Job persists in asserting his own innocence, and that hypocrites will be punished in the end.
1 Job also added, taking up his parable, and said:
2 As God liveth, who hath taken away my judgment, and the Almighty, who hath brought my soul to bitterness,
3 As long as breath remaineth in me, and the spirit of God in my nostrils,
4 My lips shall not speak iniquity, neither shall my tongue contrive lying.
5 God forbid that I should judge you to be just: till I die I will not depart from my innocence.
6 My justification, which I have begun to hold, I will not forsake: for my heart doth not reprehend me in all my life.
7 Let my enemy be as the ungodly, and my adversary as the wicked one.
8 For what is the hope of the hypocrite if through covetousness he take by violence, and God deliver not his soul?
9 Will God hear his cry, when distress shall come upon him?
10 Or can he delight himself in the Almighty, and call upon God at all times?
11 I will teach you by the hand of God, what the Almighty hath, and I will not conceal it.
12 Behold you all know it, and why do you speak vain things without cause?
13 This is the portion of a wicked man with God, and the inheritance of the violent, which they shall receive of the Almighty.
14 If his sons be multiplied, they shall be for the sword, and his grandsons shall not be filled with bread.
15 They that shall remain of him, shall be buried in death, and his widows shall not weep.
16 If he shall heap together silver as earth, and prepare raiment as clay,
17 He shall prepare indeed, but the just man shall be clothed with it: and the innocent shall divide the silver.
18 He hath built his house as a moth, and as a keeper he hath made a booth.
19 The rich man when he shall sleep shall take away nothing with him: he shall open his eyes and find nothing.
20 Poverty like water shall take hold on him, a tempest shall oppress him in the night.
21 A burning wind shall take him up, and carry him away, and as a whirlwind shall snatch him from his place.
22 And he shall cast upon him, and shall not spare: out of his hand he would willingly flee.
23 He shall clasp his hands upon him, and shall hiss at him, beholding his place.
|