Job 24–26

1“Why aren’t times laid up by the Almighty? Why don’t those who know him see his days?

2There are people who remove the landmarks. They violently take away flocks, and feed them.

3They drive away the donkey of the fatherless, and they take the widow’s ox for a pledge.

4They turn the needy out of the way. The poor of the earth all hide themselves.

5Behold, as wild donkeys in the desert, they go out to their work, seeking diligently for food. The wilderness yields them bread for their children.

6They cut their food in the field. They glean the vineyard of the wicked.

7They lie all night naked without clothing, and have no covering in the cold.

8They are wet with the showers of the mountains, and embrace the rock for lack of a shelter.

9There are those who pluck the fatherless from the breast, and take a pledge of the poor,

10so that they go around naked without clothing. Being hungry, they carry the sheaves.

11They make oil within the walls of these men. They tread wine presses, and suffer thirst.

12From out of the populous city, men groan. The soul of the wounded cries out, yet God doesn’t regard the folly.

13“These are of those who rebel against the light. They don’t know its ways, nor stay in its paths.

14The murderer rises with the light. He kills the poor and needy. In the night he is like a thief.

15The eye also of the adulterer waits for the twilight, saying, ‘No eye will see me.’ He disguises his face.

16In the dark they dig through houses. They shut themselves up in the daytime. They don’t know the light.

17For the morning is to all of them like thick darkness, for they know the terrors of the thick darkness.

18“They are foam on the surface of the waters. Their portion is cursed in the earth. They don’t turn into the way of the vineyards.

19Drought and heat consume the snow waters, so does Sheol those who have sinned.

20The womb will forget him. The worm will feed sweetly on him. He will be no more remembered. Unrighteousness will be broken as a tree.

21He devours the barren who don’t bear. He shows no kindness to the widow.

22Yet God preserves the mighty by his power. He rises up who has no assurance of life.

23God gives them security, and they rest in it. His eyes are on their ways.

24They are exalted; yet a little while, and they are gone. Yes, they are brought low, they are taken out of the way as all others, and are cut off as the tops of the ears of grain.

25If it isn’t so now, who will prove me a liar, and make my speech worth nothing?”

1Then Bildad the Shuhite answered,

2“Dominion and fear are with him. He makes peace in his high places.

3Can his armies be counted? On whom does his light not arise?

4How then can man be just with God? Or how can he who is born of a woman be clean?

5Behold, even the moon has no brightness, and the stars are not pure in his sight;

6How much less man, who is a worm, and the son of man, who is a worm!”

1Then Job answered,

2“How have you helped him who is without power! How have you saved the arm that has no strength!

3How have you counseled him who has no wisdom, and plentifully declared sound knowledge!

4To whom have you uttered words? Whose spirit came out of you?

5“The departed spirits tremble, those beneath the waters and all that live in them.

6Sheol is naked before God, and Abaddon has no covering.

7He stretches out the north over empty space, and hangs the earth on nothing.

8He binds up the waters in his thick clouds, and the cloud is not burst under them.

9He encloses the face of his throne, and spreads his cloud on it.

10He has described a boundary on the surface of the waters, and to the confines of light and darkness.

11The pillars of heaven tremble and are astonished at his rebuke.

12He stirs up the sea with his power, and by his understanding he strikes through Rahab.

13By his Spirit the heavens are garnished. His hand has pierced the swift serpent.

14Behold, these are but the outskirts of his ways. How small a whisper do we hear of him! But the thunder of his power who can understand?”