you; let the fish of the sea inform you.

⁹Which of all these does not know that the hand of the LORD has done this?

¹⁰The life of every living thing is in his hand, as well as the breath of all mankind.

¹¹Doesn’t the ear test words as the palate tastes food?

¹²Wisdom is found with the elderly, and understanding comes with long life.

¹³Wisdom and strength belong to God; counsel and understanding are his.

¹⁴Whatever he tears down cannot be rebuilt; whoever he imprisons cannot be released.

¹⁵When he withholds water, everything dries up, and when he releases it, it destroys the land.

¹⁶True wisdom and power belong to him. The deceived and the deceiver are his.

¹⁷He leads counselors away barefoot and makes judges go mad.

¹⁸He releases the bonds put on by kings and fastens a belt around their waists.

¹⁹He leads priests away barefoot and overthrows established leaders.

²⁰He deprives trusted advisers of speech and takes away the elders’ good judgment.

²¹He pours out contempt on nobles and disarms the strong.

²²He reveals mysteries from the darkness and brings the deepest darkness into the light.

²³He makes nations great, then destroys them; he enlarges nations, then leads them away.

²⁴He deprives the world’s leaders of reason, and makes them wander in a trackless wasteland.

²⁵They grope around in darkness without light; he makes them stagger like a drunkard.