Chapter 36

¹Elihu also continued, and said,

²“Bear with me a little, and I will show you;

For I still have something to say on God’s behalf.

³I will get my knowledge from afar,

And will ascribe righteousness to my Maker.

⁴For truly my words are not false.

One who is perfect in knowledge is with you.

⁵“Behold, God is mighty, and doesn’t despise anyone.

He is mighty in strength of understanding.

⁶He doesn’t preserve the life of the wicked,

But gives to the afflicted their right.

⁷He doesn’t withdraw his eyes from the righteous,

But with kings on the throne,

He sets them forever, and they are exalted.

⁸If they are bound in fetters,

And are taken in the cords of afflictions,

⁹Then he shows them their work,

And their transgressions, that they have behaved themselves proudly.

¹⁰He also opens their ears to instruction,

And commands that they return from iniquity.

¹¹If they listen and serve him,

They shall spend their days in prosperity,

And their years in pleasures.

¹²But if they don’t listen, they shall perish by the sword;

They shall die without knowledge.

¹³“But those who are godless in heart lay up anger.

They don’t cry for help when he binds them.

¹⁴They die in youth.

Their life perishes among the unclean.

¹⁵He delivers the afflicted by their affliction,

And opens their ear in oppression.

¹⁶Yes, he would have allured you out of distress,

Into a broad place, where there is no restriction.

That which is set on your table would be full of fatness.

¹⁷“But you are full of the judgment of the wicked.

Judgment and justice take hold of you.

¹⁸Don’t let riches entice you to wrath,

Neither let the great size of a bribe turn you aside.

¹⁹Would your wealth sustain you in distress,

Or all the might of your strength?

²⁰Don’t desire the night,

When people are cut off in their place.

²¹Take heed, don’t regard iniquity;

For this you have chosen rather than affliction.

²²Behold, God is exalted in his power.

Who is a teacher like him?

²³Who has prescribed his way for him?

Or who can say, ‘You have committed unrighteousness?’

²⁴“Remember that you magnify his work,

Whereof men have sung.

²⁵All men have looked thereon.

Man sees it afar off.

²⁶Behold, God is great, and we don’t know him.

The number of his years is unsearchable.

²⁷For he draws up the drops of water,

Which distill in rain from his vapor,

²⁸Which the skies pour down

And drop on man abundantly.

²⁹Yes, can any understand the spreading of the clouds,

And the thunderings of his pavilion?

³⁰Behold, he spreads his light around him.

He covers the bottom of the sea.

³¹For by these he judges the people.

He gives food in abundance.

³²He covers his hands with the lightning,

And commands it to strike the mark.

³³The noise of it tells about him,

And the livestock also concerning the storm that comes up.