Chapter 31

¹ I made a covenant with mine eyes, and I will not think upon a virgin. ² Now what portion has God given from above? and is there an inheritance given of the Mighty One from the highest? ³ Alas! destruction to the unrighteous, and rejection to them that do iniquity. ⁴ Will he not see my way, and number all my steps? ⁵ But if I had gone with scorners, and if too my foot has hasted to deceit: ⁶ (for I am weighed in a just balance, and the Lord knows my innocence:) ⁷ if my foot has turned aside out of the way, or if mine heart has followed mine eye, and if too I have touched gifts with my hands; ⁸ then let me sow, and let others eat; and let me be uprooted on the earth. ⁹ If my heart has gone forth after another man's wife, and if I laid wait at her doors; ¹⁰ then let my wife also please another, and let my children be brought low. ¹¹ For the rage of anger is not to be controlled, in the case of defiling another man's wife. ¹² For it is a fire burning on every side, and whomsoever it attacks, it utterly destroys.

¹³ And if too I despised the judgment of my servant or my handmaid, when they pleaded with me; ¹⁴ what then shall I do if the Lord should try me? and if also he should at all visit me, can I make an answer? ¹⁵ Were not they too formed as I also was formed in the womb? yea, we were formed in the same womb.

¹⁶ But the helpless missed not whatever need they had, and I did not ¹cause the eye of the widow to fail. ¹⁷ And if too I ate my morsel

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alone, and did not impart of it to the orphan; ¹⁸ (for I nourished them as a father from my youth and guided them from my mother's womb.) ¹⁹ And if too I overlooked the naked as he was perishing, and did not clothe him; ²⁰ and if the poor did not bless me, and their shoulders were not warmed with the fleece of my lambs; ²¹ if I lifted my hand against an orphan, trusting that my strength was far superior to his: ²² let them my shoulder start from the blade-bone, and my arm be crushed off from the elbow. ²³ For the fear of the Lord constrained me, and I cannot bear up by reason of his ²burden.

²⁴ If I made gold my treasure, and if too I trusted the precious stone; ²⁵ and if too I rejoiced when my wealth was abundant, and if too I laid my hand on innumerable treasures: (²⁶ do we not see the shining sun eclipsed, and the moon waning? for they have not power to continue:) ²⁷ and if my heart was secretly deceived, and if I have laid my hand upon my mouth and kissed it: ²⁸ let this also then be reckoned to me as the greatest iniquity: for I should have lied against the Lord Most High. ²⁹ And if too I was glad at the fall of mine enemies, and mine heart said, Aha! ³⁰ let then mine ear hear my curse, and let me be a byword among my people in my affliction.

³¹ And if too my handmaids have often said, Oh that we might be satisfied with his flesh; (whereas I was very kind: ³² for the stranger did not lodge without, and my door was opened to every one that came:) ³³ or if too having sinned unintentionally, I hid my sin; ³⁴ (for I did not stand in awe of a great multitude, so as not to declare boldly before them:) and if too I permitted a poor man to go out of my door with an empty bosom: (³³⁵ Oh that I had a hearer,)and if I had not feared the hand of the Lord; and as to the written charge which I had against any one, ³⁶ I would place it as a chaplet on my shoulders, and read it. ^{37 4}And if I did not read it and return it, having taken nothing from the debtor:

³⁸ If at any time the land groaned against me, and if its furrows mourned together; ³⁹ and if I ate its strength alone without price, and if I too grieved the heart of the owner of the soil, by taking aught from him: ⁴⁰ then let the nettle come up to me instead of wheat, and a bramble instead of barley. And Job ceased speaking.