Job’s Eighth Speech, Continued
24 “Why are not times kept by Shaddai,
and why do not those who know him see his days?
2 They[a] remove border stones;
they seize flocks, and they pasture them.
3 They drive away the donkey of orphans;
they take the widow’s ox as a pledge.
4 They thrust the poor off the road;
the needy of the earth hide themselves together.[b]
5 “Look, like wild donkeys in the desert
they[c] go out to their labor as searchers for the prey;
the wilderness is[d] their[e] food for the young.
6 They reap their[f] fodder in the field,
and they glean in the vineyard of the wicked.
7 They spend the night naked, without[g] clothing,
and they have no garment in the cold.
8 They are wet from the rainstorm of the mountains,[h]
and they cling to the rock without[i] refuge.
9 “They[j] snatch the orphan from the breast,
and they take a pledge against the needy.[k]
10 They[l] go about naked, without clothing,
and hungry, they carry the sheaves.[m]
11 Between their terraces they press out oil;
they tread the presses, but[n] they are thirsty.
12 From the city people groan,
and the throat[o] of the wounded cries for help;
yet[p] God does not regard it as unseemly.[q]
13 “Those are among the ones rebelling against the light;
they do not recognize his ways,
and they do not stay in his paths.
14 At dusk[r] the murderer rises;
he kills the needy and the poor,
and in the night he is like a[s] thief.
15 And the eye of the adulterer waits for dusk,
saying, ‘No eye will see me,’[t]
and he places a covering on his face.
16 He digs through houses in the darkness;
by day they shut themselves in—
they do not know the light
17 because morning likewise is to them deep darkness;
indeed, they know about the terrors of deep darkness.
18 “He himself[u] is swift on the water’s surface;
their portion is cursed in the land.
No one turns toward the path of their vineyards.[v]
19 Drought and heat snatch away the snow waters,
like Sheol snatches away those[w] who have sinned.
20 The womb forgets him.
The maggot feasts on him until he is no longer remembered,
and wickedness is broken like a[x] tree.
21 He feeds on the barren, who does not have a child,
and does no good to the widow.
22 Yet[y] he[z] carries off the tyrants by his strength;
if he rises up, then[aa] he[ab] cannot be certain of life.[ac]
23 He[ad] gives security to him, and he is[ae] supported,
but[af] his eyes are upon their ways.
24 They are exalted a little while, then[ag] they are gone.[ah]
And they are brought low; they are cut off like all others,
and like the heads of grain they wither away.
25 “And if it is not so, then who can prove me a liar
and reduce my word to nothing?”
Footnotes
- Job 24:2 Or “Some” (NASU, ESV) or “Men” (NIV, NET)
- Job 24:4 Or “altogether”
- Job 24:5 That is, the poor
- Job 24:5 Or “provides”
- Job 24:5 Hebrew “for their”
- Job 24:6 Hebrew “his”
- Job 24:7 Literally “from not”
- Job 24:8 Or “from the mountain rainstorm”
- Job 24:8 Literally “from not”
- Job 24:9 That is, those who oppress the poor
- Job 24:9 Or “And they take the child of the needy as a pledge”
- Job 24:10 That is, the poor
- Job 24:10 Or “and they carry the sheaves though hungry”
- Job 24:11 Hebrew “and”
- Job 24:12 Or “soul,” or “inner self”
- Job 24:12 Hebrew “and”
- Job 24:12 Literally “he puts offensiveness”
- Job 24:14 Literally “At the light”
- Job 24:14 Or “the”
- Job 24:15 Literally “‘An eye will not see me’”
- Job 24:18 Emphatic personal pronoun
- Job 24:18 Literally “He does not turn toward the path of the vineyard”
- Job 24:19 Or “they/them”
- Job 24:20 Or “the”
- Job 24:22 Hebrew “And”
- Job 24:22 The probable antecedent is God
- Job 24:22 Hebrew “and”
- Job 24:22 The antecedent of the singular here probably changes to the wicked person
- Job 24:22 Hebrew “the life”
- Job 24:23 The probable antecedent is God
- Job 24:23 Or “they are”
- Job 24:23 Hebrew “and”
- Job 24:24 Literally “and”
- Job 24:24 Literally “he is not”