Job Replies: The Lord Has Done This

¹Then Job answered and said:

²“No doubt you are the people,

and wisdom will die with you.

³But I have understanding as well as you;

I am not inferior to you.

Who does not know such things as these?

⁴I am a laughingstock to my friends;

I, who called to God and he answered me,

a just and blameless man, am a laughingstock.

⁵In the thought of one who is at ease there is contempt for misfortune;

it is ready for those whose feet slip.

⁶The tents of robbers are at peace,

and those who provoke God are secure,

who bring their god in their hand.1

⁷“But ask the beasts, and they will teach you;

the birds of the heavens, and they will tell you;

⁸or the bushes of the earth,2 and they will teach you;

and the fish of the sea will declare to you.

⁹Who among all these does not know

that the hand of the Lord has done this?

¹⁰In his hand is the life of every living thing

and the breath of all mankind.

¹¹Does not the ear test words

as the palate tastes food?

¹²Wisdom is with the aged,

and understanding in length of days.

¹³“With God3 are wisdom and might;

he has counsel and understanding.

¹⁴If he tears down, none can rebuild;

if he shuts a man in, none can open.

¹⁵If he withholds the waters, they dry up;

if he sends them out, they overwhelm the land.

¹⁶With him are strength and sound wisdom;

the deceived and the deceiver are his.

¹⁷He leads counselors away stripped,

and judges he makes fools.

¹⁸He looses the bonds of kings

and binds a waistcloth on their hips.

¹⁹He leads priests away stripped

and overthrows the mighty.

²⁰He deprives of speech those who are trusted

and takes away the discernment of the elders.

²¹He pours contempt on princes

and loosens the belt of the strong.

²²He uncovers the deeps out of darkness

and brings deep darkness to light.

²³He makes nations great, and he destroys them;

he enlarges nations, and leads them away.

²⁴He takes away understanding from the chiefs of the people of the earth

and makes them wander in a trackless waste.

²⁵They grope in the dark without light,

and he makes them stagger like a drunken man.