Eliphaz rebuked Job again
15
1 Then Eliphaz replied to Job:2 “If you were truly wise, you would not have replied to us by claiming that you know a lot;
what you are saying is just a lot of hot air.
3 You should not be saying things that do not benefit anyone,
using words that do no one any good.
4 by what you say, you show that you do not revere God,
and you are hindering people from meditating about God.
5 Your sins are telling you what to say;
you talk like people who will not admit that they are wicked.
6 Everything that you say shows that you should be punished;
so, it is not necessary for me to show that.
7 Tell me, do you know more than everyone else because you think that you are the first person who was ever born?
Were you born before the hills were created?
8 Were you listening when God made all his plans?
Or do you think that you are the only person who is wise?
9 You do not know anything that we do not know.
You do not understand anything that is not also clear to us.
10 My friends and I are also wise;
we acquired wisdom from old gray-haired people,
from people who were born before your father was born.
11 God wants to comfort you,
and to speak kindly to you;
do you need more than that?
12 Why do you allow yourself to be excited by your emotions?
Why are you very angry, with the result that your eyes flash?
13 You are angry with God,
and so you are criticizing him.
14 No person, including you, can be sinless.
No one on the earth can be completely righteous.
15 Hey, God does not even trust his angels;
he does not consider even them to be completely pure.
16 So, he certainly does not trust disgusting and depraved people
who commit evil deeds as easily as they drink water.
17 Job, listen to what I will tell you.
I will declare to you what I know,
18 things that wise men have told me,
truths that their ancestors did not keep hidden.
19 God gave this land to those ancestors, who were truly wise;
no one from another country caused them to think wrongly.
20 It is wicked people who suffer with great pain all the time that they are alive;
that is what happens to those who act violently toward others.
21 They constantly hear sounds that terrify them;
while they are prospering, bandits attack them.
22 Wicked people surely know that they will not escape from darkness or death,
because they are sure that someone is waiting to kill them with a sword.
23 They wander around, searching for food, saying ‘Where can I find some?’
And they know that they will soon experience disasters.
24 Because they are afraid of those things happening to them, they are afraid and worry
that those things will attack them like the army of a king waits to attack their enemies and cause them to suffer.
25 Those things happen to them because they shook their fists against Almighty God
and thought that they were strong enough to defeat him.
26 They stubbornly rush to attack God
as though they are carrying a strong shield to protect themselves.
27 They are so fat that they are unable to fight.
28 They will live in cities that have been abandoned,
cities which have become a heap of ruins.
Everything that they own will be taken from them,
and their possessions will disappear from the earth.
30 They will not escape from the darkness of death;
they will be like trees whose branches are burned by fire
and whose blossoms are blown away by the wind.
31 Since they are very foolish, with the result that they trust in things that are really worthless,
then things that are worthless will be all that they will get.
32 Before they are old, they will disappear;
they will be like branches that wither and never become green again.
33 They will be like vines whose grapes fall off before they are ripe,
like olive trees whose blossoms fall off before they produce any fruit.
34 Groups of godless people will not have any descendants,
and fires will completely burn up the homes of those who built those homes using money they received from bribes.
35 They plan to cause trouble and to do evil things,
and in their inner beings they are always preparing to deceive people.”