| 章 |
| 21:1 |
Then Job answered:
|
| 21:2 |
"Listen carefully to my words, and let this be your consolation.
|
| 21:3 |
Bear with me, and I will speak; then after I have spoken, mock on.
|
| 21:4 |
As for me, is my complaint addressed to mortals? Why should I not be impatient?
|
| 21:5 |
Look at me, and be appalled, and lay your hand upon your mouth.
|
| 21:6 |
When I think of it I am dismayed, and shuddering seizes my flesh.
|
| 21:7 |
Why do the wicked live on, reach old age, and grow mighty in power?
|
| 21:8 |
Their children are established in their presence, and their offspring before their eyes.
|
| 21:9 |
Their houses are safe from fear, and no rod of God is upon them.
|
| 21:10 |
Their bull breeds without fail; their cow calves and never miscarries.
|
| 21:11 |
They send out their little ones like a flock, and their children dance around.
|
| 21:12 |
They sing to the tambourine and the lyre, and rejoice to the sound of the pipe.
|
| 21:13 |
They spend their days in prosperity, and in peace they go down to Sheol.
|
| 21:14 |
They say to God, 'Leave us alone! We do not desire to know your ways.
|
| 21:15 |
What is the Almighty, that we should serve him? And what profit do we get if we pray to him?'
|
| 21:16 |
Is not their prosperity indeed their own achievement? The plans of the wicked are repugnant to me.
|
| 21:17 |
"How often is the lamp of the wicked put out? How often does calamity come upon them? How often does God distribute pains in his anger?
|
| 21:18 |
How often are they like straw before the wind, and like chaff that the storm carries away?
|
| 21:19 |
You say, 'God stores up their iniquity for their children.' Let it be paid back to them, so that they may know it.
|
| 21:20 |
Let their own eyes see their destruction, and let them drink of the wrath of the Almighty.
|
| 21:21 |
For what do they care for their household after them, when the number of their months is cut off?
|
| 21:22 |
Will any teach God knowledge, seeing that he judges those that are on high?
|
| 21:23 |
One dies in full prosperity, being wholly at ease and secure,
|
| 21:24 |
his loins full of milk and the marrow of his bones moist.
|
| 21:25 |
Another dies in bitterness of soul, never having tasted of good.
|
| 21:26 |
They lie down alike in the dust, and the worms cover them.
|
| 21:27 |
"Oh, I know your thoughts, and your schemes to wrong me.
|
| 21:28 |
For you say, 'Where is the house of the prince? Where is the tent in which the wicked lived?'
|
| 21:29 |
Have you not asked those who travel the roads, and do you not accept their testimony,
|
| 21:30 |
that the wicked are spared in the day of calamity, and are rescued in the day of wrath?
|
| 21:31 |
Who declares their way to their face, and who repays them for what they have done?
|
| 21:32 |
When they are carried to the grave, a watch is kept over their tomb.
|
| 21:33 |
The clods of the valley are sweet to them; everyone will follow after, and those who went before are innumerable.
|
| 21:34 |
How then will you comfort me with empty nothings? There is nothing left of your answers but falsehood."
|
