Chapter 21

¹ But Job answered and said,

² Hear ye, hear ye my words, that I may not have this consolation from you. ³ Raise me, and I will speak; then ye shall not laugh me to scorn. ⁴ What! is my reproof of man? and why should I not be angry? ⁵ Look upon me, and wonder, laying your hand upon your cheek.

⁶ For even when I remember, I am alarmed, and pains seize my flesh. ⁷ Wherefore do the ungodly live, and grow old even in wealth? ⁸ Their seed is according to their desire, and their children are in their sight. ⁹ Their houses are prosperous, neither have they any where cause for fear, neither is there a scourge from the Lord upon them. ¹⁰ Their cow does not

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cast her calf, and their beast with young is safe, and does not miscarry. ¹¹ And they remain as an ¹unfailing flock, and their children play before them, taking up the psaltery and harp; ¹² and they rejoice at the voice of a song. ¹³ And they spend their days in wealth, and fall asleep in the rest of the grave. ¹⁴ Yet such a man says to the Lord, Depart from me; I desire not to know thy ways. ¹⁵ What is the Mighty One, that we should serve him? and what profit is there that we should approach him?

¹⁶ For their good things were in their hands, but he regards not the works of the ungodly. ¹⁷ Nevertheless, the lamp of the ungodly also shall be put out, and destruction shall come upon them, and pangs of vengeance shall seize them. ¹⁸ And they shall be as chaff before the wind, or as dust which the storm has taken up. ¹⁹ Let his substance fail to supply his children: God shall recompense him, and he shall know it. ²⁰ Let his eyes see his own destruction, and let him not ²be saved by the Lord. ²¹ For his desire is in his house with him, and the number of his months has been suddenly cut off.

²² Is it not the Lord who teaches understanding and knowledge? and does not he judge murders? ²³ One shall die in ³his perfect strength, and wholly at ease and prosperous; ²⁴ and his inwards are full of fat, and his marrow is diffused throughout him. ²⁵ And another dies in bitterness of soul, not eating any good thing. ²⁶ But they lie down in the earth together, and corruption covers them.

²⁷ So I know you, that ye presumptuously attack me: ²⁸ so that ye will say, Where is the house of the prince? and where is the covering of the tabernacles of the ungodly? ²⁹ Ask those that go by the way, and do not disown their tokens. ³⁰ For the wicked hastens to the day of destruction: they shall be led away for the day of his vengeance. ³¹ Who will tell him his way to his face, whereas he has done it? who shall recompense him? ³² And he has been led away to the tombs, and he has watched over the heaps. ³³ The stones of the valley have been sweet to him, and every man shall depart after him, and there are innumerable ones before him. ³⁴ How then do ye comfort me in vain? whereas ⁴I have no rest from your molestation.